Justice has recognized the concepts of maintenance, accommodation and bonuses as unpaid remuneration to the players of the defunct futsal team Segovia Futsal and has ordered the club to pay 42,824.12 euros to the ten team members and the coach.
As stated in statements to Efe by the legal advisor of the Futsal Players Association, Eduardo Meléndez, in the resolution, The judge of the Social Court Number 1 of Segovia, agrees with the players, in contrast to the position of the National Futsal League, that he had not wanted to recognize these concepts as part of the unpaid remuneration.
The futsal team, successor to Club Deportivo La Escuela, known as Caja Segovia after its sponsor, was born in 2013 and ended up disappearing in 2019., when the club failed to remain in the first division after losing to Viña Albali Valdepeñas in the league final held in April. When the team disintegrated, it was already dragging a complicated situation of defaults that the club attributed to financial problems and that the players brought to the attention of the National Futsal League through the Mixed Commission.
The League took over the unpaid salary last season, but there was no agreement to include other items, such as goal bonuses, severance pay or maintenance. After resorting to arbitration by the Royal Spanish Football Federation, which upheld the claim, the players’ association finally went to court at the beginning of 2020 and the case ended up in the hands of the Social Court number 1 of Segovia.
Almost two years later, with the outbreak of the pandemic in the middle and various difficulties in the procedures, the players’ association has been able to know the sentence, signed by Judge Carolina Feliz de Castro, who agrees with them and condemns the club to pay 42,824.12 euros plus ten percent interest.
As explained by Meléndez, since there is no club, it is the Salary Guarantee Fund (Fogasa) that must take charge of this payment, without interest and up to a maximum establishedTherefore, the ten players and the coach will end up receiving approximately 95 percent of the stipulated amount. The lawyer has specified that, after so long fighting, the players are “satisfied”, but will only be “happy” when they finally receive the amount owed to them.
Meléndez has criticized the practices carried out during the process by the legal team of Fogasa Segovia when, for example, trying to artificially reduce the amount that had to be paid to the players, something that in his opinion constitutes an “aberration”. It has also spoiled the National Futsal League its “impudence” by refusing to provide the documentation that has been required, such as the seniority of the players, with the sole purpose, according to this lawyer, of “hindering” the claim.
