Wales announces that it will pay the same to men and women footballers

The Football Association of Wales has announced this Thursday that it has reached an agreement with the men's and women's national teams to achieve equal pay.

The new commitment will cover future international matches from the 2026 Men's World Cup and the 2027 Women's World Cup. Wales joins the list led by the Norwegian federation, the first to equalize salaries in 2017. It was followed by countries like the United States United States, England, Brazil, Denmark, the Netherlands, Ireland, Finland or Australia.

Both Welsh teams have issued a joint statement in response to the announcement under the slogan: “Stronger together”.

Noel Mooney, director general of the Football Association of Wales has been proud of the agreement: “The Federation is a modern and progressive entity that seeks to improve every day.

Let's hope future generations of boys and girls see that there is equality in Welsh international football, which is good for society."

🏴The Football Association of Wales is pleased to announce that it has reached an agreement with the @Cymru Men's and Women's National Teams to achieve equal pay.#TogetherStronger

— FA WALES (@FAWales) January 18, 2023

Despite the advances made by the countries that have agreed on salary equality, there are cases in which equality has only been possible when the men's team has given up part of their salary, as happened in Norway or Ireland.

However, despite the fact that the salaries are the same, there is still a great inequality in the final remuneration of women soccer players.

This is due to the huge gap that exists between men's and women's prize money in all competitions, both FIFA and UEFA, which pay men much more.

An example of this is the 2022 Women's Euro Cup, which distributed 16 million euros last summer, for the 371 million that the same tournament delivered in the men's category in 2021.

Spain: equal bonuses, but not salary

Spain is still far from salary equality.

The Royal Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) announced last June that they would equalize the percentages of the premiums for the women's and men's teams, although without charging the same.

It was an agreement that came after months of negotiation between the president, Luis Rubiales, and the captains of the national team at that time.

Both the men's and women's teams earn the same percentage in the FIFA and UEFA prizes.

However, the money that reaches the female categories is still much lower.

Something that also has to do with the sponsors, since in the RFEF the advertisers are not always the same for both teams and move in very different numbers.

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