Women's football takes the decisive step towards professionalization

Women's football takes the decisive step towards professionalization


Marta Carro, Luis Rubiales, Jose Manuel Franco, Lola Romero and Sheila Elorza pose after the signing of the statutes. / Ep

Iberdrola League

The CSD Board of Directors approves the statutes for the new league and opens a stage pending the coordination agreement between the Federation, which has so far been cut from the competition, and the newly minted body that will assume its organization from next season

A new stage is opening for women's football in Spain. The long-awaited professional league is now a reality after the Board of Directors of the Higher Sports Council (CSD) approved on Monday the statutes for the launch of the first professional competition for Spanish women's sports. The tournament already has an essential requirement waiting to finalize the coordination agreement between the Spanish Football Federation (FEF), until now governing the competition, and the newly created body that, starting next season, will will manage.

"It's an important day not only for women's football but for sport in Spain as a whole. The CSD Board of Directors unanimously approved the statutes of the new women's professional soccer league. We are in a position to say that we are going to make history, with a truly relevant milestone: the first professional women's league that crystallizes a true country project", José Manuel Franco, Secretary of State for Sports, congratulated himself at the official act after the The meeting was also attended by Luis Rubiales, president of the FEF, leaders of the AFE, Futbolistas On and FutPro unions, as well as around twenty players from the Iberdrola League.

“It is finally a reality. Spain settles a debt with its female athletes, to whom we owed this recognition after three quarters of negotiation and dialogue, because all parties have to give in. A consensus that is no longer capricious, manifests a clear collective intention. Equal opportunities in sport and football as the locomotive that drives other sports. That women's sport continues to grow because they deserve it after the unfair historical inequality that we drag and that we will do everything possible to stop it from existing, "added Franco, satisfied with bringing to fruition one of those who have been the pillars of his management since his arrival in office a year ago, "a firm and decisive commitment not only by the CSD but also by the Government of Spain."

"Today is a happy day," summarized Rubiales, who while waiting to outline the coordination agreement between the Federation and the governing body of the new league that is yet to be created, recalled "the investments and commitment of the Federation and of José Manuel Franco for taking the step that closes today». "You have the merit of this," he told Franco, whom he thanked for his "message of education and equality to society." "Thank you and let's go ahead," concluded the federal president.

"A historic day"

The start-up of the professional women's football league will also make it possible to unblock the promised economic aid, for an amount of around 32 million euros, half of which will come from European funds, which will allow the improvement of the structures of the different clubs as well as the construction of new facilities or the improvement of existing ones.

The players, the great protagonists, also had words of gratitude for a decision that definitely boosts the professional league, a promise that they have had to wait for nine long months since the creation of the new competition was approved last June 2021 «Thanks to all those who fight and have fought for this, the League that women's sports and soccer deserve. That this is not a pattern but that much more steps be taken, "said Marta Carro, captain of Valencia.

And it is that for the statutes of the new competition to finally become a reality, many negotiations and rapprochement between Real Madrid, Barcelona and Athletic, who had their own proposal, and the clubs still integrated within the Association of Clubs of Women's Soccer (ACFF). “It is a historic day, many years in search of this and in the end we have achieved it”, congratulated Sheila Elorza, captain of Eibar and who gave voice to the general feeling among the players of the highest category of Fenenino soccer in Spain.



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