Chapter 24 The Man Who Failed at the Last Moment
As Su Dong said to Ronnie before, the agent is important but also unimportant.
For example, Quaresma was able to enter the roster in the first round of the new season and even come on as a substitute. His own potential and strength are certainly important, but the efforts behind his agent should not be underestimated.
First of all, there is opportunity. Nicolaj, who was brought in with a lot of money, did not perform well in the summer warm-up match. Sporting Lisbon wanted to bring in Jardel to make up for the loss, and for this purpose, they sent away three main players including winger Mponza. This led to a personnel vacuum in the attacking lineup on the front wing.
So, in this situation, two young talents, Quaresma and Marcelino, both entered the first team.
Who's up?
There must be some power struggle behind this.
The role of the agent is reflected at this time, especially a big-name agent like Vega.
After that, Quaresma became famous in one battle, which was a win-win situation for the player, the agent and the team.
In the past, Su Dong didn’t understand these things, but after being in contact with Ronnie and Jose Semedo for a long time, he naturally understood the rules and operations within the big teams. He even heard that some players are obviously very capable, but they don’t get the opportunity to perform for various reasons.
The value of an agent lies in whether he can allow players to play football with peace of mind.
Ronnie is still thinking about renewing his contract and getting a pay raise, which is actually a very normal demand for interests.
If he thinks he deserves a new contract, he can negotiate with his agent. Whether the club will give him one or not, we won't know until we negotiate. Vega's attitude now is that Quaresma is developing smoothly, there is also a Marcelino in the first team, and Ronaldo is still young, so let's put some pressure on him for the time being.
But Ronnie couldn't wait any longer.
Sometimes, conflicts are just that simple and direct.
…
"I've met Ronaldo a few times before. I'm sure you've heard of him. He mentioned you to me and praised you highly. He said that even if you join Sporting Lisbon's youth team, you can definitely become a starter. He told me to come and see."
After hearing what , Su Dong suddenly realized that it was Ronnie who recommended him.
He had borrowed some money from Ronnie before and asked him to bring his father to Lisbon for medical treatment, and the boy returned the favor.
"What do you think?" Su Dong asked with concern.
He was somewhat nervous because he really wanted to know what level he was considered by these professional agents.
Mendes did not answer, but turned to look at Jorge Manuel beside him.
"In Sporting Lisbon's youth training camp, there are two forwards on the same team as Ronnie. One is Gisvi, who is tall and strong, and the other is Laurenceau, who is very fast. My personal preliminary judgment is that you and Gisvi have advantages over each other, and you are slightly inferior to Laurenceau."
After listening to Jorge Manuel's evaluation, Su Dong didn't have any idea. Instead, Mendes looked at his partner with some surprise, his eyes full of questions, as if to say, are you sure this evaluation is fair?
Jorge Manuel nodded slightly toward Mendes in affirmation.
Gisve is an aerial master trained by Sporting Lisbon's youth training, and the strength of Laurenteau is even greater. He was loaned to Bristol in English League One last season and performed very well, so he was retained in the team this season.
There was news before that if Jardel could not come, Laurenzo would be promoted to the first team as a substitute for Niculai.
If Jorge Manuel's evaluation is followed, Mendes feels that he should further mention his positioning of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.
"We all watched today's game, and the biggest feeling I got was that Sporting CP can no longer satisfy you," said Jorge Manuel. "I suggest that you go to a better team, play in a better league, and continue to maintain this momentum of improvement, either in the winter break or at the end of the season. This is very important."
Su Dong understood that he had just turned seventeen and was in the stage of rapidly improving his strength.
Competitions, especially those with training value, are crucial to him.
For example, Quaresma is now playing better and better in the first team and is making rapid progress. Although Ronaldo is at ease and playing calmly in the youth team, his progress is obviously slower than Quaresma.
"To be honest, Sue, even without Ronnie's strong recommendation, I am still very interested in you. I know your previous agent was very unprofessional, but that doesn't matter. If you are willing, I will be responsible for your business in the future. I will help you draw up a detailed short- and medium-term career plan as soon as possible and do my best to plan it for you."
…
…
Mendes' proposal is very attractive to Su Dong.
What he urgently needs now is, on the one hand, to work hard to improve his own abilities, but at the same time he also needs an agent to run around and plan for him.
Head coach Gorba had told him before that three or four teams were paying attention to him, and Su Dong at least had to figure out what his next move should be.
Transfers are really important for professional players.
