Danny Murphy thinks he lost about £5million. He’s not entirely sure – which, if you think about it, is part of the problem. When you lose that much money slowly, through schemes you don’t fully understand, recommended by advisers you trusted completely, it’s hard to put a precise number on the damage.
Murphy is one of 11 former Premier League footballers who’ve gone public about losing tens of millions of pounds through poor financial advice. Their story is told in a BBC documentary that aired last month, Football’s Financial Shame: The Story of the V11. Rod Wallace was declared bankrupt this year. Sean Davis now works as a painter and decorator and says there are days he doesn’t want to be alive. They’re all facing tax bills over £1 million, despite the police telling them they were victims of crime.
The firm they trusted, Kingsbridge Asset Management, had credibility. It was endorsed by the League Managers Association. It boasted a client list of 360 footballers. The advisers became friends, invited to weddings, included in holidays. When they recommended film financing schemes with generous tax relief, or Spanish property developments promising 40% tax rebates, it didn’t feel like a sales pitch. It felt like looking after your future.
The gap between good and terrible
Sadly for our profession, the gap between good and terrible advice can look vanishingly small from the outside. Both involve confident people in nice offices talking about securing your financial future. Both involve products with complicated names and reassuring paperwork. The difference only becomes clear years later, when the schemes unravel and the tax bills arrive.
In the same week I watched this documentary, I also read an excellent article from 7IM that stopped me in my tracks. According to FCA research, one third of UK adults are keeping cash at home. Not in bank accounts – physically at home, under mattresses or in safes. And only 8.6% of people received any financial advice last year. The top sources of financial information? Martin Lewis, their bank, and friends.
There’s something terribly sad about both of these facts sitting next to each other. On one hand, you have highly paid professionals who trusted the wrong advisers and lost everything. On the other, you have millions of people so wary of the financial services industry that they’d rather keep cash under their mattresses than engage with it at all.
Understanding the wariness
I don’t think people are keeping cash at home because they love the inconvenience. I think they’re doing it because they don’t know who to trust. And after watching that documentary, I don’t blame them.
But here’s what I also know: research from the International Longevity Centre shows that people who received proper financial advice were, on average, £47,000 better off after a decade than those who didn’t. Studies from Vanguard suggest good advice adds around 3% to your annual returns. Not through market-beating stock picks, but through discipline, tax planning, and helping you avoid the expensive mistakes that derail financial plans.
The value isn’t theoretical. It’s real. But only if you’re working with someone who’s actually on your side.
How do you know who to trust?
So how do you know? I wish there was a simple answer. But I think it starts with understanding what you’re paying for and why. Are you paying for advice, or are you paying for products that happen to come with “free” advice? Are the fees transparent, or buried in fund charges? Is the adviser qualified and regulated, or just persuasive? Do they take time to understand what you actually want from your life, or are they steering you toward predetermined solutions?
I can only speak for Emery Little and the many other great financial planning firms I know, but we’re Chartered by the CII, completely independent with no private equity backing, and we charge transparent fees for advice rather than commissions on products. But more importantly, we think advice should be boring. Not in a dull way – in a trustworthy way. It should be clarity and understanding of your financial situation and deep conversations about your actual life, not exciting promises about foreign property developments.
The V11 footballers did what they were supposed to do. They sought professional help. They tried to secure their futures. They just trusted the wrong people. That’s not their failure – it’s ours, as an industry.
Don’t keep your cash under the mattress – what if there’s a fire? But don’t hand it over without asking hard questions either.
At Emery Little, we believe trust is earned through transparency, independence, and genuine care. If you’d like to understand more about how we work or have a conversation about finding the right financial advice, please get in touch.
