Reading FC is the first WSL Club to furlough their team after UK Lockdown announced last week
Megan Bush 30 March 2020 News
No Women’s Super League Games have been played in the competition since the 23rd of February due to the outbreak of the Coronovirus Pandemic.
Last week Boris Johnson made a speech to the nation to tell the UK that they were going to be put on lockdown as of the 23rd of March, meaning no football for the foreseeable future.
Since the speech Reading FC have been the first WSL Club to put their team on furlough, temporary leave. This means that the ladies are only going to be earning 80% of their salary whilst this pandemic is going on.
However the squad were informed last week that the club are going to be paying them the extra 20% so they do not miss out.
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It isn’t just Reading Ladies that are being put on furlough by their club, it was announced that Reading are putting their U-23’s on furlough too, along with a number of non-playing staff.
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Mark Bowen, Nigel Howe and other senior managers have also taken a wage deferral, with having on-going discussions with what the players will do next in this difficult time.
Image courtesy of Katie Chan (Wikimedia Commons)
After Liverpool FC being the first Premiere League Club to be put all their staff on furlough, they received a lot of backlash from fans of the Premiere League, so much so that they reverted their decision.
Tottenham Hotspur FC also did the exact same thing as Liverpool, by putting all their non-playing staff on furlough. However since then Daniel Levy, Tottenham Hotspur chairman released a statement to say “Non-playing staff will receive 100% of their salary for April and May”.
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The fans of these clubs were ashamed that their club made these decisions in the first place, and
were pleased when they retracted their statements for furloughing staff, perhaps Reading FC will
the do the same...
A live poll on my twitter page is asking users if they think Reading FC were correct to put their
ladies team on furlough check out what users think here.
WSL fans are worried on how this could damage women’s football. The Women’s Super League
had recently became more popular with higher match attendances than ever before, it is scary to
wonder how they will recover from this, like a lot of other businesses.
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However, some fans have taken to twitter to share their feelings on the footballers being
furloughed as a positive thing as they believe they earn too much as it is.
A lot of the highest earners in the Women’s Super League are part of England’s squad and
they announced earlier this month they have a donation for Premier League players and staff to
be able to support the NHS and other important front line workers.
No one knows when the season can resume, or if it will resume at all? There have been talks of voiding the season as it is becoming difficult to find ways to carry on this season, just like the Premier League season. Some fans are going to be left very unhappy.
Reading are currently fifth in the Women’s Super League Table.
Daniel Levy
Image courtesy of Doha Stadium Plus Qatar (Wikimedia Commons)