“I am not Santa Claus, you cost us dearly and you bring in nothing”: the contested message from the president of US Orléans to its women’s section

L’US Orléans D2 féminine va-t-elle survivre aux coupes franches de son budget. MAXPPP – Jérôme Couton-Coudray

The feeling of injustice is strong at US Orléans, which has drastically reduced the budget of its women's section. To favor boys.

The US Orléans football club, whose men's team plays in the National (third division), will drastically reduce the budget of its women's team, which plays in D2, due to of its financial situation, management justified in a press release on Wednesday.

The DNACG chopper

"I had to announce to the women's first team last week the difficult decision to reduce the budget allocated to them’ quot;, explained Cyril Courtin, president and owner of the club since the beginning of April, on the USO website.

"Under current conditions, the USO experiences a deficit of two million euros in its operating expenses each year. The urgency today is to ensure the survival of the club as a whole", he stressed.

In January 2024, the DNCG, the financial policeman of French football, ordered the relegation of the men's team to National 2 (D4), but the arrival of Mr. Courtin had offered a respite to the club. However, the club must return to the DNCG in June and the president wants to cut the budget of the women's section – which amounts to 500,000 euros per year, for all age categories –, and that the first team returns to D3.

The manager assured that he understood "the feeling of injustice" of the players who tore off their support on the field while they had the smallest budget of D2, but the form also caused outrage.

Lack of support from local authorities

"On Friday, he called the girls together at their request and told them "I'm not Santa Claus, you cost us a lot and you bring nothing back"", told AFP Christian Gauthier, who in protest resigned from his position as president of the association of club.

M. Courtin denounced comments "inexact and taken out of context", claiming to have "looked for solutions to maintain (the) players in D2".

The two men meet, however, to denounce the lack of support from local authorities, "yet solicited", according to Cyril Courtin. Christian Gauthier fears that this decision will lead to the end of high-level women's football at the USO. According to him, the authorities could refuse Orléans to return to D3 and relegate the team to R2 (5th female level), which would lead to an exodus of players.