To anyone growing up playing soccer, the ultimate dream was pulling on the jersey of your national team and representing your country.
Many of us would have paid for the privilege of playing for our countries, but in reality, do soccer players actually get paid for wearing the national shirt?
Do soccer players get paid for international matches?
Yes, soccer players receive an international match fee plus performance-related bonuses for playing for their national teams. The fee depends on the country’s policy in terms of paying its players, but it’s often an amount worth several thousands of dollars. Many soccer associations don’t reveal how much they pay their players, which further adds to the confusion.
How much do players get paid for playing for their national teams?
Just like player salaries at the club level, there’s no set fee that a player gets for representing his or her national team. For instance, this revealing BBC article from 2018 explained that Kylian Mbappe received £17,000 ($22,000) per match for representing France at the world cup.
In credit to Mbappe, who has recently started negotiations on a new contract with PSG worth around £1,000,000 ($1,300,000) per week, he decided to donate his World Cup fee to charity, revealing that he would happily represent his national team for free.
Some soccer associations offer the players in their squads’ performance-related bonuses based upon how far they progress in a tournament. After the 2018 World Cup, the English Football Association announced that the squad would have received around £5,000,000 ($6,500,000) in bonuses to be shared among the squad.
While this is a fraction of the amount of money that elite soccer players earn from their clubs, it’s still a decent amount for a job that many of us would be willing to do for free.
Should soccer players play for their national teams for free?
You would think that the privilege of representing your nation and being regarded as one of the best players in the world would be enough of a draw for players when they’re called up for national duty. But in reality, soccer is a business, and players are paid to play the game.
And in fairness to soccer players, they don’t demand a fee for representing their country. Rather, it’s just the done thing, and who would reject money that’s offered to them? So, while paying soccer players to play for their national teams might seem a little over the top to some of us, it’s just the way the system works.
How do national team payments compare to club payments?
Again, while every national team is different, we can use payments made by the English Football Association to illustrate an example. Research found that England’s players would earn around £2,000 ($2,600) per match for representing the country.
In stark contrast, the average salary for an EPL soccer player is currently around £50,000 per week ($65,565). In other words, they get paid $65,000 per match, unless they have two matches in a week, of course!
When compared to the meager $2,600 England soccer players receive for representing their national squad, you can see that their club salary is way ahead in terms of numbers.
So, even though players do get money for representing their national teams, it really isn’t a great deal in the grand scheme of things and compared to their club salaries.
Recap: Soccer players’ salaries for their national teams
While you might think it’s somewhat immoral, soccer players get paid for playing for their national teams. In fairness, many soccer players donate the fee to charity, and it’s not a particularly large sum when compared to their club wages.
After all, many soccer players agree that playing for their national teams is an honor and the pinnacle of their careers, so they’re not particularly concerned with the amount they’re paid to represent their countries.