Some players' development momentum was aborted due to careless transfers, such as Benfica winger Simao, who also went to Barcelona with the title of Figo II, but what was the result? He returned in disgrace this season.
It’s not that Simao is not strong enough, but his transfer to Barcelona was a mistake.
Therefore, finding a reliable agent is as important as improving your own abilities.
But even so, Su Dong did not reach an agreement with Mendes on the spot because he did not know Mendes.
If it were Jose Vega, Su Dong would probably not hesitate at all.
…
After returning to the apartment, Su Dong exercised for a while.
After persisting in physical training for a period of time, the strength of his four physical attributes has been greatly improved. The minimum strength has reached 71 points, while the speed has reached 78 points, the explosive power has reached 76 points, and the endurance has reached 77 points. These are the results of his persistent training in recent days.
Not only that, the technical attributes are also above 70 points.
During this period, Su Dong was not idle either. He accumulated a lot of King of Football points. Seeing that the four defensive attributes were almost at full potential, he simply increased the potential to 99 points. Now his strength is above 60 points.
As a plain and boring Virgo man, Su Dong still wants to train all his attributes to the maximum before leveling up.
In addition, Su Dong still has a star ability card that has not been redeemed. He is unable to use it for the time being. He wants to train Batistuta GOL to be more proficient and then redeem a new star ability card.
Sooner or later, he will become a man with dual SIM cards and dual standby!
As your strength improves, training will naturally become easier.
But facing Pontes' training, Su Dong still felt a lot of pressure because the difficulty had increased.
For example, for push-ups, he started with supporting himself with both arms, gradually shortened the distance between his arms, and now he is trying to support himself with one arm, alternating between the two arms. As you can imagine, this is still very difficult.
However, having tasted the benefits of recent hard training, Su Dong was able to persevere.
…
After exercising for a while and sweating a lot, Su Dong took a shower and washed his clothes at the same time.
Sitting on the bed, seeing that it was almost time, he called Ronnie's dormitory.
The person who answered the phone was Jose Semedo.
This guy is always in a cheerful mood. As soon as he heard Su Dong's voice, he started talking about the game this evening.
"Ronnie took out three opposing players by himself, but unfortunately, he failed at the last moment."
The price of saying this was that Semedo was kicked by Ronnie and ran away with a cry.
After Ronnie answered the phone, Su Dong asked about the game, but he didn't care too much. After all, the game of Sporting Lisbon youth team didn't need an outsider like him to worry about it.
Su Dong soon talked about Mendes.
"I think he's right. This next step is very important for you. You shouldn't rush into making a decision."
"According to the transfer regulations, the earliest date is January 1. In this case, you still have three months to think about it slowly. The most important thing is to see if there are any games to play. If you want to be a bench player, don't go even to Real Madrid."
Su Dong deeply agreed with this.
He should be more down-to-earth and talk to the other party slowly to see their sincerity.
Of course, this isn't his concern, so he'd better have an agent.
"I know Mendes. He is quite reliable and a very careful person. He speaks and does things very well. Most importantly, he takes our ideas and needs to heart, which Vega cannot do."
"It's just like what I said before. Vega is like Real Madrid. It has a big name, a loud brand , and a lot of resources. But it's useless to us at this stage. It's just for show."
Ronnie has a very clear plan and understanding for this.
"Besides, don't take agents too seriously. They provide services for us. We have full control over the terms of the contract. For example, in the contract I signed with José Vega, although I authorized him to do all the work, in fact, if I want to contact him about the contract, I only need a faxed piece of paper."
The main reason why Ronaldo has not made a decision yet is that he has taken into consideration many other aspects, such as Sporting Lisbon.
He has recently been communicating with technical director Aurelio Pereira. If the technical director has no objection, he will immediately terminate his contract with Vega and join Mendes.
Su Dong has no experience in dealing with agents.
The scammer he had fired before said he was an agent, but in fact he was not formal at all. It was said that he did not even have the qualifications of an agent. So strictly speaking, Su Dong’s entire overseas transfer was not standardized and problems could arise at any time.
After hearing what Ronnie said, Su Dong finally understood that players actually have a lot of control over agency affairs.
In that case, there is nothing to worry about.
Today, Su Dong is just a player in the third-level league, and his biggest advantage is his youth.
Since Mendes is valued by Ronaldo and has also signed Ugo Viana, the rising star of Sporting Lisbon, there is no need for Su Dong to worry too much.
Authorize him to make plans for player affairs, and if it succeeds, everyone will be happy. If not, you can change people later.
Thinking of this, Su Dong no longer had anything to worry about.
