Chelsea have paid the highest amount of fees to agents and intermediaries compared to other Premier League clubs for the 2023-24 season.
Mauricio Pochettino’s side spent £75.1 million ($93.2 million) on fees paid to agents and intermediaries – in figures published by the English Football Association (FA) — between February 1, 2023 and February 1, 2024.
Chelsea signed 13 new players in total over the summer and winter transfer windows, with Moises Caicedo, Romeo Lavia, Cole Palmer, Nicolas Jackson, Christopher Nkunku and Axel Disasi among the highest-profile arrivals.
Manchester City were second on the list, with over £60.6 million paid in agent/intermediary fees, with Mateo Kovacic, Jeremy Doku, Matheus Nunes and Josko Gvardiol a selection of players signed by the Premier champions League.
There is a significant drop towards the third highest paid club; Manchester United paid over £34m in agent/intermediary fees, with Liverpool’s totaling £31.5m and Arsenal completing the top five with over £24.7m.
The total amount spent by Premier League clubs on agent fees was more than £409.5 million, up from £318.2 million in the 2022-23 campaign. The figures have increased from season to season, with the 2016-17 campaign totaling £174.2 million across the league.
Championship spending on agent/intermediary fees stood at just over £61.34 million, with Leeds United topping the division on £13.2 million.
The figures are the total payments made per club to football agents and intermediaries registered with the FA during the period from February 1, 2023 to February 1, 2024, a period encompassing the two most recent transfer windows.
For the 2022-23 campaign, Manchester City were the highest paid club in terms of finders/agents’ fees with an outlay of £51.5 million.
In December 2023, FIFA revealed that football clubs spent a record $881.1 million (£701 million) on agent fees in the 2023 calendar year.
This is a 42.5% increase from 2022, where teams spent $623.2m (£492m) on agents and more than the previous record of $654.7m dollars (£516.9 million), established in 2019.
FIFA’s report on football agents in international transfers also revealed that English clubs paid the largest amount in agent fees, totaling more than $280m (£221.1m).
In November 2023, football agents in England won a judgment against the introduction of the new FIFA Football Agent Regulations. An FA tribunal found the regulations would breach UK competition law following an appeal by four main agencies.
The FA had initially delayed the introduction of the regulations – which included capping an agent’s commission at three per cent on all player salaries above £161,000 and limiting payments to agents for brokerage transfers to ten percent of the costs – following an appeal.
The ruling said the introduction of a fee cap and pro-rata payment rules would breach the Competition Act 1998.
The new regulations were introduced by FIFA to raise “professional and ethical standards” and were initially due to come into force in England on October 1. They include requiring agents to pass an exam if they want to continue trading, as well as changing rules regarding representing multiple clients in a transaction and representing minors, as well as capping agent fees.
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(Darren Walsh/Chelsea FC via Getty Images)