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As the World Cup gets underway, Canada's soccer federation is locked in a brutal labor dispute with its players.
Dear readers,
As lukewarm soccer fans, the two of us are currently engaged in the time-honored tradition of trying to learn just enough about the World Cup that we don’t sound like complete idiots when talking about it. This is made more difficult by the fact that most of the matches are taking place in the middle of the night here in the U.S., but we’re doing our best over here.
For example: After watching Wednesday night’s match between the U.S. and the Netherlands — which featured some dramatic pushing and jawing between Danielle van de Donk and Lindsey Horan (take a wild guess which player belongs to which side) — we learned that Horan and van de Donk are in fact teammates in Lyon. An interesting subplot!
On a serious note, though, we’d actually sincerely recommend watching sporting events that you don’t know much about tuning into them. You can root for whoever you want, and you learn a lot really quickly. Plus, it’s a nice reprieve from watching our two terrible baseball teams, who have been squaring off all weekend.
There is, though, a lot of baggage surrounding this year’s Women’s World Cup. That’s the topic of this week’s newsletter. Hope you enjoy!
-Ian and Calder
In the three years that we’ve been writing Southpaw, the U.S. Women’s National Team stands out as the most prominent example of a team that successfully harnessed the power of collective action and public opinion to change sports for the better. In June of 2021, we wrote about the USWNT’s tenacious fight for equal pay; in May of 2022 we wrote about their victory in that fight.
Now, as the team chased its third-straight victory at the World Cup, we’re happy to be able to cheer for the team knowing that its players are being fairly compensated. Unfortunately, though, many other teams from this year’s tournament have failed to follow the U.S.’s lead.
The most egregious example is Zambia, whose squad has already flamed out of the tournament after two brutal 5-0 losses. But the only thing worse than the team’s record is the fact that most of its players haven’t been paid — that’s right, not paid at all — for two years.
Choose whatever unflattering adjectives you’d like to describe this situation, but it’s downright embarrassing that any team with players in the World Cup refuses to compensate its players. National pride doesn’t put food on the table.
But it’s not just the World Cup also-rans who are stiffing their players. Canada, the winner of the 2021 Olympic gold medal and one of the World Cup favorites at this year’s World Cup, is also in the midst of a nasty labor dispute between its governing body and its players.
Here are the basics: In February, Canadian soccer’s governing body announced that budgetary constraints had forced the federation to make significant cuts to the women’s program, including drastically reducing the number of training days and players invited to training camps. The Canadian Soccer Players’ Association responded with a threat to strike, but Canada Soccer threatened legal action, and the CSPA backed down.
Heading into this year’s World Cup, the federation had not reached a deal with the players that guaranteed them equal compensation with the men’s team (who have still not been paid for the 2022 World Cup). On Friday, the team announced that it had reached an interim deal with the federation, but accused Canada Soccer of forcing the team to choose between compensation and funding for future training camps and other programs.
“These are choices we should not have had to make,” the team wrote in its statement.
The good news is that the men’s and the women’s squads appear to be working together to secure fair compensation and pay equity. The bad news is that the teams have to go to the mat in the first place to get the federation to pay them for the labor. Of course, sexism and the historic denigration of women’s soccer play a part in this struggle, but it ultimately boils down to green and poor management. For years, players from both the men’s and women’s squads have accused the federation of mismanaging funds and cutting deals that direct revenues away from players. Sexism is not the cause of Canada’s soccer’s financial woes, but poor financial management exacerbates sexist tendencies within international soccer. When it comes time to slash budgets, women’s teams almost inevitably take the bigger hit.
Canada’s national team could easily go all the way in this World Cup, but even if they raise the Cup, the problems with the federation are far from finished. As the USWNT’s lengthy fight for equal pay made clear, success on the field is no guarantee of fair treatment off it. The only path to fair and equal compensation runs through sustained collective action and vigorous public support. As the tournament unfolds, they deserve that support.
RODNEY’S ROUNDUP
Do you want to read about . . .
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. . . ongoing discussions about moving Washington’s football franchise back to RFK Stadium? “The RFK site exudes nostalgia, but sentiment can’t drive a stadium deal” by Barry Svrluga in The Washington Post (July 29, 2023).
. . . some fallout from Bronny James suffering cardiac arrest this week? “Bill requiring AEDs at youth sports programs awaits action by Hochul” by the Capital Tonight Staff in Spectrum News (July 28, 2023).