The frosty relationship between Alex Ferguson and Mino Raiola appears to be at the centre of Paul Pogba’s departure from Manchester United.
“There are one or two football agents I do not like and Mino Raiola is one of them,” Ferguson wrote in his book Leading, released last year.
“I distrusted him from the moment I met him…He [Raiola] and I were like oil and water.”
The French midfielder had found first-team chances limited at Old Trafford, and chose to join Juventus on a free transfer in the summer of 2012.
When the time came for Pogba’s representatives to negotiate a new contract with United, it appears the relationship had reached the point where neither party, Ferguson or Raiola, could work together.
However, Ferguson is not as influential as he once was at Old Trafford, and the club have already dealt with Raiola twice this summer when signing Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Henrikh Mkhitaryan.
It has now been reported that, should Pogba’s transfer, worth £100m, to United go through, Raiola will receive £30m from the deal.
Needless to say, Ferguson wouldn’t have been prepared to sanction such a deal when he was in charge.
