The Jorge Mendes highway that connects Portugal to Wolverhampton – Sports
nicknamed “one of the best players in the world” by Pep Guardiola, young Matheus Nunes was one of the most desirable assets in this transfer market. The Portuguese team, the decisive role in Sporting CP by Rúben Amorim, including in the conquest of the first year, in 2020/2021, and the praise of one of the most acclaimed coaches of the century of the century and wrote the preface to the so-called green.
from the news, it seemed in Alvalade despite operating a miracle with medium. Guardiola’s praise is not manifested in a transfer of his own to Manchester City, the player rturned down a proposal from West Ham and played in the lions’ first two official games this season, adding an assist and a goal – one worthy of making stop the Scrolling in any food of a social network.
However, with the same speed with which Nunes threw the ball to the bottom of the Rio Ave goal, the news emerged that no sportsman wanted to read: Matheus Nunes is a reinforcement for Wolverhampton.
The fair will become official on Wednesday, with the club publishing images of the player in a new jersey on social media Hours later, on Thursday, Sporting also communicated to the CMVM the change from the Portuguese international to the trained emblem by Bruno Lage in exchange for 45 million euros, to which can be added another five million dependents of collective goals of Wolverhampton and individuals of the footballer. The lions were still entitled to 10% of a capital gain from a future transfer.
Unsurprisingly, the deal, a record in the club’s history, exceeding the 40 million euros paid by Fábio Silva to FC Porto, was triggered by agent Jorge Mendes, as had been the young dragon, and in Sporting’s statement to CMVM, it is explained that the charges for intermediation services relating to the transfer amount to 4,454.67 euros, plus a maximum variable amount of up to 494,963 euros.
In the summer, the English club was acquired by 45 million eurosun Group, one of the conglomerates of euros in the economy16, in an operation that had Gestifute16 as its economy, also becoming a business that started the previous year by Foyo Culture. and Entertainment Limited, a company with legal headquarters in Hong Kong and controlled by Fosun, acquired a share in Start SGPS, holding in which Jorge Mendes brings together all the companies operating in the sports sector, in an action that was announced as a partnership for the development of Chinese football. Since then, the Portuguese agent has been the main protagonist of Wolves.
As early as 2016, Mendes started building a ‘direct’ motorway from Portugal to Wolverhampton for Scott Murray, a journalist for The Guardian, who used The Fiver newsletter last Thursday – with the departures of Hélder Costa (SL Benfica, 15 ME), Ivan Cavaleiro (AS Monaco, 8 ME), Sílvio (zero cost, Atlético de Madrid) and João Teixeira (SL Benfica B, value unknown) for England; names to which we can also add that of Ola John, a former player for the Reds, at the time managed by Doyen.
After a first season without any noteworthy sporting results, Wolves finished the Championship in 15th place and participated in the national cups, Mendes took Portuguese coach Nuno Espírito Santo to Moullinex, after having coached FC Porto during one year. Along with the coach, followed the captain of the dragons Rúben Neves (17.9 ME), Roderick Miranda (3 ME, Rio Ave), Diogo Jota (loan, Atlético de Madrid), Willy Boly (loan, FC Porto) and Rúben Vinagre (AS Monaco, value unknown). In another team – in addition to the transfers of Pedro Gonçalves, Tomás Rey, also known as Potemão, Tomás Rey, who were part of the formation – the club managed to win the English second division.
In 2018/19, Wolves were in the Premier League. To compete in what is considered the best league in the world, the ‘Mendes highway’ took to England Rui Patrício (7 ME, Sporting CP), João Moutinho (5.6 ME, AS Monaco), Raúl Jiménez (loan, Benfica) and also effectively bought the passes of Jo (14 ME) and Boly (12 ME), who had been in the previous season for neither club. Once again, it will hinder a better Espírito Santo for a season: Nuno and his students and their students will be realized in an imaginary way the club as countries39 of the continental tests after a season.
In a more demanding competitive context, Wolves tidied up the house. In 2019/20, Ivan Cavaleiro and Hélder Costa, two of the first passers-by on the ‘via Mendes’, left, the first for Fulham and Leeds, a luck that had already happened to Roderick Miranda’s fate in the previous season, with a change for the Olympiacos Greeks. However, new names arrived from Portugal and with a passport: Daniel Podence (19.6 ME, Olympiacos), Pedro Neto (17.9 ME, Lazio), Bruno Jordão (8.9 ME, Lazio) and Renat Dadashov (500 thousand euros, Estoril). Added to this is the definitive purchase of Jiménez from Benfica for 38 million euros.
Wolverhampton’s connection to Portugal was good and it was recommended. The Wolves again finished the Premier League in 7th place and in their Europa League debut they ended up in the quarter-finals. However, with bad luck: the FA Cup final, the FA Cup, which is worth a place in the Payqualification s for the second UEFA club competition, won by Arsenal, eighth offer, which made that place for Manchester City, unlike what had been offered the year before when the model was used and argued for Manchester City’s countries , already qualified for European countries, which led to the ‘ticket’ being offered to wolves.
