No pay, no play, say Reggae Girlz

Several members of Jamaica’s Reggae Girlz history-making World Cup squad including Bunny Shaw, Havana Solaun, Toriana Patterson, Allyson Swaby, and Lauren Silver, have declared that they will not play another match for Jamaica until they are paid money they are owed from their World Cup campaign.

Each has posted a No Pay No Play poster on their Instagram pages stating their position.

Under a banner declaring No Pay, No Play, the girls posted: “This is an issue that goes simply beyond “getting paid.” It’s about the girls following in our footsteps. It’s about leaving something better off than when you found it. We signed contracts and have yet to be paid.

“The Reggae Girlz are the first Caribbean team ever to qualify for a World Cup. The hours of hard work and dedication put in by this team doesn’t have a monetary value. It’s about so much more than money. Women’s soccer has taken a back seat for too long. It’s time to take a stand.

“For this reason, I, along with my teammates won’t be participating in any tournaments until being paid,” the post said.

In response, Jamaica Football Federation (JFF) president Michael Ricketts said he did not know what would have triggered this latest protest from the Reggae Girls. The players are owed US$120,000, Ricketts said, and half that amount was transferred through Sagicor Bank last week.

In the meantime, team manager Jean Nelson had been in communication with the players informing them that some money had been transferred to their accounts and that the balance would be paid once they received US$750,000 earned at the 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup the end of September.

FIFA, Ricketts said, is to pay over that sum at the end of the month.

However, the players insisted they have not been paid.

“My teammates and I have not received any money. Our agreement ended on August 30 and today is September 2 and there is nothing pending,” Lauren Silver confirmed, indicating that the players had formed their own union in anticipation of something like this happening.

“We as a group just always wanted to have a line of communication open with each other. Like most companies have a union but since it was a repetitive action, we as a team have been trying to work together more.”

She acknowledged that Jean Nelson did communicate with them but the bottom line was that they still had not been paid.

“Jean has communicated with us to the best of her ability but at the end of the day she is not responsible for our salary,” she said.

(SportsMax)