Within the “Wage Hole” collection, we dive into the world of (un)equal salaries in males’s and ladies’s area hockey. On this episode: Bloemendaal goals of the lads’s nationwide title each season, however the ladies should accept a spot within the Promotion Class this season. ‘Equality between women and men is our absolute precedence.’
Bloemendaal’s males have the identical attract in area hockey as Actual Madrid has in soccer. Once more this yr, they’re among the many prime favorites for the nationwide title. The Bloemendaal ladies haven’t performed on the highest degree since this season. They’re at present the quantity 13 group within the Netherlands, main the Promotion Class.
If golf equipment like Amsterdam and Den Bosch handle to allocate their budgets in order that each their women and men compete for the nationwide title, why shouldn’t Bloemendaal have the opportunity to take action? Bloemendaal is commonly accused of investing in males’s area hockey however not in ladies’s area hockey.
Prime hockey coach Michiel Hilders with Bloemendaal expertise Teun Hooghout. Picture: Koen Suyk
On common, gamers’ salaries rose from a number of hundred to a number of thousand euros per yr
Former goalkeeper Michiel Hilders joined the Bloemendaal board as commissioner of prime area hockey and sponsorship two seasons in the past, shortly after Maria Verschoor and Josine Koning had publicly spoken out in regards to the disparity in salaries in males’s and ladies’s area hockey. One of many first issues he did was invite Verschoor for a cup of espresso. ‘I had a number of conversations together with her, as a result of I wished to know this subject effectively.’
Beneath his wing, Bloemendaal determined to alter course. The ladies’s wage home went up a notch. Two seasons in the past, the membership nonetheless had worldwide gamers like Argentina’s Maria Granatto, New Zealand’s Tyler Lench and Germany’s Sonja Zimmermann, who, in keeping with Hilders, acquired comparable salaries to their male colleagues. The next yr, the ladies had solely Dutch gamers. Consequently, the out there price range was divided extra evenly among the many choice. This resulted in a mean wage improve for the gamers from just a few hundred to a couple thousand euros per yr.
Hilders: ‘For gamers from overseas, together with airfare and lodging, we paid an quantity corresponding to the wage of a male nationwide group participant. We selected to make that extra sustainable. Why would we make investments such a excessive quantity in a foreigner who typically leaves after only one season, whereas we even have gamers who’ve been within the first group for 4 or 5 years? That’s at odds with sustainable coverage.’
Spanish area hockey legend Santi Freixa is assistant to André Morees at Girls 1. Picture: Thijme Huurman
We pay all our 20 gamers, which no membership within the Promotion League does. Michiel Hilders, Bloemendaal’s prime hockey board member
The ladies had been relegated to the Promotion Class final season. The membership determined to not flip off the cash, however to speculate extra within the Ladies’s 1, pushed by the ambition to return rapidly and long-term to the best degree. Bloemendaal, like different golf equipment, is reluctant to reveal figures, however states that the present price range is actually not inferior to groups within the backside half of the Tulip large league.
‘We pay all our twenty gamers, which no membership within the Promotion League does. The technical employees, which consists of André Morees and Santi Freixa, is prime degree. Furthermore, the amenities for the ladies are after all equal to these of the lads,’ Hilders says.
‘On the sector, we’ve got fully equalized the packages. For instance, our girls additionally prepare with coronary heart fee displays, beneath the steerage of an train physiologist. Specialist trainers can be found for each the penaltycorners and goalkeepers. We additionally supply our women and men precisely the identical amenities off the sector: a free subscription to the health club, the chance to hire reasonably priced housing in Amsterdam via the membership, vehicles for transportation to coaching classes and matches, and meals made out there. As well as, each groups have precisely the identical price range for group journeys and bills throughout preparation.’
The contracts of Dutch nationwide group internationals and youth gamers who advance to the primary group have additionally been equalized. Hilders: ‘We now have a uniform wage construction. That implies that gamers and gamers inside a sure class and beneath related circumstances obtain related salaries.
Worldwide Jorrit Croon is the figurehead of the Bloemendaal males’s group. Picture: Koen Suyk
The distinction with the lads stays large
In fact, many of the cash nonetheless goes to the lads. Marc Lammers not too long ago stated that at Den Bosch the ratio between the lads’s and ladies’s price range is 58/42. Bloemendaal doesn’t disclose the odds. However the truth is that the variations are higher than at Den Bosch. Hilders: “However given the present place and choice composition of each our males’s and ladies’s groups, that distinction is explainable at present.
Terminating the contract of a male worldwide after which investing the freed-up cash within the ladies’s group is just not what Bloemendaal goes to do to fill the hole. The historical past and repute of Males’s 1 weigh too closely for that. With 22 nationwide titles and 6 EHL titles, Bloemendaal is probably the most profitable membership in males’s area hockey.
Hilders: ‘However we do all the things we will to scale back the price range variations. Folks typically discuss dividing the pie in another way, however we try to extend the pie by working very laborious. Solely that takes time.
