Soccer with no fans 'massive concern' economically, says players' union

RESENDING WITH COMPLETE SCRIPT

VIDEO SHOWS: INTERVIEW WITH FIFPRO GENERAL SECRETARY JONAS BAER-HOFFMANN IN WHICH HE TALKS ABOUT THE ECONOMIC NEED OF FANS TO ATTEND GAMES, FIFA'S COVID RELIEF FUND, THE DANGERS OF PLAY BURN OUT / FILE FOOTAGE OF FANS AND STADIUMS, PLAYERS TRAINING AND FIFA SIGNAGE

SHOWS:

LIVERPOOL, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM (FILE - JUNE 25, 2020) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL)

1. VARIOUS OF LIVERPOOL FANS CELEBRATING AFTER THEY WON THE PREMIER LEAGUE

HEIDELBERG, GERMANY (SEPTEMBER 24, 2020) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL)

2. (SOUNDBITE) (English) FIFPRO GENERAL SECRETARY, JONAS BAER-HOFFMANN, TALKING ABOUT NOT HAVING FANS IN THE STADIUM, SAYING:

"It is a massive concern, for sure. I think when we are talking Premier League, Bundesliga etc. it will have an impact there. But these leagues have other substantial sources of income than for example lower leagues in England or let's say a league in Scotland or another much smaller footballing market that very heavily depend on match day revenue, but who also heavily depend on of course their sponsors to be attracted by their exposure they get to match day attendance and some leagues are close to 50% when it comes to dependence on their match day income. So, the longer this of course gets delayed, the more severe the economic situation will become. And as a matter of fact, the way that we are seeing it now, probably economically, this current season now just starting will be harder on football than the one we just left behind us where we had a massive impact but it was in a fairly short amount of time in terms of the overall duration of the season. Whereas now we may be going half or two thirds through the season without significant attendance and that will hit the industry hard and which will trickle down to the position of players, the wages they can receive and that is of course not only the millionaire players who are very well compensated at the top of our game, but that is also guys and women who are making a few thousands, possibly less a month, and for those the impact will be just as severe as the impact on any other part of our countries."

MANCHESTER, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM (FILE - JULY 13, 2020) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL)

3. VARIOUS EXTERIORS OF MANCHESTER CITY'S ETIHAD STADIUM

HEIDELBERG, GERMANY (SEPTEMBER 24, 2020) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL)

4. (SOUNDBITE) (English) FIFPRO GENERAL SECRETARY, JONAS BAER-HOFFMANN

"What I think is important is when there is a chance to combine a very well developed protocol that the competition organisers are putting in place with a decent state of the pandemic in that certain location, then we do try to find a way to get fans back. Which is of course in the interest of the game itself. It is just not the same without fans. It is probably 50% less at least and economically the impact is severe, but we want to be cautious, not be advising governments on how they manage public health and that needs to be their primary concern."

ZURICH, SWITZERLAND (FILE) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL)

5. VARIOUS OF SIGNAGE AND FLAGS OUTSIDE FIFA HEADQUARTERS

HEIDELBERG, GERMANY (SEPTEMBER 24, 2020) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL)

6. (SOUNDBITE) (English) FIFPRO GENERAL SECRETARY, JONAS BAER-HOFFMANN, TALKING ABOUT FIFA'S COVID RELIEF FUND, SAYING:

"The question is the way this programme is structured is whether the money ends up in the right corners, and we have many countries which players really may be going months and months without receiving their salaries. Clubs may be close to insolvency. We are really very concerned of course that the federations now of course need to do the right thing and they invest the money in the right corners. And not in every part of the world are we terribly encouraged with what we have seen in the past and how money has been spent, and really at this time, it is not important to build more office buildings or fancy infrastructure, we need to make sure that the game is picked up from the ground up, which is of course the amateur game, but which is also the lower part of the professional game, and hopefully this money really kicks in in these corners, to make sure that we don't have insolvencies coming our way. We may have players leaving the professional game, contracts not being honoured, a lot of disputes coming in between clubs and players, so somehow manage the economic impact of the crisis."

COLOGNE, GERMANY (FILE - AUGUST 15, 2020) (UEFA - PART NO RESALES. NO COMMERCIAL USE. MUST ON-SCREEN COURTESY "©UEFA 2020")

7. VARIOUS OF MANCHESTER UNITED TRAINING AHEAD OF EUROPA LEAGUE SEMI-FINAL AGAINST SEVILLA

HEIDELBERG, GERMANY (SEPTEMBER 24, 2020) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL)

8. (SOUNDBITE) (English) FIFPRO GENERAL SECRETARY, JONAS BAER-HOFFMANN, TALKING ABOUT PLAYERS SUFFERING FROM BURNOUT, SAYING:

"We have already seen over the last few years in studies that we have done, that a lot of players very frequently do not get medically reasonable rest time between matches, they don't have the off-season breaks, they have mid-season breaks and need to recover fully. And now we are cramming more games into shorter periods of time, and that will have an impact on wear and tear type injuries, muscle pulls and things like that, and we are very concerned that these numbers of injuries will be increasing. And that is where everybody in the end loses, the player in regard to his career and the fans who are trying to watch players playing at their peak, when it matters most."

COLOGNE, GERMANY (AUGUST 15, 2020) (UEFA - PART NO RESALES. NO COMMERCIAL USE. MUST ON-SCREEN COURTESY "©UEFA 2020")

9. VARIOUS OF MANCHESTER UNITED TRAINING AHEAD OF EUROPA LEAGUE SEMI-FINAL AGAINST SEVILLA

STORY: FIFPRO, which represents around 65,000 professional soccer players around the world, says the new soccer season will be a "severe" economic challenge for clubs if fans cannot attend matches.

This week the UK government announced that a pilot scheme to get fans back into stadiums in October would be postponed due to a rise in coronavirus cases.

However, supporters have been attending Bundesliga matches - in reduced numbers - and Thursday's UEFA Super Cup in Budapest between Bayern Munich and Sevilla will go ahead with people watching on from the stands.

Speaking to Reuters on Thursday (September 24), FIFPRO General Secretary Jonas Baer-Hoffmann said the current situation was of 'massive concern' and while clubs in big European leagues have substantial sources of other income, others lower down the chain were facing huge uncertainty, which in turn would impact on player wages.

He also warned there was a danger that players would suffer an increase in injuries as they were being asked to play more matches in a shortened period of time due to the season beginning later.

(Production: Iain Axon)