Santos women’s team sleep in hotel lobby ahead of match

SAO PAULO: The coach of Santos women’s team criticised the Brazilian Football Confederation (CBF) on Tuesday after her players were forced to spend part of the night in a hotel lobby before a crucial first division game.

“This is the respect that people have for women’s football in Brazil,” said Emily Lima, as she recorded on video the players curled up on hotel sofas.

“Goodnight to everyone who’s going to sleep quietly in their own beds before working the next day.”

Lima’s club Santos said the CBF’s logistics company hired to get the women to their match in Amazonia could not arrange a direct flight from Sao Paulo to Manaus and so had the players stop off in Brasilia overnight.

However, there was an error with the hotel reservations and so the team spent part of the night in the lobby until alternative accomodation was found around 0100 local time.

The CBF said in a statement their representative in Brasilia resolved the problem after less than an hour and is taking steps to prevent the problem from happening again.

Lima’s message came two nights before Santos – who currently sit second in the league – were due to play Iranduba and just three weeks after Brazil were knocked out the World Cup by hosts France in an extra-time thriller in Le Havre.

The United States won the tournament for the second consecutive time.

“This is the reality,” said Lima, who was fired as coach of the national side in 2017 after just 13 games in charge. “Why is the United States so far ahead of us?”

Lima recorded more videos the morning after explaining how they had found a hotel in which to spend the night.

She also detailed Santos’ post-match travel plans, saying that after Wednesday night’s game, the squad will return from Manaus on a 0400 flight to Brasilia before catching a connection to Sao Paulo.