The fall-out of last night’s article about Carolina Morace’s alleged demands was immediate. Within minutes of publishing several high profile people involved in the women’s game attacked its accuracy on Twitter.
Included in those criticising the article was former national team player Kara Lang. Via direct messaging, I engaged Lang in a lengthy discussion about the article into the early hours of Monday morning. During that exchange, I invited her to write a response that I would publish unedited. That invitation remains open and does not have a due date.
In the meantime, in the interest of fairness, a summary of the concerns that were voiced to me:
[PRBREAK][/PRBREAK]In the original article I wrote that the women’s funding was “mostly” directly coming from the CSA. After listening to concerns from Lang, and clarifying things with one of my sources, I edited the article to more accurately reflect the funding sources. About half to two-thirds comes from the Canadian Olympic Association and the Own the Podium program. Lang correctly pointed out to me that the men would be eligible for OTP funding as well if they qualified (although likely only to the U-23 program).
Although my numbers were not directly refuted, the idea that the women received more funding then the men was dismissed as “ludicrous.” If anyone can provide me with the line item budget for both the men’s and women’s programs I will be happy to publish that information.
In terms of expenditures, what is known is that in 2010 the women played 19 matches and had 122 days of camps (11 camps averaging 11 days each). Each camp had an average of 25 players and 12 staff. The men played six matches and, in addition to the preparation time associated with the friendlies, had one camp that lasted 10 days. There was an average of 19 players and nine staff per camp. Morace’s salary is said to be “six figures,” and is comparable to Stephen Hart’s
Lang took issue with the quote in the article that questioned whether Morace had ever spent time in her Mississauga apartment. Actually, she informed me that she had just come from the apartment. When asked to give an example of Morace directly working with young players and coaches I did not receive a response.
Lang said that Morace was only asking for “as much power as she had been promised in her contract,” and insisted that the CSA prevented the program from spending money on several occasions. She gave specific examples of a request to buy matching backpacks for the team that was rejected, as well as a request for new socks that was turned down.