{"id":1591,"date":"2024-02-17T19:31:55","date_gmt":"2024-02-17T19:31:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/?p=1591"},"modified":"2024-02-17T19:31:55","modified_gmt":"2024-02-17T19:31:55","slug":"mls-refs-reject-tentative-contract-lionel-messis-miami-could-open-with-replacements","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/?p=1591","title":{"rendered":"MLS refs reject tentative contract. Lionel Messi&#039;s Miami could open with replacements"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"mg-t-b-20 ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt88 mg-t-b-20 article-content\" data-v-04c4edbe>Major League Soccer will lock out referees after its union rejected a tentative contract, putting Lionel Messi\u2019s Inter Miami on track to open the season next week with replacement officials.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mg-t-b-20 ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt88 mg-t-b-20 article-content\" data-v-04c4edbe>The Professional Soccer Referees Association said Saturday that 95.8% voted against a tentative agreement with the Professional Referee Organization, which supplies match officials to MLS, the NWSL and some lower-tier leagues. The union said 97.8% of approximately 260 eligible members voted.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mg-t-b-20 ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt88 mg-t-b-20 article-content\" data-v-04c4edbe>A five-year agreement had been set to expire on Jan. 15, and a pair of brief extensions ended Monday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mg-t-b-20 ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt88 mg-t-b-20 article-content\" data-v-04c4edbe>The league said PRO will lock out the union on Sunday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mg-t-b-20 ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt88 mg-t-b-20 article-content\" data-v-04c4edbe>The PSRA said in a statement the tentative agreement lacked a sufficient economic package and quality-of-life improvements.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mg-t-b-20 ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt88 mg-t-b-20 article-content\" data-v-04c4edbe>&#8220;The skyrocketing growth of MLS has significantly increased demands on officials mentally and physically, and as such has increased demands on both our professional and personal time,&#8221; union president Peter Manikowski said in a statement.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mg-t-b-20 ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt88 mg-t-b-20 article-content\" data-v-04c4edbe>The league said PRO&#8217;s proposal for wages, benefits and travel was a 25% improvement from last year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mg-t-b-20 ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt88 mg-t-b-20 article-content\" data-v-04c4edbe>Messi and Miami play the MLS opener at home against Real Salt Lake on Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mg-t-b-20 ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt88 mg-t-b-20 article-content\" data-v-04c4edbe>MLS used replacement officials for the first two weeks of its 2014 season before reaching a contract.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mg-t-b-20 ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt88 mg-t-b-20 article-content\" data-v-04c4edbe>League executive vice president Nelson Rodriguez said the union rejected a no strike-no lockout proposal. He said in a statement PRO would use &#8220;experienced professional match referees supported by veteran VAR officials,&#8221; a reference to the video assistant referees.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mg-t-b-20 ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt88 mg-t-b-20 article-content\" data-v-04c4edbe><i>Reporting by The Associated Press.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Major League Soccer will lock out referees after its union rejected a tentative contract, putting Lionel Messi\u2019s Inter Miami on track to open the season next week with replacement officials. The Professional Soccer Referees Association said Saturday that 95.8% voted against a tentative agreement with the Professional Referee Organization, which supplies match officials to MLS, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":1590,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1591","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-soccer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1591","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1591"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1591\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1590"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1591"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1591"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1591"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}