Agents will be forced to reveal bank accounts

Tuesday October 3, 2006

Football agents' bank statements will be requisitioned by anti-corruption investigators as the Premier League bungs inquiry intensifies.

Lord Stevens, the former Metropolitan Police commissioner who is conducting the investigation, yesterday stated that 39 of the 362 transfers which took place between January 2004 and January this year have raised suspicions. "If we find irregularities we will pass that to the Football Association, if we find criminal acts we will pass that to the police," he said.

Stevens' 20-strong Quest team, which has been checking through the deals for six months, was yesterday granted a further 61 days in order to produce a final report on the probity of the English Premiership's transfer activities.

The FA, whose chief executive Brian Barwick and head of compliance Jonathan Hall attended Stevens' briefing to Premiership and recent Premiership chairman yesterday, has the power to demand access to individuals' bank accounts. That looks to be increasingly necessary after Stevens' requests to agents for "voluntary assistance" fell broadly on deaf ears.

On July 10 this year letters and questionnaires were sent to 150 agents requesting details of their activities. According to Stevens, only 65 "responded fully", prompting him to request the assistance of the agents' guild.

"The Football Agents' Association's board passed a resolution on September 27 urging members to open their bank accounts in this country and abroad to Quest in respect of our specific requests," Stevens said. "There will continue to be a forensic investigation of agents' bank accounts, voluntarily or through the FA. There will be a forensic investigation of entities both onshore and offshore and individuals identified to the inquiry as having received payments out of the transfer monies. There is a large amount of work to be done in relation to that yet."

Any further refusal from agents will prompt a similar request from the FA, which has the power to suspend agents' licences until co-operation is received. "If we are asked to try to obtain information from agents under powers of inquiry we will of course do so," said the FA in a statement yesterday.

However among the number who did provide full responses were informants who have given the Quest team valuable leads. "Meetings have been held with individuals who specifically requested a meeting with Quest, and there have been a number of those," said Stevens.

"Important information has been submitted to this inquiry, some by individuals and a lot by anonymous information. This has been considered in conjunction with detailed examination of forensic accounting analysis of each and every transfer."

If it appears a protracted process, that is because it is one. "This is not an easy inquest," admitted Stevens, "but it is essential and we will do everything we can."

Yesterday's briefing did not name the eight clubs under more severe scrutiny and the clubs themselves have not even been informed. "If Lord Stevens was to name those eight clubs today there would be an unprecedented frenzy and that is what the team were keen to avoid," said the Premier League's chief executive Richard Scudamore.

Four of the 29 clubs who attended yesterday's Premiership chairmen's meeting for Stevens's address were ruled out of the investigations. Sheffield United, Watford and Reading, being newly promoted to the elite league, were not Premiership participants during the inquiry period; Leeds United conducted no transfer business during their involvement in the league at that time.

Apparently, there have been deliberate obstructions from individuals unwilling to submit to full disclosure and there was a strong hint from Stevens that the two extra months' inquiry period provided by the Premier League is insufficient.

"The two months is going to require us to work flat-out in relation to that but fortunately we have a very experienced team and we will put out what we can in two months' time. I think that's fair enough," he said.

It is understandable, however, that the Premier League should press Quest, whose investigations - though highly reputable - often run late, into a swift response. The inquiry has already cost English top-flight clubs £600,000. "It's important that the next phase only takes two months, so that the clubs for whom nothing untoward has been identified by Lord Stevens's team are left out," Scudamore added. "I think that's absolutely right. It was a sensible time frame discussed with Lord Stevens about what could realistically be achieved in that timeframe.

"We started this seven months ago and all we knew was that we had 362 transfers to look at."

In that time there has been an exposé of alleged Premiership corruption in the BBC's Panorama documentary, Undercover: Football's Dirty Secrets, but with a suggestion of disappointment, Stevens indicated that he had received no supplementary assistance from the broadcaster. "I saw the programme, obviously. But we are looking for full disclosure of what is on the cutting-room floor and we haven't got that yet."

Key points of the investigation

·39 transfers involving eight unnamed teams require further investigation.

·Clubs under investigation have not been informed.

·Most of the transfers still under scrutiny are domestic transactions.

·Premier League approve extension of inquiry by two months.

·362 transfers examined from the period January 2004 to January 2006.

·65 of the 150 agents contacted for information have replied.

·Agents may be forced to open up bank accounts for inspection.

·Evidence of criminal activity will be passed to the police.

·Lord Stevens reports "unanimous support" from clubs for inquiry.

·Leeds, Reading, Sheffield United and Watford are no longer part of inquiry as they conducted no Premier League transfers during the period of investigation.

Guardian.co.uk