Canadian women's soccer players 'outraged and deeply concerned' over funding cuts
CBC
The ongoing labour dispute between Canada Soccer and its men's and women's teams boiled over Friday with threats of job action from the women and a call for Sport Minister Pascale St-Onge to step in from the men.
"Enough is enough," women's captain Christine Sinclair said.
Sinclair said the women, currently in Orlando, Fla., preparing for the SheBelieves Cup, will not train or play.
"As a team, we've decided to take job action and from this moment on we'll not be participating in any Canadian Soccer Association activities until this is resolved," she told TSN. "Whether that's training, whether that's games."
"Until this is resolved, I can't represent this federation," added Sinclair, the world's all-time leading goal-scorer who has won 319 caps for Canada.
The two teams laid out a list of grievances in separate open letters posted on social media.
The women's team said it is "outraged and deeply concerned with the news of significant cuts" to national team programs as it prepares for this summer's World Cup.
"With the biggest tournament in women's football history less than six months away, our preparation for the World Cup and the future success of the women's national team's program are being compromised by Canada Soccer's continued inability to supports its national teams," the women said in a statement posted on social media.
"Despite our strong track record of success and history-making achievements for more than a decade, we continue to be told there is not enough money to adequately fund our program and our youth teams."
Both teams have been embroiled in labour talks for months with Canada Soccer. The Canadian men refused to play a planned friendly in Vancouver last summer because of their unhappiness at the state of the negotiations, which included division of prize money from the men's World Cup in Qatar.
The sixth-ranked women say they are being told "to perform at a world-class level without the same level of support that was received by the men's national team in 2022, and with significant cuts to our program — to simply make do with less."
The women say the number of players and staff coming to camp has been cut, as have training camp days.
Both programs and their associated youth teams have had their budgets "substantially cut," the 53rd-ranked men said.
"How Canada Soccer is allocating or using funds is unclear and cloaked in secrecy," their statement said.
