Guide
Agents and young players: what to establish before anything is signed
Updated
Confident summaries do the most damage here, so this page deliberately gives none. What follows is a sequence, not a statement of the rules.
Question 1
Why do you need a list of agents?
The answer changes completely depending on whether you are checking somebody who has already approached you or looking for representation you do not yet have.
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Why we do not summarise the rules here
The rules on representation of minors sit in The FA Football Agent Regulations. They were updated for the 2026/27 season with effect from 1 June 2026, and are published in full.
A website paraphrase is a snapshot of somebody's reading of a document that changes each season. Here, the cost of a wrong one falls on a child. Read the regulations, or have somebody read them for you.
First, the free checks
Search the exact name on The FA's register of registered football agents and on FIFA's directory of licensed agents. Then look at The FA's published agent transaction details.
These take minutes, cost nothing and dispose of a proportion of approaches immediately. Do them before replying rather than after a meeting.
Then the document
The FA publishes standard representation agreements for download. Obtain one and read it before being handed anything, so that the document you are offered is being compared rather than assessed cold.
Establish in writing, before signing: who pays the agent, when, how much, what happens if nothing comes of it, and how the agreement ends.
Two things that should stop a conversation
A request for money from the family, in any form, for representation or for access to a trial or a session.
Pressure to sign on the day, at a session, before anybody has had time to run a five minute search. Nothing legitimate in this process requires a signature that cannot wait until the evening.
Get advice that is not connected to anybody
From somebody with no relationship to the agent, the club, the trial or the person who made the introduction. That independence is the whole value.
The PFA and a solicitor with sports experience are the usual routes. An hour costs little against a contract with a term attached to a child's playing career.