By Andrew Warshaw
July 2 – FIFA and UEFA should share television revenues from their respective tournaments with footballers who most need financial help, according to international players union FIFPro board member Joaquim Evangelista. Evangelista, head of the Portuguese Professional Footballers Association, said he would urge fellow board members at this week’s FIFPro general assembly in the Netherlands to lobby football’s governing bodies to hand out more of their money to unions in countries where players are struggling.
“FIFA and UEFA should stop the rhetoric and support players concretely,” he said.
“We deal with the biggest problems in football: human dramas. So those who benefit the most from players (FIFA and UEFA) should also show solidarity A percentage of TV rights revenues should go to help players through the unions.”
The sale of broadcasting rights for the 2014 World in Brazil has generated an estimated $437m while the just-completed Confederations Cup broke all television audience records.
Evangelista told Reuters that players themselves needed financial support as much as clubs and national federations, strange though that may seem given the salaries many footballers can attract.
“FIFA should help us cater for the most dramatic cases or support some specific programmes like our summer training camps for out-of-contract players,” he said.
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