Women’s FA Cup final prize money and how it compares to men’s FA Cup
The winners of the Women’s FA Cup final between Chelsea and Manchester United on Sunday are in line to receive record sums thanks to a major boost to prize money.
There is £100,000 on offer to whichever team lifts the trophy at Wembley, where Chelsea will be looking to triumph for a third year in a row.
That sum is a four-fold increase on last year and 20 times as much as that banked by the 2017 winners, Manchester City.
It will take Chelsea or first-time finalists United’s total prize money from this year’s Women’s FA Cup to £210,000.
It comes after the Football Association increased the prize pot for the competition by 700 per cent to £3m for the 2022-23 campaign.
“The FA Cup, whether men’s or women’s, is the biggest and best domestic cup competition in the world, and this increased investment from the FA highlights that we want clubs competing in it to be rewarded, while also highlighting our ongoing commitment to the women’s game,” the FA’s director of women’s football, Baroness Sue Campbell, said in March 2022.
Women’s FA Cup prize money vs men’s
Yet the prize money on offer in the Women’s FA Cup remains a fraction of that awarded in the men’s competition.
Victory in the men’s FA Cup final is worth £2m, while the winners will pocket total prize money of £3.9m once previous rounds are tallied up. Both sums are around 20 times as much as in the Women’s FA Cup.
The pot for the men’s competition has also swelled this year, albeit by a quarter to around £20m. The gap in prize money has therefore shrunk relatively but grown in absolute terms.
There is also inequality when it comes to payments for appearing on television.
Teams in the Women’s FA Cup do not receive fees when their matches are chosen for live broadcast, whereas the men get six-figure windfalls.
The discrepancy prompted players from Lewes FC, the Championship team who have pioneered equal funding for their men’s and women’s teams, to write an open letter earlier this year to Karen Carney, the former England player now leading a government review into the future of the women’s game.
“We are happy the prize fund increased this year and we’ve had more money coming in from the cup but still, comparatively, it is a small increase compared to where the men are at,” said Lewes midfielder Lauren Heria.
Why do Women’s FA Cup winners earn less than men?
The FA says the prize money difference is down to the Women’s FA Cup being at an earlier stage in its commercial development.
“Our primary focus is on attracting new audiences so that it can continue to thrive and become more sustainable in the future,” Baroness Campbell said.
While the men’s tournament began in 1871 and is the oldest of its kind in the world, it wasn’t until a century later that the Women’s FA Cup was hoisted for the first time.
Despite the rapid progress made in recent years, rights deals in women’s football still lag far behind the men’s game.
The Women’s Super League made a quantum leap with its latest domestic TV deal, worth around £8m per season. By comparison, equivalent contracts in the Premier League pay £1.7bn a year.
More money for early rounds
There is also a difference in the way that the FA allocates prize money in the Women’s FA Cup and the men’s competition.
The winning women’s team total payout of £210,000 represents around seven per cent of the whole pot, while the men get almost 20 per cent.
This is because more money is weighted towards the earlier rounds in the Women’s FA Cup, to ensure all teams receive a meaningful payment that aids the development of the wider game.
“A disproportionate amount will be invested into the early rounds of the competition,” Campbell said.
“This will ensure those clubs further down the pyramid entering those rounds really feel the benefit of the prize money earned.”
Wembley sell out won’t benefit Chelsea or United
It’s not just the prize money setting records at this year’s Women’s FA Cup final; the attendance is likely to break new ground, too.
Wembley has sold out of all 90,000 seats, meaning it is in line to see the biggest crowd for any women’s match ever staged in Britain. Last season’s final drew 49,000.
A full stadium would top the 87,000 who watched the Lionesses win Euro 2022 last year and fall only narrowly short of the world record 91,500 who packed into Camp Nou to watch Barcelona Femini play Wolfsburg in last season’s Women’s Champions League.
Neither Chelsea or Manchester United will receive a penny of the estimated £2m takings from ticket sale and matchday food and drink, however.
That is, at least, one way in which there is equal remuneration between the genders, with the men’s finalists not benefiting from the Wembley gate receipts either.