Football Federation – COVID-19
Spanish La Liga is trying to deal with the Coronavirus crisis as well. The country’s Football Federations adviced all clubs in the elite division to cut their players’ wages until the situation goes back to normal. At this moment, it’s not clear how many of the clubs are actually going to respond to this call.
Two of the La Liga clubs already did it, though. The champion Barcelona and Atletico Madrid officially announced that their players agreed to a 70% wage cut. With this money, the two clubs will pay their non-playing staff. Atletico’s players and coaches decided to make a donation to the non-playing staff as well.
According to the official numbers, professional football clubs in Spain represent 1.37% of Spain’s GDP, which is quite impressive. It’s believed that the football clubs in the country are responsible for around 185,000 jobs in Spain. You can see why it’s essential for the players to agree to a pay cut and help those who don’t really share their luck to be paid so well.
At this moment, it’s still not clear if giants Real Madrid will do the same regarding the players’ wages. The club’s president Florentino Perez stated that the club is not planning to do such a thing, but in recent days it’s been rumored that Los Blancos’ could also enforce the wage cuts.
Spain is one of the countries in Europe which are hurt the most from COVID-19, alongside Italy. It’s believed that around 120,000 people got the virus, while more than 10,000 have died because of it. The whole country is blocked right now, and there’s a tremendous amount of panic among the citizens. In times like these, the football clubs must show some compassion and help as much as they can.
An official statement from La Liga said that the Federation urges the clubs to take some special measures in the situation, just like Barcelona and Atletico Madrid did. According to the Federation’s statement, they must do as much as they can to guarantee the sector will recover after the crisis is gone.
The clubs from the English Premier League could take the same measures as well. The Football Association announced that they would hold talks with the Players’ Association, and this subject will be discussed. We can only expect that players will agree to pay cuts in almost every other country on the continent right now.