Financial, mental health issues pushing women towards early retirement

MANCHESTER, England, Oct 12 - Nearly half of women's footballers are considering leaving the game early, with financial pressures and mental health struggles the main reasons, according to a FIFPRO report highlighting the gulf between the sport's rapid growth and conditions for most players.

The 2026 FIFPRO Global Employment Report "Working Conditions in Women's Football", billed by the global players' union as the most extensive review of working conditions in the women's game in a decade, interviewed 800 players worldwide and found stark disparities.

Some 49% of players surveyed said they were considering leaving football earlier than planned. Of those, 59% cited their financial situation as a reason and 46% pointed to psychological stress.

"The women's football industry has come a long way," FIFPRO Director of Women's Football Alex Culvin said. "(But) for 95% (of players), the rest of the industry, there is a hell of a long way to go."

While inflation-adjusted average monthly club wages have tripled since FIFPRO's previous global study in 2017 to $2,601, the median is substantially lower at $1,669, illustrating what the report describes as "uneven and fragmented" growth.

In 10 Eastern European countries analysed, average salaries remain below the national minimum wage. Even in Western Europe and Asia/Oceania, which include some of the game's bigger markets, average pay is not significantly higher than national minimum wages, according to FIFPRO.

"The professionalisation of women’s football is accelerating in some parts of the world and revenues are increasing, however, the progress and benefits are not evenly distributed among players across the world," Culvin said.

The report found only 56% of players have an employment contract, while 13% receive a club pension and 47% said their clubs do not have sufficient staff.

Average contract length has risen from 12 months in 2017 to 19 months, while the proportion of players with agents has climbed sharply from 14% to 41%.

"Whether a player has a written contract, a pension, medical cover or parental leave often depends less on her ability" than the country she lives in and the club she plays for, according to the report.

CONDITIONS HAVE IMPROVED AT TOP LEVEL

Culvin said conditions have improved dramatically for a small group of about 5% at the top, but many players are being asked to meet professional demands without being given professional environments in which to work.

"There is a recurring theme of precarity and fragile conditions," she said.

"Not only in terms of treatment and fair remuneration, but also just generally the expectations that are put on these players, professional expectations that don't operate in professional circumstances because the conditions that are provided to them are suboptimal."

Mental health emerged as another significant concern, with 57% of players saying they had struggled with their mental health. Half those players had not been provided with support by their clubs.

FIFPRO is calling for enforceable minimum standards covering areas including pay, facilities, staffing and healthcare to be written into employment agreements at national level.

Only eight of the 30 national women's leagues analysed have a collective agreement with players through their unions.

FIFPRO wants psychological support to be mandatory. It pointed to the National Women's Soccer League in the US, where mental health practitioners work alongside club staff and players have a right to six months of mental health leave.

One area in which the global union said regulation had produced clear progress was maternity protection. Since FIFA introduced global minimum maternity standards in 2021, the proportion of players considering leaving football to have a family has fallen to 19%, compared with 47% in 2017.

Culvin said women's football had reached a point where rapid commercial expansion should be matched by greater protection for the players driving that growth.

"There doesn't need to be a choice for us between commercial growth and player protection," she said. "Those two things need to go hand in hand and work in tandem."

For players with relatively short careers, she added, ambition cannot come solely from those on the pitch.

"It can't just be the player's ambition," she said. "It has to be matched by the club's ambition, and not only ambition, resources to that ambition." REUTERS