The footballer’s plan: first play and then check the salaries

Footballers have been the center of attention for two weeks with this break in competition. In the first place, because they have seen their professional activity, like so many others, slowed down by the appearance of the coronavirus. And secondly, because they are on everyone's lips as a solution at hand to mitigate the effects that this crisis will have on professional football and on the population. UEFA, RFEF and LaLiga have already slipped their plans to reorder the schedule, and the clubs have also postulated their intentions to cut wages and apply for ERTEs. However, footballers in Spain, until now, had simply expected events. Until they have been shaken. If they have made something clear, in general, to their spokespersons, the captains, and their maximum defenders, the unions, it is that they will collaborate, as they already do with the one who needs it, and that se will lower wages if appropriate, but on one condition: all in due time.

So far, all the measures that have been discussed have focused on agreeing on a salary readjustment for the most privileged, footballers (20% in Germany; 70% at Barça). They, the protagonists, propose the reverse path: first determine when the competition resumes, what day it ends and how, then assess the damage to the clubs and finally negotiate measures to keep the economy sustainable. They do not refuse to lower their payrolls. Unlike. They put their 14 monthly payments and the two extra, in which they charge a large part of their tab, at the service of their clubs to make numbers. What they request is that the steps be taken in a more orderly manner. They understand that if the remaining 11 days are ended and the European competitions and the Cup can be finished (the final remains), there will not be the same scenario as if the season is shortened or if it is not played again. Television earnings, which are the mother of everything, will set the pace. This is one of the things that David Aganzo, president of AFE, wanted to transmit yesterday to Javier Tebas in a meeting.

In this telematic appointment, the day-to-day life of footballers was also discussed, in which no one has seen their working hours reduced in order to justify these cuts. The professionals, they allege, are working with the obsession to compete again, even if it is beyond June 30 and their vacations are reduced (they do not care). But they understand that postponement, which is what there is, is not the same as suspension. So you have to wait.

In that LaLiga-AFE meeting, Tebas explained the employer's position to help the clubs in coordinating the ERTE request. As Barça has done and the union calculates that they will do, in the worst case, 25% of the professional clubs in total (about 10 out of 42), although LaLiga believes that they will be quite a few more and even historical entities. But he also explained that, in general, they prefer to take other measures at the moment rather than dismiss. The State would not see fit to compensate millionaires now, while it will not be easy for clubs to justify that their measures are taken by “force majeure”. The appointment, by videoconference and without inviting footballers ON, comes a day after the employers met with the RFEF in the Follow-up Committee to which the AFE belongs but to which, this time, they were not asked to participate to stop all the competition sine die.