Mino Raiola dead at 54 after suffering from illness, Erling Haaland transfer, Paul Pogba transfer
Influential football agent Carmine ‘Mino’ Raiola is fighting for his life in a Milan hospital amid reports that he’d died from an illness.
Reports from Italy on Thursday evening AEST stated that Raiola, who is one of the most well-known agents in world football, had died, before they were refuted by his confidants.
According to reports in Italy, Raiola was hospitalised in Milan in January and underwent delicate surgery for a condition that was not deemed to be life-threatening at the time.
READ MORE: Mercedes accused of hiding ugly Hamilton ‘truth’
READ MORE: Fake training session led to AFL’s greatest ambush
READ MORE: Real reason for Liverpool’s astonishing success
Raiola was born in 1967 in the southern Italian town of Nocera Inferiore and rose to become one of the most influential agents in the world game in the early 1990s.
After starting his journey at Sports Promotions, a sports agent company, Raiola started his own business in the mid-90s, with his first major piece of business the transfer of Czech great Pavel Nedved from Sparta Prague to Italian Serie A side, Lazio.
Raiola has brokered some of the world’s biggest transfers, including Paul Pogba’s $154 million move from Juventus to Manchester United in 2016, a world record at the time, and Romelu Lukaku’s $126 million move from Everton to Manchester United the following year.
The Italian is poised to have an extremely busy off-season with the futures of high-profile clients Pogba and Norwegian phenom Erling Haaland currently up in the air.
Other players who are managed by Raiola include Mario Balotelli, Matthijs De Light, Gianluigi Donnarumma, Stefan De Vrij, Ryan Gravenberch, Marco Verratti and Blaise Matuidi.
MORE TO COME
