Fake contracts, forged signatures, withholding salaries, medical negligence, harassing and physically assaulting players – women’s footballers have reached out to FIFPRO detailing their experiences with a Neapolitan club.
The players, who are being assisted by Italian player union AIC, have shared their stories with FIFPRO as they want their experiences to serve as a warning for other players.
Founded in 2019, Pomigliano CF rose to Italy’s top-flight in 2021 earning the right to compete with the likes of Juventus, AC Milan and Roma. They were relegated after finishing bottom of the 2023/24 Serie A Femminile in a chaotic season that saw them go through four different managers and at one point announce their resignation from the league before reversing their decision days later. The club has since stopped operating. It is not formally connected to ASDC Pomigliano, a men's club which is still functioning and plays in an amateur regional league.
Midway through last season, Pomigliano CF stopped paying players and coaches. It later transpired that they had forged signatures on multiple player contracts.
FIFPRO has learned that after a game against Napoli in April 2024, a male member of staff struck a player in the face and branded her a b****. This was after he tried to assault an opposing player on the pitch.
Footballers have also revealed that people connected with the club’s hierarchy entered their apartments unannounced; one women’s player, listening to music on headphones while cleaning, was startled to see one male individual – who had sent her multiple inappropriate text messages – had let himself into her home and was standing in her hallway.
Despite being relegated to Serie B, Pomigliano CF are not playing in Italy's second tier this season after failing to apply for a licence. Some players, assisted by AIC, have started legal proceedings to collect arrears and compensation.
The proceedings are still ongoing and legal clauses have also been activated by AIC to collect the sums demanded as a guarantee by the Italian Football Federation (FIGC) for participation in the last Serie A championship, as the club have so far failed to comply.
'They terminated my contract after refusing to pay for surgery'
'Player A' is one of a number of footballers whose contract was forged by the club last season. Pomigliano threatened legal action against her if she did not play despite harbouring a serious shoulder injury.
As per Italy’s Legislative Decree and internal regulations set by FIGC, the cost of players’ medical assistance must be covered by the clubs, yet Pomigliano would later illegally terminate her contract after refusing to pay for the surgery she needed.
"At the beginning of the 2023/24 campaign, there wasn’t a great deal of communication about when pre-season was going to start and when the coach was fired during the first week, it felt like everything was going to be a little off," she tells FIFPRO. "As the season went on, we weren’t getting paid on time. We would consistently ask the administration for pay slips, yet they didn't respond to emails or WhatsApp messages."
Player A, who gave birth to her first child last year, is still owed four months' wages. "When it's months without getting that money and you have other bills to pay, it's difficult."
Pomigliano never communicated to Player A that they had terminated her contract. She found out via the Italian player union. "I initially reached out to AIC in April for advice with my shoulder injury. I was bringing the club notes from an orthopaedic doctor saying I needed surgery yet that was ignored, and my name was still being put on the matchday roster.
"I started to receive threatening messages from the club saying if I didn’t turn up for training, despite the injury, they would take me to court. The day after I spoke with them about needing surgery, they submitted a forged mutual termination of contract to the league. The club didn’t even communicate the termination to me – I found out from a lawyer at the Italian players’ union."
'The club owes me an entire season's salary'
Another former Pomigliano footballer, 'Player B', did not receive any wages during the 2023/24 season. Before she signed, the player was told she would have her own bedroom in an apartment; she ended up sharing a mould-ridden room with another team-mate.
She tells FIFPRO: "They stopped responding to my agent and when I confronted the club president, who was smoking cigarettes, he promised it would be ‘taken care of’, but it never was."
The player also describes the club’s medical processes as being "a complete disaster". FIFPRO has learned that the medical department was limited to one doctor and two massage therapists. She says: "They didn’t have anyone handling players returning from injury. They used frozen water bottles for the first month because they had no working ice machine."
She continues: "I was coming off a significant injury. Despite needing to be reintegrated, I was immediately put into a training game on my first day. They were pushing me too hard. Things got worse when I got injured again and the club were reluctant to give me an MRI. They didn’t want to do an ultrasound.
"A few days later the team doctor, who was a cardiologist, examined my knee, did a Lachman’s test and poked around. They told me I was being delusional and insisted I was fine.
"He said I only had a bone bruise and that I could play in the Sunday match. My injury then happened on the Tuesday. I still felt uneasy, and eventually, I saw a surgeon in Naples, who suspected the injury. Pomigliano’s response was minimal, which was really traumatising for me."
'When you got injured, you had to pay for everything'
As per Italy’s Legislative Decree and FIGC’s medical regulations, club doctors must subject players to strict medical checks at least every six months. However, some footballers have revealed they did not even receive individual medicals upon signing for Pomigliano.
Another player who wishes not to be named, 'Player C', says: "When we went for our medical, it was with the whole team and we just did cardio. Nothing else. I didn’t do a personal medical before training with the team."
She continues: "The president thought the players didn’t want to play – at one point he even refused to arrange transport to games and we had to carpool – but the problem was really that players were injured and the club didn't care.
