A football agent has been arrested after a Premier League player reported being threatened with a firearm following an altercation on a busy north London street.<\/p>\n
The Telegraph reports the agent, who cannot be named for legal reasons, has worked with players operating at international level and that the player in question is an established Premier League regular. The incident was reported to police late on a Saturday evening in early September.<\/p>\n
“Police were called at 23.14hrs on Saturday, 6 September, to reports a man in his 20s had been threatened with a firearm on Cockfosters Parade, Barnet,” a Metropolitan Police statement confirmed.<\/p>\n
The force said their enquiries identified a second alleged victim. “Officers spoke to the victim and during the course of their investigation it was also reported another man in his 20s had also allegedly been blackmailed and threatened by the same individual. No injuries were reported in either incident.<\/p>\n
“A 31-year-old man was arrested on Monday, 8 September on suspicion of possession of firearms with intent, blackmail and driving without a licence. He has been bailed while enquiries continue.”<\/p>\n
A source speaking to The Sun described the impact on the player and the wider business side of football. “This was a terrifying incident and one which has sent shockwaves through the business side of football. The player was understandably shaken up\u2014to have threats made against you with a gun is shocking.<\/p>\n
“He reported it right away. It was the right thing to do for his safety. He has been supported by his friends and club and they all hope it will not impact his performances. But there will be serious questions about why this happened, which the police are now trying to answer.” <\/p>\n
The story highlights the off-field role agents play in the modern game. A football agent traditionally takes care of all off-field matters, namely contract negotiations, sponsorships and even the managing of social media accounts on the likes of Instagram, X and TikTok. They make the majority of their money by earning commission from transfers, often bringing in the help of intermediaries to help facilitate and flush out potential deals.<\/p>\n
Agents can work individually or as part of a wider agency. Jorge Mendes and Rafaela Pimenta are named in discussions about prominent agents; the draft notes Pimenta took on the client base of Mino Raiola after his passing in April 2022, and that Cristiano Ronaldo and Erling Haaland are among the high-profile players associated with leading agents.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
An agent has been arrested after an alleged firearm threat against a Premier League player. More info.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4255,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[172],"tags":[983,1215],"class_list":["post-4256","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-epl","tag-agents","tag-controversy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4256","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4256"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4256\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4255"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4256"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4256"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4256"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}