Sara Bjork-Johnarsdottir was denied her salary by Leon while she was pregnant.
Now the Juventus star is coming out and criticizing his former club via Players Tribune.
– They constantly made me feel that having a child is a negative thing, writes the Icelander.
In March 2021 – after a season in Lyon – the former Rosengårds player announced that she and her boyfriend were expecting a child.
Despair, however, was soon replaced by the joy of becoming a mother, when the club refused to pay her salary.
Sara Björk-Johnarsdottir is now taking aim at her former club in the Players Tribune.
“This story is going to upset some tough people in football. You shouldn’t be talking about this side of the sport. But I have to tell the truth.”
“I thought something went wrong.”
After a meeting between her agent and the club, it was decided that the midfield star would continue the pregnancy at her home in Iceland, among family and doctors who spoke the same language.
But when I noticed that she didn’t get any salary, she started to feel uncomfortable.
“I didn’t think I had anything to worry about until I got my first paycheck. I thought maybe something went wrong, so I checked with other players to be on the safe side. They got paid on time,” Gunnarsdottir wrote.
When the salary continued to shine with his absence, Gunnarsdottir chose to contact the club through his agent.
On the club’s part, they claimed they had done nothing wrong and referred to French law.
threatened by the club
The French Players’ Union and Fifpro (the international players’ union) got involved, but there was still silence from Lyon.
When the agent threatened to take the case to FIFA, the club responded:
The Icelandic writes: “If Sara goes to FIFA with this, she has no future with Lyon.”
After the birth of a son and Gunnarsdottir’s return to France, she chooses to confront the Lyon club president about the stated threat to her future at the club. However, the club president denied these allegations. Instead, coach Sonia Bompastore was blamed.
“He said it was Coach Sonia who decided she couldn’t see me as a future player on the team,” Gunnarsdottir wrote.
In May last year, the case took a turn, when Leon was forced to pay the salaries she had missed. An amount that eventually amounted to about SEK 900,000.
But there was no going forward at Lyon for the 32-year-old, who signed a two-year contract with Juventus in June 2022.
“It became clear to me that no matter what I said, as a new mum I would have no future at the club. They would make it impossible.”
