The difficult path of Liga F to self-financing and the obstacles that Real Madrid wants to put on wheels | Relief

The financing of League F is a sensitive issue. The competition has become professional since 2022, although up to this point there have been many wars, some hidden and others very public. To be considered professional implies self-government, independent of the sports federation, and is also assumed to be able to promote a championship that supports this independence. Theory and practice, of course, do not always go hand in hand. Not only in women’s football, but also in professional competitions such as Asobal, there have been problems justifying their professional status.

The F League is currently having trouble finding revenue. In the first three years of its existence, competition, which gradually increases, was supported by both the Supreme Sports Council and La Liga.two institutions that in different ways were strong economic bastions that allowed competition to be stable and with some ambition. They both also have some doubts about their future.

The CSD, when the agreement was reached to professionalize the women’s football league, promised to support the first steps with a good financial contribution. It was an agreement for three seasons, and the last one is the one that is now in dispute.. This push consisted of direct aid of five million in 2022, 7.5 million in 2023 and another 7.5 million this year. Support that in principle should stop now.

Council sources also recall that improvements to club structures have been proposed as part of the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan, with a request for €18 million and subsidies of €1.5 million for independent clubs that compete in the top category.

An important effort that is now at a crossroads. The subsidy was intended to help competition so that it could start on its own, but the goal of complete independence was not achieved.. For this reason, and also because supporting women’s sports is important to the government, CSD is looking for new alternatives to help the championship, since direct contribution should not be an everlasting tool.

For several months, legislative initiatives have been taken with the idea of ​​including the F League in the pool allocation. If an equal distribution is achieved, the competition could win just over ten million euros per season.money which would be a big relief to competitors. It probably won’t cover everything, but it’s more than a solid start, a big step toward saving the league.

The current moves are aimed at ensuring that the percentage of pools that currently belong entirely to La Liga (45.5%) will no longer be exclusively dedicated to the men’s competition and will be shared equally with the women’s championship. This means that Liga F’s revenues will directly harm LaLiga’s revenues.

The story of the money pool was one of the great battles of men’s football of the past. There was a time when nothing was earned from them, a time when clubs made money only at the box office, since there was no other commercial and television income. Securing a piece of that pie was a league-changing achievement that women’s football is now pursuing.. It is also necessary to consider that this money, which was once a bargaining chip for the economy of men’s football, is today still a secondary income in the economy of La Liga.

Real Madrid’s complaints at the La Liga meeting represent a new setback for Ligue F’s financial problems. It is important to note that the opinions of Jose Angel Sanchez, no matter how loud they may be when he represents a huge club, do not usually have much influence domestically. organization. Madrid is in the minority in the organization, always against it, and although he usually takes many of the organization’s issues to court, his voice has little consequence when it comes to the truth.. Sometimes, in addition, he uses these meetings to make noise, not so much with a real desire to correct the situation, but with the goal of making his many complaints heard.

Either way, it calls into question a system that has been very profitable for the F-League to date. The institution, under the leadership of Javier Tebas, was created from the very beginning of professionalization as the main pillar of the women’s championship.. In August 2022, an agreement was signed making LaLiga the exclusive commercial agent for the women’s competition.

This means La Liga guaranteed annual revenue – six million in the first season, eight in the next two and 10 from next year – in exchange for control of the use of the championship. If the F League were a big commercial success, the agreement would be very lucrative for the men’s championship.who would receive everything that exceeded the millions contributed earlier. That didn’t happen, so in practice the agreement became La Liga’s economic injection into Liga F. That’s what the hell Madrid wants to disappear.

Reducing this clause would be a drama for the women’s competition, of which this agreement is one of the main sources of funding. The championship had an initial agreement with Finetwork that it would be the main sponsor, but this contract turned out to be completely wrong. The technology company stopped paying, and the institution was left without its most important commercial agreement. Everything that Finetwork did not provide had to be taken from La Liga coffers.

It’s true that when it comes down to it, there are a lot of overlaps between La Liga and Liga F. There are 13 teams that have a team in both, so the money doesn’t come entirely from the organizations.. Even this is not worth it for Real Madrid, who understand that the money that trickles into women’s football is better invested elsewhere.

Problematically, the F-League has yet to find a new sponsor, partly due to the difficulty of managing high expectations. The first, most direct, Without this money, the dependence on men’s football and community organizations is very high, and the reverse would be appropriate.that little by little he freed himself from them to find his own path.

Due to lack of sponsorship It also leads to a loss of confidence, which is detrimental to women’s football.. The idea that the league is not sustainable, that it survives on artificial respiration, may even lead one to believe that professionalization has been capricious, more to do with desire or impulse than the reality of developing women’s sport in the country.

Over three years of great effort, interest in the championship has increased. good TV deal with DAZN, which allowed competitors to expand their consumer basea nascent industry, an improvement in the working conditions of the protagonists… noticeable successes in a short time, but which, as is the case in all companies, always depend on economic success. And this is a mystery that has yet to be solved.