Instead of focusing on what separates football teams, the Swedish Football Association SvFF said in a press release this week that it will escalate its work on achieving full equality between the nation’s football teams.
After the 2017 season of Sweden’s elite division Allsvenskan ended, football activists organized major demonstrations under the slogan EqualPayForEqualPlay in solidarity with the three bottom teams that were relegated.
With league winner Malmö receiving 64 points last season, it was estimated that the southern Swedish club was paid over 200 % the amount of bottom team AFC Eskilstuna at 20 points, even though the two teams provenly played the exact same number of games.
The football association later admitted it was wrong to award fewer points and subsequently relegate the teams Jönköpings Södra IF, Halmstads BK and AFC Eskilstuna from the national top division.
“As an organization, we want to promote the values of equality and fairness, and we have realized it is wrong to treat some teams differently than others”, president Karl-Erik Nilsson stated in an interview. He emphasized that “football is about focusing on what brings teams and players together, not what separates them” and then revealed that “all football teams next season will be awarded the same amount of points if they play the same game”.
Following the relegation demonstrations, officials from the top 3 teams of Sweden’s elite division Allsvenskan were made to agree to take a drastic cut in their total amount of points that they received last season. Håkan Jepsson, chairman of Malmö FF, admitted in a statement that the EqualPayForEqualPlay campaign made him realize it was wrong for his team “to receive more points than the rest of the league for playing exactly the same game”.
As the relegation of the bottom three teams had to be nullified, the size of Allsvenskan 2018 will increase from 16 to 19 teams, as three additional clubs achieved promotion from second-tier Superettan.
Championing the rights of less fortunate football clubs, these 19 clubs will be pioneers in seeking to shift the focus in football from divisive game results to a more equal and compassionate game environment.