Notice: This Season’s Soccer Is Cancelled!

August 6th, 2009

Luckily, this notice is not in the UK, Italy or Spain, but in Argentina, a country no less passionate about its soccer.

As always, the issue is money, or the lack of it, and the result was that the planned kickoff to the Argentine domestic soccer season on Tuesday was put on hold indefinitely, while the game’s national governing body seeks a solution to clubs massive debts. “For the time being there will be no soccer,” Julio Grondona, head of the Argentine Football Association said Tuesday.

That’s hard to believe – no soccer while the national governing body looks for money!

Debts of up to 40 million pesos, ($10.5 million) at clubs like River Plate, Independiente, Racing, Newell’s and Rosario Central are the problem. These are not new issues and negotiations involving a new TV deal are in progress. There is also a plan to ease Internet betting in an effort to generate revenue for the clubs, but everything eventually broke down and the cash-strapped teams are left high, dry and cashless.

It seems that many of the affected teams depend on transfer fees from European clubs for talented young players, but few youngsters are on the sales block and the cash flow has dried up while the European clubs do their shopping elsewhere. Certainly the amounts of money changing hands for soccer players have increased, according to recent prices paid for players.

The soccer public is not happy – Reuters reported that the A.F.A. headquarters in Buenos Aires was attacked by about 100 people who arrived in two buses, threw stones at the building, broke windows and demanded the resignation of AFA president Julio Grondona.

How much money are we talking about? It’s not chickenfeed. Clubs owe the government 300 million Argentine pesos ($78.5 million) in taxes plus other debts to the AFA and to their own players. Owing money to their own players sounds completely counter-productive!

I have little doubt that a solution will be found quickly and the fears of a “soccer-less” Argentina put to rest. It’s almost unthinkable that one of the world’s most soccer-mad countries is balancing on the edge of a ball-less season.

Or could we be looking at a giant bargaining ploy? On Monday, the AFA asked the TV companies to pay 720 million pesos, up from the 268 million pesos originally agreed. Latest news is that the TV companies are considering a counter-proposal that includes a contract extension with the AFA from the present 2014 expiry date to 2020 and advance payments to clubs to cover their current debts.

It seems that much is wrong and neglected in the Argentine soccer world. There are reports that the clubs are poorly run; the directors make mistakes and don’t meet their obligations. An local soccer fan who watches soccer in Europe commented, “The game is poorly commercialized, it’s obsolete … There are infrastructure, the bathrooms of some clubs look like Kosovo.”

Hopefully the TV authority will cough up enough money to put everything right!

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 6th, 2009 at 6:41 am and is filed under Personal / Internet. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Leave a Reply

Click here to cancel reply.

Name (required)

Mail (will not be published) (required)

Website