FA to give full consideration to Lord Stevens' corruption report

By Ben James Jun 16, 2007, 9:41 GMT

London - The Football Association has said it will give 'full consideration' to the report by Lord Stevens into corruption in English football, which on Friday identified 17 transfers, including those of Didier Drogba to Chelsea, as suspect.

The 15-month investigation, led by the former London police chief, singled out five Premiership clubs - Chelsea, Newcastle, Bolton, Middlesbrough and Portsmouth - who it believes acquired players in deals which could not be cleared as legitimate.

Despite that, Stevens, who examined a total of 362 transfers, said that he could find no evidence of illegal payments to club officials or players.

However, the report was highly critical of the role of several agents, in particular Pini Zahavi, who was responsible for the Drogba deal, and Barry Silkman, who had dealings with Middlesbrough.

'The FA will give full consideration to its contents and the documentation that is due to be passed on by the Premier League and Quest,' the FA said in a statement.

Israeli Zahavi, one of the highest-profile agents in world football, received special criticism from Stevens, who recommended he be subject to a FIFA investigation.

'There was an initial failure to disclose his involvement in a number of transfers,' the report said of Zahavi.

'But, more seriously, he has failed to provide the Inquiry with complete bank statements due to the confidential nature of them. There has also been a lack of responsiveness by Zahavi. There remain questions relating to his relationship with and payments to Barry Silkman and Barry Silkman's failure to initially disclose his involvement in all the transactions in which he received fees.'

Silkman, who participated in the transfers which saw Yakubu Ayegbeni and Fabio Rochemback join Middlesbrough, reacted angrily to the report.

He denied any wrongdoing and said that if he was guilty of anything then so was the England manager Steve McClaren, who was then in charge at Middlesbrough.

'I publicly challenge them to say what I did in the Fabio Rochemback deal that was illegal in any way,' Silkman was quoted in The Times newspaper on Saturday.

'It was completely open and clean. If they come out and say I have done anything illegal and suggest I've paid a manager, the manager concerned has to be Steve McClaren, the England manager. So, if they are not suggesting that, what are they saying is illegal about the deal?'

According to The Guardian newspaper, Chelsea said on Friday that they would continue to work with Zahavi as long as he remains a FIFA-licensed agent.

The 17 transfers involved five Premiership clubs. Chelsea (Didier Drogba, Petr Cech, Michael Essien), Newcastle United (Emre Belozoglu, Jean Alain Boumsong, Amady Faye, Albert Luque), Bolton Wanderers (Ali Al-Habsi, Tal Ben Haim, Blessing Kaku, Julio Correia), Portsmouth (Collins Mbesuma, Benjani Mwaruwari, Aliou Cissé) and Middlesbrough (Aiyegbeni Yakubu and Fabio Rochemback).

One transfer was not revealed, while two managers, Sam Allardyce, the then Bolton manager who is now at Newcastle United, and a former Newcastle manager, Graeme Souness were also named in the report.

The report cited inconsistencies in the statements of Souness and Kenneth Shepherd, the son of Newcastle chairman Freddie Shepherd, while it said there was a possible conflict of interest arising at Bolton, where Allardyce's son, Craig, a former agent, was involved in transfer dealings with the club.

The findings of the report will now be passed to the FA and FIFA, depending on where the individuals identified are registered.