The agent of Australia star Harry Kewell has hit back at recent criticism of his client.
Bernie Mandic has written the following letter in response to columns by the Sydney Morning Herald's Michael Cockerill explaining a few things that have been reported against Kewell.
DEAR Mr Cockerill,
There is nothing that Harry and I are more impressed with than a man who stands behind every single word that he has written. It must feel good to be even beyond papal infallibility. Only one problem, or nine to be precise, with your grand stand:
On 16 June, 2010 you wrote that, ''Guus Hiddink never indulged Kewell''. Totally wrong. He allowed Harry to do what ever external commercial work he needed to do while at the 2006 World Cup. No other player was allowed to do any.
On 16 June, 2010 you wrote that Harry ''can't even complete a proper warm-up with the other players''. Totally wrong and without a shred of factual evidence to support your claim.
On 1 June, 2010 in your opening paragraph you wrote that Harry's paymasters are Channel Nine.
Totally wrong and without a shred of factual evidence to support your claim. He has no Nine deal and has not had one since 2007. Over the last month you have repeatedly stated that Harry has played ''only a couple of minutes of football since Christmas''. Totally wrong and without a shred of factual evidence to support your claim but you keep on repeating it. He has played 52 minutes. Considering that football is a game of numerous statistics and percentages I would have thought you might consider being out by 2500 per cent as a significant error.
At the end of June, 2008 you wrote that Harry was signing with Roma. Totally wrong and without a shred of factual evidence to support your claim.
At the end of October, 2007 you wrote that Harry was a ''fringe'' player and that ''it's on the cards'' he would be coming back to Sydney FC. Over two and a half years later, you are still totally wrong and not a shred of factual evidence to support your claim.
In mid-February 2007 you wrote that Harry was in the last year of his contract and that Liverpool were looking to get rid of him. Totally wrong and without a shred of factual evidence to support your claim. At the time he had more than a year left on his contract and Liverpool never put him on the market.
The week before the Japan game in June, 2006 you wrote that Kewell's World Cup spot was in jeopardy due to his Channel Nine deal. Totally wrong and without a shred of factual evidence to support your claim. He did every Nine request.
Today you wrote that I told you, ''the football media was a joke, utterly irrelevant''. Again you are playing with the truth. Not only is the location of the conversation wrong but you have conveniently left out that I was speaking specifically about Australian newspaper journalists that cover soccer and quoted what Rupert Murdoch said about newspapers in general - ''Only 9 per cent [of the people] describe us as trustworthy, a scant 8 per cent find us useful, and only 4 per cent think we're entertaining (14 May, 2005).''
Standing behind every single word would be very impressive if your word actually stood for anything more than vindictive fantasy.
Yours sincerely,
Bernard Mandic
