FIFPRO President Sergio Marchi: "Football belongs to all footballers"

FIFPRO President Sergio Marchi underlined on Wednesday that football belongs to the players.

The Argentinian, who during his playing days represented the likes of Gimnasia de la Plata and San Lorenzo, was speaking in an interview with The Athletic.

Marchi, who also serves as Argentinian player union Secretary General and FIFPRO South America President, said: "Football doesn’t belong to [Gianni] Infantino. It doesn’t belong to FIFA. Football belongs to all footballers. And if there are Gods of football, it is Franco Baresi, Toto Schillaci, Diego Armando Maradona, Lionel Messi, Socrates, Ronaldinho. Not Infantino."

Marchi was also quick to highlight the plight of many professional footballers around the world who remain unpaid.

He said: "We’re in the 21st century and thousands of players still go unpaid. Meanwhile, FIFA celebrates record ticket sales. Let them have their party, but the people who built the game should be paid too.

"Football is deeply inequitable. It’s unjust. And we’re in a profession that ends at 35, with a whole life still ahead."

Marchi added: "It was announced that tickets for the World Cup are now going on sale, millions will surely be sold, according to the [FIFA] president, who says it will generate over three billion dollars in revenue. And it’s incredible. Yet I’ll say it again: There are still footballers who haven’t been paid their salaries for two, three, even four years."

To read the full interview in The Athletic, head HERE.