Messi, Ronaldo among soccer stars to forgo millions in wages due to the coronavirus
Like many workers around the world, Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo and their teammates agreed to take massive pay cuts during the coronavirus crisis to help ease the financial burden on their employers. Between the two stars, they will forgo close to $75 million in wages and each also donated more than $1 million to hospitals in their hometowns.
As European soccer leagues and tournaments are shut down indefinitely, some of the world’s most storied clubs asked their players to give up wages. They obliged.
Ronaldo and his Juventus teammates along with coach Maurizio Sarri agreed to forgo $100 million in salary. The club announced that the money amounted to four months’ worth of wages, a third of players’ salaries. Ronaldo, the highest-paid player in the Italian league, will give up more than $11 million. Ronaldo and his agent, Jorge Mendes, also donated $1.8 million to help hospitals in his native Portugal.
Serie A suspended all matches on March 9.
As of Wednesday afternoon, Italy, a nation of 60 million people, had reported 13,155 coronavirus-related deaths, more than any country in the world with a rate of 218 per million. The United States, by contrast, currently has 4,718 deaths, which is 14 per million.
“Due to the current global health emergency preventing the performance of the sporting activity, Juventus has reached an understanding with the players and the coach of the first team regarding their compensation for the residual portion of the current sport season,” the team statement said. “The understanding provides for the reduction of the compensation for an amount equal to the monthly wages of March, April, May and June 2020.”
Meanwhile, in Spain, Messi and his FC Barcelona teammates agreed to a 70 percent pay cut and will make an extra contribution to make sure the club’s other employees can earn their full salaries during the coronavirus crisis.
“As well as the 70 percent reduction in our salaries during the national state of emergency, we will make a contribution so that the club’s employees can earn 100 percent of their salaries during this time,” Messi announced on Instagram.
Messi will lose $64 million in wages. He also donated $1.1 million to two hospitals, one in his native Rosario, Argentina, and one in Barcelona, Spain, the second-most-impacted European country with 9,387 deaths thus far.
FC Barcelona president Josep Maria Bartomeu praised the players for their generosity.
“From the first moment, Messi said that this must be done,” Bartomeu told Spanish media. “It is a gesture that demonstrates their commitment to the club. I wanted it to be something agreed and not imposed. It has been achieved as I wanted and the players were committed from day one. ... The squad will not only have their salaries cut by 70 percent during this period of inactivity, but an additional 2 percent so that club employees who are non-sporting staff can keep their salaries. This proposal came from the captains.”
Despite the significant wage cuts, Messi, Ronaldo and other European soccer stars will still earn tens of millions of dollars between salary and endorsements.
Barcelona boasts the world’s highest-paid roster in any sport, with an average annual salary of $13.6 million, according to Sporting Intelligence’s Global Sports Salary Survey.
Messi, the world’s highest-paid soccer player, is still among the richest athletes in any sport even with the pay cut. According to Forbes’ list of World’s Highest-Paid Athletes, he was due to make $92 million annually in salary and bonuses and $35 million in endorsements for a total of $127 million.
With a reduction of 70 percent in wages, he will still make $64 million — $29 million in salary, $35 million in endorsements.
Ronaldo was due to make $65 million in wages and $44 million in endorsements. With the pay cut, he could still earn $91 million this year.
Other European clubs that have announced player pay cuts include Borussia Dortmund, Atletico Madrid, Espanyol and Alaves.
Forbes estimates the cost of canceling four months of league play, plus Champions League and the Euro 2020 tournament could total $4 billion in lost ticket revenue, TV and radio broadcast rights, sponsorships and merchandise.
Inter Miami players, whose inaugural Major League Soccer season is also on hold, have been watching the news from Europe with interest. Some of them have spoken among themselves about how they can help the less-fortunate during the crisis and are trying to come up with ideas. The average salary in MLS last season was $411,926, but a third of the players earned less than $100,000.
“I think that’s great [European players forgoing salaries], but it’s not something we’ve talked about,” Inter Miami defender Ben Sweat said. “Personally, I think if most of the players in MLS were making the amount of money the European players were, I think we might have done something individually to help. It’s pretty easy when you’re making millions of dollars a year to make a decision like that. We want to help the community, help our staff the best we can, whether that’s with our salaries or in another way, that’s something down the road we will talk about.”
This story was originally published April 1, 2020 at 7:00 PM.