When playing with the round leather, Olaf Scholz is a typical event fan. The Chancellor once admitted that he was “not a great football expert,” “but I’m a football fan when it comes to big tournaments.”
Above all, the European Championship for women in England, which has just ended, has delighted grandstand guest Scholz – and prompted an advance that, depending on your point of view, can sound daring, naive or long overdue.
At the meeting with those responsible for the German Football Association (DFB) on Tuesday, the SPD politician wants to primarily discuss the issue of payment in women’s and men’s football. Scholz said when he visited the European Championship final between Germany and hosts England: “I am firmly convinced that equal pay plays an important role, especially when it comes to competitions like this.”
“Great honor” for the DFB
DFB Managing Director Oliver Bierhoff, who received the Chancellor together with President Bernd Neuendorf and Vice-President Célia Šaši? on the DFB campus earlier in the afternoon, is looking forward to the exchange. It was a “great honor” that Scholz accepted his invitation, said Bierhoff. On the occasion, he could also “enlighten him a little better about the numbers”.
With his message with the hashtag posted on Twitter during the EM
The reality is different. For the European Championship title, the DFB women each received 60,000 euros, while the men received 400,000 euros a year earlier. National coach Martina Voss-Tecklenburg would like the bonuses to be at least equal, “perhaps at some point the same money for the same title,” as the 54-year-old said at Bayern 1. However, Voss-Tecklenburg did not agree with the demand for a generally equal payment: “I have to contradict the Chancellor on that.”
Equal pay arouses skepticism
Skepticism is also high in the consulting scene. “I have a hard time with equal pay. In my world, you are paid based on supply and demand,” said Jörg Neblung, who now advises 40 clients – including goalkeeper Almuth Schult – to the Münchner Merkur. According to his professional colleague Felix Seidel, the topic is currently being dealt with “too much populism” and he doesn’t know “any German player who is screaming for the same pay as her male colleagues”.
The concrete demands of women’s football are different: visibility, equal opportunities, acceptance. Kick-off times during prime time would be an important step. According to a current survey by the opinion research institute Civey on behalf of “t-online”, at least a third of the fans surveyed want to follow the women’s Bundesliga more closely in the future.
The introduction of basic salaries is also required. There are still female soccer players “who play in the Bundesliga and cannot even finance their livelihood with their salary,” reported Seidel.
There is a will to change
At least the will to change is there. They work “closely with the DFB” and see “where we can support further professionalization,” said Managing Director Donata Hopfen of the German Football League of the “Süddeutsche Zeitung”. Bayern Munich President Herbert Hainer also wants to push the development forward: “Football also has a female side, and we all have to promote that a lot more together.”
It is important “that well-known personalities work for us,” said national goalkeeper Merle Frohms. But the footballers had heard similarly benevolent sentences after the home World Cup in 2011 – little happened after that. “Don’t just talk, but let the facts follow,” Voss-Tecklenburg demanded in the ZDF “Sports Studio”. At the moment, however, she has the feeling “that it’s not just lip service and symbolic politics.”
The footballers will therefore be watching closely what Scholz’s visit to the DFB will bring in concrete terms.
