This strike is the umpteenth episode of the conflict between the Royal Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) and the Women’s Professional Football League (LPFF), two organizations that are at odds with each other. In fact, both went so far as to announce that they would be the ones to draw the League calendar, which led to the intervention of the Higher Sports Council to avoid having two different calendars. When everything seemed ready for the start of the championship, however, the referee strike has arrived. The group claims to professionalize their work and be able to be above the interprofessional minimum wage. The arbitral tribunal has confirmed that a press conference will be held this Monday in which information will be given on the state of negotiations between the RFEF, the LPFF, the CSD and the arbitrators.
Zubizarreta: “It’s not a very professional image”
In a new press release published by the LPFF after midnight, the club’s obligation to be present on the pitch has been reiterated despite being aware that the referees have not traveled and will not be present at the match. It doesn’t affect him much at Barça, as he had to make his debut on Sunday in the derby against Llevant Les Planes, in Sant Joan Despí, a Catalan team that is making its debut this season. Markel Zubizarreta, general manager of the women’s Barça, spoke at the Ciutat Esportiva Joan Gamper: “The information we have at this time are basically the statements that have come out from both the referees’ committee and the League. We will prepare the game in the same way and tomorrow we will show up to play. It’s important to give an image of a professional league, and I honestly think that by not playing on the first day we wouldn’t be giving that image. I understand that it’s a global problem, it’s not just a committee problem technical referees, but they must agree as has happened to us in many things between the League, Federation and CSD, but I think they must sit at a table and make a regulation, an operation in accordance with the Professional Football League”. According to Zubizarreta, “everything has been done late”: “We found out the number of non-EU players two days before the market closed, now the referees are also late… In the end, I think everything must be regulated with the Professional League : referees, facilities, regulations… There is no doubt about that. What we do believe is that everything should have been ready to start the League when it was due.”
“We hope that we will not find more problems, but it is clear that if someone wants to have problems, it is easy to find them. I think that both the Federation and the F League must agree on many things in order to start. These negotiations they must be carried out as quickly as possible so that we operate like a professional league and not with the image we are giving if this day is not contested. [de no jugar el primer partit de Lliga] they are the players and the coaching staff, who have been working for a month and a half to play. More than anything because if the League had started later, maybe we would have had more holidays, all the training planning was thinking about playing tomorrow… If that doesn’t happen, it’s clear that it doesn’t help us at all”, he added.
Ferran Cabello, coach and sporting director of Levante Las Planes, maintains the same line as Markel Zubizarreta. “What we will do is carry out our professional activity. We will come to the stadium, we will warm up and prepare as if the match situation were normal, but we already understand that it will be very complicated for us to play the match”, he acknowledges. “The situation worries us because we are being asked for certain requirements and we are complying with all the steps we had to take and now one day before the beginning of a league that must be professional, where everything must begin in change and where a professional image must be given, because we are already in an uncomfortable situation that will cause them not to compete on the first day”, he concludes.
