What responsibility do agents/players have when signing for a club?

A tadge Naive of me I know, but after the season just gone, with any number of football clubs in dire circumstances for one reason or another, and us possibly losing out to sign a player to a side with average attendances of 1500 (may not be for financial reasons I know that we lost out), I was wondering, when an agent contacts a player to advise that he has lined up a terrific deal for him at say X club, what responsibility to the player does the agent have that the club are going to be able to fulfill the deal all things being equal and should they like the EFL be showing their client a degree of due diligence when negotiating the deals, or as I anticipate it being a case of grab the money and run until the **** hits the fan and they can move onto the next club pocketing another wedge on the way.

Also with regards to the players ,football is a small enough environment that the rumours about financing of clubs will be doing the circuits prior to signing for a team, as well as being able to see what attendances they are achieving, so before signing a lucrative deal should they be asking themselves is this going to be fulfilled to the end of the contract, simple arithmetic will give them a rough idea.

Therefore if it is blatantly obvious that the deals agents and players are signing are too generous for the clubs concerned then why should the PFA step in to cover the wages when they are not paid as these players are contributing to their club's demise.

My understanding is that agents are meant to follow a code of practice when representing their client. However, they are meant to act in an advisory role and the extent of any due-diligence they are required to perform, would depend upon the specific agreement that they have with a particular player. Some will want more assurances than others.

The football creditors rule certainly helps agents, as any club that goes into administration is legally required to pay football creditors in full. I would suggest that this premise, significantly reduces the amount of "due diligence" that is undertaken. I don't necessarily think that it should though!

Doidge going from FGR to Bolton would make a good case study on this point.

Saw an interesting tweet from Nicky Adams (Bury) since deleted by the looks of it. We all know about the problems there. He said that he signed a new contract and assumed he was staying but that the contract was rejected by the League? Hadn't heard of this before?

Anyway, the contract was therefore void and he's just joined Northampton Town today. They've also signed 35 year old Alan McCormack from Luton today on a 1 year deal today. They've made 7 signings this summer. Have they paid for their stand yet?

I'm guessing the OP is referring to the situation at Bury. While I have a certain amount of sympathy for the players and other staff who have not been paid it does highlight yet again the difference between football clubs and businesses in pretty much any other industry.

Last summer it was already clear that Bury were in something of a financial mess yet they were able to sign a number of high-quality players, presumably by offering higher wages than would be able to attract elsewhere. In any other job you would do some due diligence and wonder whether the employer will be able to honour the contract. In football the players can just think that league clubs never go bust so someone will always bail them out and make sure they get paid or in the worst-case scenario the PFA will cover their wages.

And then in any other job the moment that you don't get paid on time you start planning to leave and find new employment. Yet in football the Bury players have continued to express their loyalty to the club and their desire to keep playing for them even when they haven't been paid for several months. All that I can just about understand but the decision of Nicky Adams to sign a new contract with the club in March seems bonkers; admittedly at that point I think they were still paying the wages on time but was he really that unaware what a mess the club is in.

Anyway if you want to know more about what agents do, this podcast makes for interesting listening, though it is produced by in collaboration with an agency so only gives one side of the picture.
https://twitter.com/TransfersPod

I hope that Christy Pyms agent has acted with the best of intentions by pointing him towards Peterborough. Barring injury, Pym wont start as first choice which I'm sure he's aware of. Getting himself a three year contract is somewhat of a coup though, providing there are no strings attached like a certain amount of games having to be played.

I see that Nicky Adams has jumped out of the fire of Bury into the frying pan of Northampton - a club that lost two million pounds the season before last, has falling attendances and yet is offering sufficiently attractive wages to have persuaded eight players to sign already this close season.

They do have average attendances of 5100 last season a thousand more than Bury, but admittedly their track record isn't brilliant. From BBC today regarding the local council which is up **** creek 'police are currently investigating a £10.25m loan made by the council to Northampton Town Football Club to redevelop its stadium in 2013,' they also survived winding up in 2015, comments from their #Supporters Advisory Panel ' held in February confirmed that the current board of Directors are able to fund the club for as long as it wants

"A question was asked about the ongoing ownership of the club.

The club confirmed they are always open to investors or partners who have the desire, willingness and finance to take the club forward but until then it is business as usual, and this won’t have any detrimental impact on any budgets for next season. There are no financial issues and the current Board of Directors are able to fund the club for as long as they want or as long as is required. The Supporters Trust’s ownership plans were then questioned, and some brief discussion was had.

The club confirmed they had some initial discussion with the Supporters Trust about 5 months ago but not much detail had been given since and they are interested to see what plan the Trust announce at their meeting on March 10th. A key point of that presentation has to be the finance and where that is coming from as if the Trust did want to purchase the club then that would require significant funding itself, then of course the club requires ongoing funding.

Off the field the club is strong, stable and healthy. Trust ownership usually evolves from a crisis situation and luckily that is not the case here. The Trust have indicated they may be looking to put together a hybrid model with private investors and individuals and if that was the case, it was agreed, that it was important for transparency for the identity of those investors to be released at the meeting on March 10th if not before."

So possibly a better move for him than Bury

grecian-near-hell said:

" There are no financial issues and the current Board of Directors are able to fund the club for as long as they want or as long as is required"

Click to expand...

Everything is rosy then. Great(!) Looks like the next basket-case club in the making.

According to a post I saw on twitter they owe creditors £5.5 million and seem to be signing experienced players who will no doubt be on hefty wages left, right and centre.

What could possibly go wrong?

Precisely, it's not like they haven't been there before. Perhaps Pagrotty ought to start a collection for them for when it happens, but then they haven't stolen NTFC manager have they