It's a long way to where you live

it's only a 6 hours flight to NYC.

Shlj I dont live in NYC I live in England.

Yes - around a 6 hour drive instead of a 6 hour flight

SVT reports that Marta has agreed to a contract with Swedish club Umeå for the 2008 season. Expressen says her salary will be doubled as she can earn 1.2 million kronor for 2008 (approx. $187,500 USA dollars) and that the LA Galaxy ownership who will have a franchise in the new U.S. women's league had offered her 7-year 7 million kronor contract (over 1 million USA dollars for seven years). (Previous links in Swedish) Damallsvenskan Newsblog has explains the showy way Marta announced to her home fans that she is coming back.

Lotta Schelin has agreed to stay at Göteborgs FC for one more year. She talks about her decision to re-sign with the Swedish club with SVT (video). (Swedish)

Is it just me or are a lot of young talented international players signing one year contracts? Is this typical in European leagues or do you think they are considering crossing the Atlantic for 2009?

Source:
http://www.ooosasoccer.com/

I think most teams in Europe do 1 year contract, in UK the transfer window is open till February and trasnfer do happen regularly.

Both could be considering going back to the states if they have only signed one year contracts but it would be a gamble to join the pro league in the sates at a very early stage in it's relaunch. I've not heard of any girls in the English league thinking about going over there.

Thanks, I figured that's how it worked. I get your point about it being a big risk in the first year, so some might wait a year. But at the same time, in the back of their minds the younger players know that people like: Fleeting, Smith and Prinz seemed to benefit from their tenures in the US, so they might be a bit impatient about the opportunity.

Apparently Marta went on to say, "I can see myself playing there." about the American league and I know that Simone Laudehr of Germany said she would seriously consider it after she's done at Duisberg, and I also swear I read or heard Lotta Schelin say she would be open to it, so you never know.

Anyway, totaling speculating, thanks for your help.

It's gonna be a case of wait and see. It's a long way off and things change. I know of one player who wouldn't go as she said so during the world cup.

Who's the one player?

Emma Byrne , she said she's settled where she is.

Well, good for her. I've always expected the older more settled ones to stay, they just don't get paid enough to pick up whatever they've got and move it. But when you're in your early twenties it could be still seen as fun. It's a shame that the USSF never encouraged the young kids in the USWNT to play a little more club in Europe during the gap years.

I am sure some young players would be happy to make a living there in a few years time.

There was a five minute bit on the England women on five live this morning. Apparently the girls aren't happy and I don't blame them. For the Word Cup they got £2,100 gross pay , after tax it was £1400 which worked out at £40 a day for their time out in China. The girls are now having to work extra hours to make up for loss of earnings , especially those who took unpaid leave.

The FA say they've put more money into the women's football than ever before and there's advertising revenue coming in. Both Casey Stoney and Eni Aluko who were on this morning said they were disappointed with the FA for money payed to them. There not asking for much said Casey Stoney , just what they deserve. They love playing for their country but now their fitness levels are suffering because they have to train less due to working more to make up the money lost.

This is disgusting in my book , it's just another case of the girls being shoved in the background. If the FA have put in so much money where it is! I would like to see more of the England women's games on tv , this is the only way your gonna boost the game and get the money coming in. Unlike the men the girls aren't paid massive wages by their club if at all , they play for the love of the game. Would it kill the FA to pay them that little bit more

I think I might of drifted off track there a little

Drift off all you like smithy - you can chat about anything in this section, and you're the boss now after all

It is pathetic how little they get, and the FA should do something about it.

I phoned and ordered 2 tickets for the England - Spain game at Shrewsbury today, and I got the impression they're not expecting a large crowd, which isn't surprising, as Shrewsbury is a bit out of the way and a 7pm ko on a Sunday there is not destined to get people travelling for miles.

It's costing £5 a ticket, £7 for the car park sticker and £1 postage. I assume a fair amount of the takings will go to Shrewsbury Town, and I don't begrudge it to a small club.

But, any guesses regarding how much the players will pick up? It is a European qualifier after all, so they deserve a decent amount.

I'm also totally fed up with the amount of time and space the media have given to other internationals coming up.
So far, I reckon England (men) have 96% of the coverage, Scotland 3%, Wales and Ireland the rest.
England ladies - zilch.

So they paid 21 people under 50,000 pounds for about 2 months work, how they can look at themselves without throwing up in their mouth a little bit is beyond me.

I don't know the specifics of the FA, but I'm assuming with the popularity of the English men's team it has obscene amounts of money. It'd be one thing if this was a league and they really needed to turn a profit ASAP, but I'm assumming that's no where near the case and that's how much the FA spends on toilet paper in a month and with the other expenses added in the women players are probably asking for about 0.03% of the yearly budget. Is asking people to be in the vicinity of reasonable too much these days?

It'd be nice to see the FA want to do the right thing, but if the report embarasses them into doing the right thing that'd work to. Maybe give them a bonus for getting out of the group stage.

She must be good to play with only one leg...

The men get paid sooooo much by their clubs but when they play for England it is a lot less but still a lot more than the women get. I can't remember now how much the men get paid but after tax it's still alot and with the amount they get from their clubs they don't notice the difference.
Faye White the England captain is the latest Woman to come out now and voice her disapproval.

What has Faye said then?

And I see Bluey is having a bit of fun here

Mmmm. Kelly Smith.....Big Thighs......One Leg......Mmmmmm

Stop it, you'll get me all excited.


I was one of those people to have a go at female tennis players, for doing less work and still asking for equal money.
So, it's logical that I take the womens side in this argument. Yes, they do the same work and they should be paid equally-ish.

I'm 100% certain that the FA would do that, if only they had the money to do so.
It's unfortunate that the Womens game has not taken off in the way that Mens has and did.
While some clubs are dying, there are record numbers of people interested in the game, which is great.
Just a matter of waiting to see it develop and hope for the best.

It's great for the FA to get people interested, but if you don't get anyone turning up to watch, the game will die very quickly. I think that's the main point....need money and most of the regular money comes from fans. No fans = no money = no football. Men's game = fans = lots of money.

Ok, so I said the FA would give you more cash if they could...yeah, they should give more now, but would you? if you were the FA?

I've thought of a genuine idea which involves naked models playing against and all-star womens team.
Obviously I won't suggest it.