Fortune hits back in pay row
Manchester United soccer player Quinton Fortune has hit back at his former manager's demand for one-fifth of his earnings with allegations of fraud and a counter-claim of more than R2-million.
Fortune's lawyers have accused soccer coach Colin Gie of using his influence over the Cape Flats soccer star he helped to discover in an unscrupulous manner in order to exact payments and say Gie's "reprehensible" actions amount to fraud in law.
They claim Gie used certain of Fortune's bank accounts "as his own banking facility to make payments to himself and his creditors" rather than for Fortune's benefit - and allege that Gie treated half the payments Fortune made to his Fortune Football Club "as his own funds".
The claims were made in papers filed before the Cape High Court in preparation for Wednesday's court battle between Gie and Fortune.
Gie claims he discovered Fortune when the budding star was 13 and living in a Kewtown council flat.
He wants the High Court to force Fortune to honour the contract he signed with him when he was 15 years old.
Fortune's lawyers say Gie's repeated failure to repay Fortune a loan of £67 000 (about R800 000), and unreasonable demands for money, drove the star to break the contract in July 2002.
They claim that, from the 1998 signing of the contract to its termination, Gie used his influence over Fortune to persuade him to make "certain payments" - amounting to £606 754 (about R7,4-million) - at his request. They are asking the court to order Gie to repay it.
According to the disputed agreement, signed by Fortune in Cape Town in 1998, Gie is entitled to claim 20 percent of Fortune's estimated R160 000 weekly earnings.
Fortune's lawyers accuse Gie of using his influence and power "in an unscrupulous and unconscionable manner" to persuade the then-teenaged Fortune to sign the contract. They argue that, under the rules of the South African Football Association and the international body Fifa, the maximum contract length for a player's agent is two years, while they should normally expect a five percent cut of their player's earnings after tax.
Fortune's lawyers further claim that Gie "substantially" failed to meet the terms of the contract by not obtaining the appropriate endorsements, sponsorships, legal services or long and short-term insurance for Fortune, and by not managing Fortune's diary properly.
Although Fortune arrived at Old Trafford in July 1999 as Gie's client, he has since been represented by the Elite Sports Company owned by Jason Ferguson, son of Manchester United boss Sir Alex.