Los Angeles (AFP)
The lawsuit brought by the American soccer players, two reigning world champions, against their Federation to claim wages equal to those of their male counterparts will be judged on May 5, 2020, announced a spokesperson for the women footballers on Monday.
This complaint of discrimination, which aims in particular to denounce the inequity of wages and working conditions between men and women in football, was filed on March 8 by 28 female footballers.
Although discussions have begun between the two parties, they are currently at a standstill. The announcement of the date of the trial, decided Monday by federal judge R. Gary Klausner in Los Angeles (California), comes a week after the freeze on these talks.
"We are delighted with the date on which the trial was set, it will be coming soon, we are in a hurry to move forward on this issue, we are already looking forward to May 2020, when the players will give their side of the story," he said. Monday Molly Levinson, one of the mouthpieces of American footballers in a statement.
"We hope these world champions will receive what they are legally entitled to: fair wages and working conditions, nothing less," she added.
Although an agreement could be reached before that date, for the moment, the trial was scheduled in the middle of the rally of the National Women's Team for the preparation of the Tokyo-2020 Olympic Games (July 24 - August 9).
With slogans "Equal pay!", The question of the equity of wages between men and women had been put in front of the scene during the last Soccer World Cup, organized in France (June 7 - July 7) and won by the Americans.
In the United States, the best players are under contract with the National Federation of "soccer", which pays them, not with clubs, as in Europe.
© 2019 AFP