Mino Raiola – The Super-Agent Who Engineered the World’s Biggest Football Deals

The late Italian Mino Raiola was not just an ordinary agent for football players in Europe but was a huge economic institution competing with the top clubs of the old continent.

He was known to have been shrewd in securing the best offers for his players, while at the same time getting his highest rewards through these deals.

Raiola's client list, 54, includes prominent names in the world of football like Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Paul Pogba, Erling Haaland, Matthijs de Ligt, and others.

Raiola was suffering from lung health problems, and in January 2022 he was admitted to San Raffaele Hospital in Milan, Italy; by this April, the doctor supervising his condition reported that Raiola was fighting for his life.

However, Raiola's family, the most prominent architects of player transfer deals in the world, announced on Saturday, April 30, 2022, his death after suffering from illness at the age of 54, according to what was published by Raiola's official page on Twitter.

 

His Childhood

Kamini Raiola, better known as Mino Raiola, was born on November 4, 1967, in the southern Italian city of Nocera Inferiore, Campania, and moved only a year later to the Dutch city of Haarlem with his family.

His uncle and father opened an Italian restaurant called the “Napoli Restaurant,” and Raiola worked in it since his childhood, and he was called a pizza maker.

Raiola passed high school in 1965, then joined the Faculty of Law and studied there for two years, then studied business administration.

He was also distinguished by his proficiency in seven languages: Italian, English, German, Spanish, French, Portuguese and Dutch.

Mino Raiola is not considered an outsider in the world of football, as he was a player in the youth team of Dutch club Haarlem.

But he stopped at the age of 18, and two years later took over the position of Haarlem youth team president, and sporting director, later, according to the Financial Times.

It was Arthur Neumann's 1991 transfer from Haarlem to Twente Enschede for around €341,000, the most expensive sale in Haarlem's history, and one that drew Raiola's attention to a career as an agent.

 

Exceptional Career

Mino Raiola started his work as a translator and player agent for the Dutch company “Sports Promotions” for the athletes' agency and contributed to a group of transfers for several unknown players, but things turned over time and Raiola became one of the most prominent agents of football players in Europe.

During his stay there, he contributed to the transfer of a group of Dutch players to Italy, most notably Frank Rijkaard in 1988 from Sporting Lisbon to Milan, followed by Dutch legend Dennis Bergkamp from Ajax Amsterdam to Inter Milan in 1993.

At that time, Raiola was secretly photographing all the documents related to the transfer deals of players so that he would know how to implement the deals himself in the future, and after his successes within the Dutch company, the Italian scout decided to start working on his own.

The beginning of Raiola's career was exceptional, especially after the European Nations Cup 1996, when he transferred Czech star Pavel Nedved from Sparta Prague to Lazio for nearly five million euros, and also contributed to Nedved's transfer to Juventus in 2001. Later, Nedved won the Golden Ball from France Football magazine in 2003.

After these successes, Mino Raiola’s greed increased, and he played the role of godfather in several prominent deals in the world of football, including the transfer of the Brazilian Robinho from Manchester City to Milan, and the Swedish Zlatan Ibrahimovic among the best clubs of the old continent from the poles of Milan to Juventus, then Barcelona, Paris Saint-Germain and Manchester United, and Italian Mario Balotelli from Inter Milan to Manchester City.

The list of transfers sponsored by Raiola also includes the Belgian Romelu Lukaku, from Everton to Manchester United, the Dutch Matthijs de Ligt from Ajax Amsterdam to Juventus, and the Norwegian Erling Haaland, the star of Borussia Dortmund, who is wanted by a group of the best clubs in Europe.

Raiola is not just a broker, he owns and runs a company specialized in this field, called “Sport Business Strategy,” based in the Principality of Monaco, which manages the business of 77 clients, between players and managers, like Marco Verratti, Lorenzo Insigne, and Gianluigi Donnarumma, as well as juniors like Moise Kean, Justin Kluivert and Xavi Simons, his players are worth around £799 million according to Transfermarkt.

According to Goal website, Raiola had compared Pogba to Salvador Dali's painting and claimed Ibrahimovic's move to Paris Saint-Germain had given visitors to the French capital something they could see other than the Mona Lisa.

Raiola is also officially the most profitable agent in football according to data obtained from OLBG. He received huge commissions in exchange for facilitating the conclusion of transfer deals for football players between European clubs, as the value of his commission from each deal he concludes is approximately one million euros.

However, the Football Lakes website revealed in August 2016 that Raiola received the largest commission in history, which was estimated at 49 million euros for the transfer of Paul Pogba from Juventus to Manchester United, a deal that cost the Red Devils 105 million euros as the most expensive deal in the world during that time.

This greed according to some, others see it as cunning, savvy, and business management, which made Raiola a great millionaire, with his fortune until 2022, according to CA Knowledge, $90 million.

 

Super-Agent

Raiola is an agent loved by players but also hated by clubs for his highly complex negotiating tactics.

However, Raiola did not care about the harsh criticism from fans and club management, and told the BBC at the beginning of 2021: “I only care what my agents want, if I am greedy and bad, why are my agents happy with me? Why don't they leave?”

He continued, “I would be lying if I said that the criticism does not bother me, but if I am Ibrahimovic's agent, no one can judge me except for himself.”

He concluded: “My job is to conclude the best deal for the player, no more, no less, and to obtain services from the club that people may not even know about.”

However, a number of European clubs, players, and athletes mourned Raiola as soon as the news of his death was confirmed, and Paris Saint-Germain was one of the first major clubs to offer condolences to the Raiola family.

Real Madrid, Inter Milan, and AC Milan also offered their condolences to the Raiola family, via tweets on their Twitter accounts.

On his part, Erling Haaland, published a picture of him with his late agent through his account on Instagram, commenting on it with the phrase “the best.”

Henrikh Mkhitaryan, star of AS Roma, shared his condolences, saying: “I will miss you and my agent, my best friend, my family. You will be with us forever.”

Juventus president Andrea Agnelli noted Raiola's earnest negotiating style, writing: “Don't take the piss in paradise, they know the truth... tvb Mino.”

In turn, Juventus player on loan from Everton this season, Moise Kean, posted a video on his Instagram with Raiola smiling and laughing together.

 

Controversial Man

Raiola sparked controversy in more than one scene, including being investigated twice by the Italian authorities in 2008 for irregularities related to transfers he was responsible for at that time.

Those investigations were linked to a series of investigations conducted by the Italian authorities into the existence of corruption within the Italian football corridors.

In May 2019, the Italian Football Association banned Raiola from continuing his work as a player's agent for three months for undisclosed reasons.

The International Federation extended the period of suspension to prevent Raiola from continuing his work around the world, not only in Italy after the FIFA Disciplinary Committee received communications from the Italian Federation.

On January 22, 2020, Raiola, along with several prominent football agents, threatened FIFA with legal sanctions after the latter discussed a law regulating the maximum payments that players' business agents can receive in the deals they supervise.

Raiola then resorted to the judiciary and appealed the ban decision to the Federal Court of Appeal in Italy.

On June 13, 2019, he was able to overturn the ban and published a picture of the decision the next day.

If Raiola is accused of greed, he, on the other hand, loves a life of luxury and prosperity, as he lives between the Principality of Monaco and the American city of Miami.

Mino Raiola also not only stirred controversy in the world of football but decided to spend his life in a controversial place, after buying a luxury villa in 2016, for 8 million euros, which was previously owned by the famous mafia leader Al Capone.