European Football Association (Uefa) is distributing around 470 million kronor in prize money in the European Championship – an increase of 156 percent compared to the European Championship in England 2022. How large a share of the cake each nation gets, in addition to the 20 million they are guaranteed for qualifying for the championship, is decided by how far they go in the tournament.
”Going in the right direction”
New for this year's European Championship is that Uefa has decided that each country must give 30-40 percent to the player squad.
This means that each player can get close to one million kronor if Sweden wins the championship – and at least 260,000 if Sweden flops and loses all matches.
It's incredibly important. It shows that it's going in the right direction. It's very positive when you read about it, so I hope it continues like that, says Fiorentina star Madelen Janogy.
Striker Rebecka Blomqvist agrees:
It's something we've been fighting for. That something happens in that way, and that we get to take part in it, it feels nice.
Exactly how many percent of the revenue the Swedish players will get is not clear yet. According to Sweden's press chief Fredrik Madestam, negotiations are still ongoing with the players and their representatives.
Infected issue
The issue of player compensation in the national team has long been highly debated. One who has been at the forefront of the fight for more equal economic distribution is Sweden's former team captain Nilla Fisher. In 2020, she reported the Swedish Football Association to the Discrimination Ombudsman (DO) for the different compensation that applied to the men's and women's national teams. A report that DO rejected when they considered that the two national teams "are not in a comparable situation".
Compared to the men's European Championship last year, the women's national teams are still a good bit behind, where the winners Spain received over 310 million for their victory. On the men's side, however, the players were not guaranteed any prize money from Uefa, but rather how much the squad would get to share was negotiated between the association and the players.