"They wanted us to give 100 percent on the field, but when we got injured, the club didn’t take care of the treatment. We were expected to pay for everything – recovery, physio, etcetera. Everyone was sick, everyone was mentally drained.
"They did not deserve to have a women’s football team. They would force players to go to church – it didn’t matter if you were Muslim, atheist – it was mandatory for everyone. If there is any chance that they want to build a team again, it shouldn't happen."
'They forged my signature to try and keep me at the club for longer'
Signing with Pomigliano in the summer of 2023, 'Player D' first saw red flags after she was informed by the club secretary the day before the 2023/24 campaign was due to begin that they had still not secured her visa and was thus not registered with the Italian Football Federation. This was after she had been in Italy for two months, had completed pre-season and had been promised everything was sorted by the club.
Pomigliano’s administration failure resulted in her not only missing the first few games of the season but having to fly from Italy to her homeland outside of Europe – only to then find the visa appointment that the club had said they scheduled never existed. In the end, she was able to secure an urgent appointment after an embassy worker took pity on her and she eventually secured the visa.
As the season progressed, Player D encountered harassment from a male connected with the club’s hierarchy who sent her multiple inappropriate WhatsApp messages. She tells FIFPRO: "When I first got there, he helped me with my house. He said, 'If you have any problems, I’ll help you out'.
The individual persistently asked her to dinner several times. She repeatedly refused, highlighting the unprofessional nature of the situation, but the messages brazenly continued: 'I want to spend an evening with you', 'I would have cuddled you making you feel less alone', and 'You look gorgeous in your profile photo, are you at home?'
She says: "By the time the third coach of the season arrived, he and the team trainer would laugh and say things like: 'He wants to take you swimming. When are you going to let him take you out for dinner?' It felt like they were all in on his perversion."
The male individual, who had keys to the players’ apartments due to his working role with the club, would frequently access them unannounced and without warning, claiming he was showing prospective tenants around. "One morning, I was cleaning my apartment in just a t-shirt and underwear. I had my headphones on, I look behind me and he’s in my hallway, just staring at me. As I wasn’t fully clothed, I told him to get out.
"He said he needed to show people around the apartment, but he never informed us he was coming, he didn’t even knock, he just walked in. It felt inappropriate. I ended up buying a camera and I have footage of people entering my bedroom when I wasn’t there, without prior knowledge or warning."
Like many of her Pomigliano team-mates, Player D also had her contract forged by the club. After reaching out to the Italian player union to recoup months of unpaid wages, the union discovered Pomigliano had falsified Player D’s signatures and also altered her contract duration from 2024 to 2025.
"They had created a whole new document, changed the dates and signatures on both parts," she says. "Thankfully, I had kept the original copy of the contract, so it was easy to show they manipulated it. I would really like to see the club penalised for forging player signatures because they've done this year after year to many girls. They can’t keep treating people this way and get away with it."
A warning to other players
The players have shared their stories with FIFPRO as they want their experiences to serve as a warning for other footballers. Player A says: "I was one of the older players and a lot of the younger players there might have felt their entire careers were on the line if they were to ever make a fuss about all of this. A lot of the girls are still missing multiple months of wages, some received no wages at all.
"If you’re a player going to Italy, I would encourage you to get the Italian player union’s contacts right away. Those are good numbers to have in your phone. The player union are there to help."
How the Italian union is currently supporting the players
AIC has been in contact with many Pomigliano players to deliver legal assistance for unpaid wages. Since all Italian clubs issue a surety bond to guarantee any debts when registering for the championship, the union are hopeful, after having recovered and verified all the contractual documents, that players will recover their sums. AIC is waiting for ongoing FIGC internal procedures to be able to request for the guaranteed amounts to be distributed to the players.
As for the falsification of dates and signatures, AIC has supported players in drafting and filing reports to public prosecutors and FIGC.
AIC released the following statement to FIFPRO: "As a long-time football institution and stakeholder that stands with the players, and one that has been an active promoter of the launch of women's football in Italy during the last years – reaching with them incredible achievements such as the change of status of Serie A players who became professional in 2022/23, the subscription of one of the most valuable women players' CBA in the world, not to mention the wider Sports Reform that has enlarged players' professional protections also in the amateur sphere of men and women footballers, now known as Workers of Sport – we want to highlight and stress that this extremely negative case has to remain an isolated one.
"During the last years, clubs with important organisations have entered Serie A Femminile and the other championships in Italy. At their side, long-term women's clubs continue to proudly support raising this beautiful game.
"The situation suffered by the players in this case cannot be the norm. We have drawn before the attention on unfair behaviour regarding this club during the last years, following players' demand for support. It is clear the system needs to do better to avoid such cases that, luckily, professionalism is helping to eliminate totally.
"Nevertheless, as always, we invite all the players to come to us if they need our assistance but also to be at their side in the pre-signing phases of a deal to help them strengthen their position and provide information that can be useful even in not such heavy circumstances. Whether for prevention or for solution, AIC is always at the players' side."
