The Football Agent System

(Jay POV)

The plane was still crawling toward the gate when Jay’s phone found the network again.

It buzzed once, then kept buzzing, the number in the corner of the screen climbing while the seatbelt sign stayed lit and nobody was allowed to stand.

Forty-one notifications. Then fifty-three. Then more than he could be bothered to count.

The signed contract sat zipped inside the bag under the seat in front of him, and none of the noise on the screen had anything to do with the paper that actually mattered.

Go Ahead had published their announcement while he was in the air.

He found it near the top of the pile, the club’s own post, plain and professional in the way he was starting to understand meant they took it seriously rather than the opposite.

Go Ahead Eagles have reached agreement with winger Jay Cole (21). The Englishman signs until June 2078, with the option of a further season, and will join the first-team squad in January. The move is subject to the completion of work-authorisation and international-registration formalities. "Jay is a hard-working wide player with a good left foot and a strong learning curve," said head of recruitment Peter Doevendans. "We look forward to welcoming him in the new year."

No fireworks. No language about a hidden gem or a coup. Just the facts, a contract length, a pathway, and one measured line from the football department.

He opened the photographs attached underneath.

In the first, he stood holding a home shirt up beside Peter, both of them half-smiling for a camera neither had wanted to keep waiting.

In the second, he was seated at the signing table, the contract open in front of him and a pen in his hand, looking for all the world like a young footballer who belonged exactly where he was sitting.

Jay looked at that version of himself, then looked down at the real one.

Same jacket he’d worn from England to Norway and back, cuffs going soft at the edges. His old work shoes packed in the bag beside his boots, because he owned one decent pair and they were the ones on his feet.

The lad in the photo had already arrived somewhere. The lad in seat 24C was still catching up to him.

He opened his banking app while the plane inched forward.

The balance was the same as it had been that morning. The same as it had been the week before.

Nothing had landed, and nothing was going to for weeks, because the fourteen thousand a month started on the first of January and not a day sooner, and until then he was a professional footballer with the same empty account he’d flown out with.

He understood the difference now in a way he hadn’t a month ago. He had secured what the next two and a half years would look like. He had not put a single pound in his pocket for today.

The phone kept buzzing all the way up the jet bridge.

By the time he reached the baggage hall, the Southmere Athletic group chat had woken up for the first time in months.

He’d barely been in it since August, since the day the shifts and the training and his mum all stopped fitting in the same week and something had to give. Now it was forty messages deep and climbing.

Some of it was real.

Danny K: LADS. Jay’s only gone and signed for a Dutch top flight club 😳

Ollie: no way. proper proud of you mate, you carried our front line for two seasons and got nothing for it. buzzing for you

Marnie (physio): Knew it. Best left foot that ever came through here and it wasn’t close

Some of it was the other thing.

Reece: always said this boy was going pro. ALWAYS. you heard it from me first years ago

Tomo: 100% we all knew. Jay was different class

Jay read Reece’s message twice.

Reece, who hadn’t sent him a single word since August. Reece, who Jay had messaged back in September asking if he still had that contact at the college side, and who’d left it on read for eleven days before replying "soz mate been mad busy."

Now everyone had always known.

Danny K: oi Jay sort us some tickets when you’re over there yeah 😂

Ollie: he owes the squad a night out before he leaves, minimum

Kyle: on a serious one though, any chance your agent takes on other lads? been struggling to get seen, would mean a lot

Jay started typing a reply to Reece.

He got as far as funny that, considering you couldn’t be bothered to before his thumb stopped over the send button.

He read it back once, then deleted the whole thing letter by letter and locked the phone. It wasn’t worth the argument, and an argument was exactly what someone like Reece wanted, a reaction to screenshot.

The café staff chat had found it too.

Someone had put his official Go Ahead photo side by side with a picture of him from July, sleeves rolled up, scrubbing down the coffee machine with a rag over one shoulder.

Priya: from THIS to THIS in three months I’m actually crying 😭😭

Big Sam: does the club know their new signing still owes me a closing shift

Priya: they’re gonna put "former barista" on his Wikipedia and I’m here for it

That one made him smile properly, standing at the belt, because it came from people who’d actually watched him do both jobs rather than strangers deciding who he was.

A private message sat under the group one, from Dev, the café manager.

Congrats Jay, genuinely made up for you. Give us a ring when you’ve had a minute to breathe. No rush, but if you fancy any hours before you fly off in January we should have a chat about it.

Not assuming Jay was coming back. Not assuming he’d quit either. Just leaving the door open and asking him to call, which was more than most people managed.

Jay didn’t try to answer any of it in the baggage queue, because deciding his next two months while standing next to a luggage belt was exactly the kind of thing that led to getting it wrong.

Garcia rang while Jay was still waiting on his case.

"You landed," Garcia said. "Good. We’ve got the countersigned copy in the G11 system, and the public statement went out with the wording we agreed. Nothing off in it, I’ve read it twice."

"Yeah, I saw. Looks proper."

"From here on, anything that touches Go Ahead comes through me. Interviews, sponsors, other lads asking you to put a word in, any of it. You don’t promise anyone anything, you send it to me. That protects you and it protects the club."

"There’s already people asking about tickets and that."

"Send them to me. That’s what I’m for." A pause. "Anything else on your mind?"

"The work permit thing." Jay watched a case that wasn’t his go past. "That’s all done, yeah?"

"The applications have started and the document prep’s underway, but the contract and the international registration are separate stages," Garcia said. "The registration goes through the transfer system in the January window, not before. That’s normal. It’s not a problem."

"So they could still change their mind?"

"No. Their legal side already confirmed you fit the professional-player category under the current rules before they ever sent us terms. What’s left is formal approval and the January registration, not the club deciding whether they still want you. That decision’s made. It’s signed."

Jay let a breath out he hadn’t noticed holding.

"And your cut," he said. "When do you actually get paid?"