Offers increased at the last second, bonus payments, clauses – intensive negotiations continued until the end of the transfer window on Friday night. Sometimes the transfer fees for players are communicated in the case of successful deals, sometimes the parties involved remain silent. With RB Leipzig managing director Max Eberl and long-time top scout Sven Mislintat, two prominent representatives of the industry have recently campaigned for a more open handling of the numbers. Mislintat told the German Press Agency that he had absolutely nothing against publishing all payments, not just transfer fees, but also all salaries, commissions and shares. Then you can evaluate the sporting performance on the pitch and in management based on the financial possibilities, says Mislintat.
His openness may also be due to his new job. After his time at VfB Stuttgart, Mislintat is now technical director of Ajax Amsterdam. The Dutch record champion is a listed company and is therefore subject to certain transparency criteria anyway. However, most professional teams in Europe are not listed on the stock exchange, but set up as GmbH & Co. KGaA, for example.
Henning Zülch, economist from the HHL Leipzig Graduate School of Management, says: “All companies are accountable within the framework of their different legal forms. But we have the problem that the disclosure of financial data is always linked to the individual legal form of the club. We have an eV, we have lower accountability than if we have a public company. So we don’t have a legal basis that obliges the clubs to give transfer information to the market. They don’t exist, so you don’t do it either.”
Personal rights have priority
From his point of view, sports law expert Martin Stopper also has concerns about the recent demand for full transparency, for example in player contracts. “Because you can’t say in a way that a protection of secrets, business secrets, data protection, personal rights all fall behind. There are of course other protective rights in connection with the transparency of stock corporations, annual reports, GmbHs and so on Overall consideration to determine: ‘Who benefits from what?'”
The mere demand for transparency may sound charming at first, especially in view of the excessive growth in football, the horrendous consultant fees and player salaries in the tens of millions. But what full transparency would actually achieve or change remains unclear.
Max Eberl, for example, spoke to the Süddeutsche Zeitung in favor of more transparency because, in his opinion, media reports – for example from transfer journalists – would circulate incorrect figures. However, erroneous media reports alone cannot undermine data protection rights.
Experienced managers know the salaries anyway
Even among the experts, opinions differ as to what would be achieved with a total disclosure of transfer fees and player salaries. Economist Henning Zülch believes that the player advisors and their bargaining power should be curtailed. “The goal is a realistic market valuation of the player based on reasonable expectations that you have in order to generate a market value that is more in line with the player’s capabilities. That must be the goal. Now we have the problem that we often do not have any reliable data on the market. As a point of reference, Transfermarkt.de is always used as the basis based on swarm intelligence. That is how the market values come about there. On the other hand, due to the many rumors that are in the market and that are being spread, to disadvantage or favor one party or the other.” Total transparency would eliminate this influence of rumor and hearsay.
Meanwhile, lawyer Martin Stopper sees no need for it either, because the people involved already have enough background information. “Especially those who have been in the business for many years can roughly imagine what salaries are paid – at least in Europe. Let’s leave out the new player Saudi Arabia, you have a feeling for what each player is worth “And if you then know exactly what the transfer fee is in a transfer that you have nothing to do with yourself, I don’t know what that’s supposed to help you. And above all, from a legal point of view, it is important to what extent that is should be a justifiable tool that makes football better.”
The first attempt by Sven Mislintat and Max Eberl may have caused a stir in the football industry. But nothing more.