Mexican soccer boots the dollar for peso

This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.

MONTERREY, Mexico -- Banks, stockbrokers and homeowners with skyrocketing mortgages aren’t alone in feeling the pinch of the current economic crisis. It’s hitting sports franchises as well with the Mexico soccer federation among the latest forced to circle the wagons.

This week the federation, known as the FMF, ordered its teams to begin paying coaches and players in pesos rather than dollars beginning next season. That could have a major impact on the game in Mexico if top international players turn their back on multiyear contracts paid out in unstable pesos rather than Euros or U.S. dollars.

‘I think if we have problems, logically we have to negotiate well,’ Mario Trejo, sports director of the Pumas club of Mexico City, told the national sports daily La Aficion. ‘(The players) are accustomed to negotiating with other types of money.’

But, Trejo added, ‘it’s a good move on the part of the FMF.’ Especially since Mexican clubs aren’t the only ones likely to be pinch pennies over the coming months and years.

‘These conditions aren’t only in Mexico. They’re global,’ Decio de Mario, secretary general of the FMF, told the newspaper.

-- Kevin Baxter