Agent costs were expected - Douglas

Last updated : 13 September 2013 By Bigrich.....

According to statistics released, the Millers committed £106,383 to players' representatives during the 2012/13 season whih was the biggest amount in the fourth iter.

Douglas told the Advertiser when asked about the issue: “In football nowadays, agents are part and parcel of trying to bring players into a club and they are almost an occupational hazard. The table of agents fees wasn't a surprise because our budget was high, if not higher, than anyone in League Two anyway, but there are clubs who would rather pay a player more and let him pay his representative and therefore disguise the amount seen to be paid to agents. In that sense, the figures are skewed to an extent.

“In our discussions with agents, we negotiate strongly and I can honestly say that there is not one player who has left this club getting the deal he wanted. Every prospective signing has a value to us and we include agent costs in that. We enter negotiations with an idea of what an individual player is worth a year and when we reach that, we don't go any further. How the money is divvied up is up to the player and his representative.”

He adds: “As we know, with the new stadium, Tony (Stewart) was determined to get out of League Two and Steve (Evans) had a healthy budget as a result. But as a club, we don't like paying agents fees and we don't like money going out of the game.”