English football players brought the whole country to tears of happiness by winning the women’s Euro 2022. Local newspapers are full of headlines that football is finally home and that girls have saved the entire population of England from the pain that lasted 56 years. But they received 15 times less for winning the tournament than their male counterparts a year ago for losing in the Euro 2020 final.
Two European Championship finals in a row were held at Wembley – the men’s one year ago and the women’s this Sunday. Both were played by England. Only the men lost miserably to the Italians, and the “lionesses” were stronger than the German national team and finally brought joy to their compatriots.
The founders of football have not achieved victories in major tournaments since 1966, when the German national team was also beaten in the final of the 1966 home World Cup. There were no women’s tournaments then.
They had high hopes for the men’s Euro 96, which was also held in England, and for which the song Three Lions (It’s coming home) was specially written, which since then English fans have been singing in all stadiums and tournaments. But even there, the “lions” lost in the semi-finals (and again to Germany!). So all this time the British were waiting for “football to return home.”
And they waited. Already in extra time, Chloe Kelly scored the winning goal, making an entire nation happy. Residents of the country in love with football celebrated the triumph all night and even demanded an extra day off on Monday for such a reason.
The heroines of this football evening were no less delighted, and not one of them complained that “by saving England from 56 years of pain”, they would receive 15 times less prize money than the male losers received a year ago.
This year, UEFA doubled the prize fund of the women’s tournament – in 2017 at the last European Championship it was 8 million euros, and this year – as much as 16 million! 60 percent of this amount was equally distributed among each of the 16 participating teams, while the remaining 40 were paid depending on the results. Thus, the British received 600 thousand euros for the whole crowd for participating in the tournament, 660 thousand for winning it. And a total of 2 million euros, since they also won all the matches of the group stage.
The British media calculated that each would receive 65.5 thousand euros for this incredible success (not the entire amount will be distributed to the players – there is also a coaching staff), and this amount is equal to the daily earnings of Cristiano Ronaldo at Manchester United.
For the men’s European Championship last year, despite the pandemic, UEFA also increased spending – from 304 million euros in prize money in 2016 to 371 million in 2021. The winner of the tournament received 10 million euros, and the finalist – 7 million.
Each team also received a base income of 9.25 million euros, and further also depending on the results. As a result, the England men’s team accumulated income of 29 million, reaching the final and losing there. Thus, each of them earned almost a million.
16 million in prize money versus 371 million for the entire tournament, 2 million for a win versus almost 30 million for reaching the final. Given that the match between the women’s teams of England and Germany at Wembley was attended by 87,192 spectators, which was a record for both women’s and men’s European Championships. And where is the justice?
