Soccer Canada has made a new offer to its players in a bid to resolve their ongoing contract impasse.
Posted at 4:48 p.m.
Earl Cochrane, general secretary of Soccer Canada, said a “global compensation offer” was presented to male and female players on Tuesday. He declined to share details.
Soccer Canada’s previous offer was made in late June. At the time, the organization said it was seeking “to even out issues related to player pool compensation, travel policy and setting up high performance environments” between the two teams.
Players responded in late August and Soccer Canada responded this week with its offer.
The men’s team players have formed an association (the Canadian Men’s Soccer Team Players Association of Canada) as compensation negotiations continue, following the example of the women’s team, which is represented by the Canadian Soccer Players Association.
The association covers players who have been called up to any Men’s National Team camp since January 2021.
Time is running out, as the Soccer World Cup is set to begin on November 20.
Cochrane says the hope is that the impasse can be resolved before the tournament begins. But both sides said there were issues that could be resolved after the World Cup in Qatar.
There are, however, two pressing issues that needed to be resolved before the tournament started. One of them concerns the assistance available for friends and families of players who travel to Qatar and the other involves the distribution of scholarship money.
Cochrane says there has been “significant progress” on both fronts.
The World Cup in Qatar marks only Canada’s second trip to this tournament in men’s soccer, following that of 1986 in Mexico, where the representatives of the maple leaf were eliminated after defeats against France, Hungary and the Union Soviet.
And with FIFA paying millions to participating teams, there is a lot of money at stake for the current group of players.
Dissatisfaction with the state of negotiations prompted the men to boycott a scheduled June friendly against Panama in Vancouver, citing “unnecessarily protracted” negotiations for a new contract. Players have hinted they want a bigger share of the World Cup purse and a “full friends and family package” for the tournament.
They are said to have asked for an after-tax payment equivalent to 40% of the eight-figure payment expected for the World Cup.
At the 2018 World Cup in Russia, FIFA provided a total of US$791 million to the 32 participating teams, a 40% increase from the 2014 tournament.
Of this amount, 400 million was paid out in the form of a purse, ranging from 38 million to the winner, 28 million to the runner-up and 24 million to the third-placed team. Teams eliminated in the group stage received eight million each.
Each qualifying team also received 1.5 million to cover preparation costs, meaning all teams were guaranteed at least 9.5 million each for their participation.
Male players, currently ranked 43e in the world, are preparing in Europe for friendlies against Qatar on Friday in Vienna, Austria, and Uruguay next Tuesday in Bratislava, Slovakia.
The Canadians will also have a preseason game against Japan on November 17 in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, before starting their World Cup tournament on November 23 against Belgium.
After this duel against Belgium, Canada will face Croatia on November 27 and Morocco on November 1.er December, as part of the Group F matches.