The 2020/21 season would be an interregnum in the happiness of Lobos fans, who began at the time to lose Diogo Jota to Liverpool (44.7 ME). In a year in which Jorge Mendes took to Moullinex Fábio Silva, Nélson Semedo (32 ME, FC Barcelona), Marçal (2 ME, Lyon), Toti (1 ME, Estoril), Vitinha (loan, FC Porto) and Rayan Aït- Nouri (20 ME, Angers) the club performed below expectations in the league, finishing the championship in 13th position.
This was also the season that marked the end of the connection between the Espírito Santo team, with the Portuguese coach moving to London, to change Tottenham, in an experience that went from eight to eighty: in August he was elected of the month and at the end of of October was fired. For NES, Bruno Lage, former national coach for Benfica. José Sá (8 ME, Olympiacos), Francisco Trincão (loan in the amount of 6 ME, FC Barcelona) and Chiquinho (3.5 ME, Estoril) joined the squad via ‘via Mendes’.
With Wolves Blade. But a disastrous final stretch, with just two wins in 10 games, plus two draws and six defeats, meant that the most Portuguese team in England ended up in the middle of the table in 10th place.
For this one, the coach remains in charge of the club that seems to have the guarantee of one of the biggest objectives of the market to guarantee the permanence of Rúben Neves. In addition to retaining the midfielder, two Portuguese internationals arrived, Matheus Nunes and Gonçalo Guedes (32.6 ME, Valencia).
In total, 30 and two Portuguese coaches or with connections/past through clubs land in Wolverhampton, mainly from what is known as the ‘Mendes series car’, pointed out as one of the clubs with which the Portuguese agent has great power and can facilitate the transfer to the passports of the players who maintain the management, the main routes of football.
This ‘carousel’ includes clubs such as SL Benfica, FC Porto, Valencia, AS Monaco, Rio Ave or Atlético de Madrid.
FIFA has agents in its sights and this could bring more news for Jorge Mendes… and for Wolves
The level of influence Mendes has over Jorge’s interests and the fact that he has economic associates with the club, often as an economic scheme based on the higher payment of intermediation values to the agent, through Gestifute, paid by Fosun, coming from the club, who, as he also owns shares in Gestifute, also has access to part of this value, is not to FIFA’s liking.
At the end of 2021, the body that oversees football at world level presented a draft With rules that will be implemented from November to regulate the activity of football agents, a document that brings an absolute reform to the maneuver of these actors.
MaisFutebol, which had access to the document, I share to some changes that occur – and that do not please. For example, intermediation allows it to be accessible to anyone, and to carry out player passes transactions a license is required, a definition that takes lawyers and family members ‘out of the game’.
The most controversial measure, however, seems to be tailored to Jorge Mendes, with the creation of a chamber through which the money for all transfers will have to pass, the FIFA Clearing House. From the end of the year, commission must be paid by the client, athlete or club, directly to the football agent, with payment to be made through the organization.
The commissions also have maximum ceilings. According to the sports newspaper, the player cannot pay his representative more than three percent of the value of his contract; the buyer cannot pay his representative more than three percent of the value of the contract made with the player; the seller cannot pay its representative more than ten percent of the transfer fee and in the case of zero-cost transfers, the selling club cannot pay its representative more than ten percent of the player’s last contract before leaving the club .
But there is more. According to information published by The TimesFIFA has also planned the agent or a directive which states the following: “any person or entity that has an interest, direct or indirect, may not have an economic interest in the activity (…) , nor may it exercise any function in a company that manages the interests of the players”.
The objective is to make the business more transparent, but directly related, for example, Jorge Mendes. The case of Wolves is one of the most explicit because of the direct link between the club and Fosun and the Chinese conglomerate with Gestifute.
Still a few months away from FIFA’s official reform, the question to be asked is: how can the super-agent maintain this road that connects Portugal and England? Is this the end of the Jorge Mendes empire as the connoisseur?
In 2016, journalist Pippo Russo, in the book “A Orgia do Poder”, in which the rise of the Portuguese agent in the world of football is portrayed, in an unprecedented exhibition to date on the way Mendes moved between clubs and businesses, tried to answer the question “are we close to the end of the Mendes System?”
“I am of the opinion that, sooner or later, the Mendesian empire will fall, because it is the law of nature. However, I don’t know if a fall is close, nor do I believe it is a fall in the player transfer market, today. opening of the Chinese front and Asian relations in general project Jorge Mendes to a new dimension, broader than that of super agent of players. , within this new dimension, the market of players is only a part. is that work”.
Six years later, it is confirmed that Jorge Mendes and his empire remain intact. Even after several documents released by Football Leaks that denounce various actions of the ‘Mendes System’. Will this be the super-agent’s last summer?