The world of football agents and agencies is broader and superficially more holistic than ever before.

Gone are the days of Mr Ten Per Cents lurking in mackintoshes. Well, those probably still exist, but all the rage now are wider-ranging organisations offering a suite of “services” above and beyond negotiating a few extra quid.

These agencies offer opportunities to swathes of ex-players and no doubt a great many of them supply useful help and guidance.

One wonders, though, if they are all what they cracked up to be when you think of a situation like the one which befell Carlisle United this week.

The Blues felt they had their goalkeeping cover sewn up in the form of ex-Hearts player Ross Stewart. Having trained with the club for three weeks, he agreed a deal until the end of the season.

Yet the move collapsed because, it turned out, he was still registered with another club whom he had previously joined on an emergency basis.

Stewart himself did not even realise this, Paul Simpson said. Which rather begs the question: who was advising him? Who was on top of his affairs?

Who was handling the boring but necessary detail of such contractual matters at the time they were pushing their client towards a hopeful vacancy at Brunton Park?

Some reacted to last night's news by pointing the finger at United. Simpson, though, said the Blues had done everything they could at their own end. What, then, about Stewart's end?

It does make you conclude that someone in the mix of all this hasn’t done everything that was required. Someone, you have to say, wasn’t across it from start to finish. How could the required information remain elusive until it was too late?

All in all, it’s the kind of carry-on that should be avoidable in this era of services, suites and so on. Deals like this, these days, shouldn't fall into such a black hole.