The employees of the club did not all seem to know in the middle of the afternoon. However, the information had leaked on the Team site an hour earlier. Deprived of the Champions League at least until April 12, Starligue until April 22 and international players not even having the Olympic qualification tournament scheduled in Paris (April 17-19) but postponed to consider: the club handball Montpellier took an unprecedented step and not without consequences. Until further notice, it places part of its staff and players on partial unemployment for economic reasons and closes all its installations by sanitary measures. "I announced it to the players," says Julien Deljarry, the Montpellier president. For more than a month at least, we will no longer have match revenue. We are a business like any other with charges. We must not believe that sport is not affected by economic constraints. Without a recipe, balancing a budget is obviously very complicated, if not impossible. We have little choice but this measure which does not please anyone but in exceptional crisis, exceptional measure "
A giant with a budget of € 8.2m
On the French sports map, Montpellier is a giant with the Starligue's second budget: € 8.237 million behind that of the PSG (€ 17.452 million). He seemed more than others safe from such a measure which affected all club employees: the administrative staff, the technical staff and the players, but not the players of the first team subjected to a special regime. "Be careful, warns Jean-Jacques Bertrand, sports lawyer in Paris. A fixed-term contract cannot be put to partial unemployment whatever its activity. An athlete who has signed a contract for one year, two years or more is considered to be on a fixed-term contract and partial unemployment cannot be applied for. In a sports club, this can therefore only concern administrative personnel, technical managers or others. "The players can therefore only be put to rest for lack of activity and their remuneration depends entirely on the club, without the aid envisaged by the State:" We have requirements to satisfy, continues Julien Deljarry. Preserve the health of our employees, sports equity and the economic survival of our business. We must comply with what the President of the Republic asked for and count on the financial aid from the State announced in terms of aid to continue to pay our employees without loss of salary. "
All club facilities (weight rooms, gymnasiums, etc.) being closed, players have no way of training until further notice. As soon as the resumption of the games is announced, life will resume its normal course but it could take several weeks.
At this time, the 2018 European champion is the first and only pro club in France, all disciplines combined, to make this decision: "I think all the clubs are doing it or will do it," concludes Julien Deljarry. We are just the first to say it. "