The families of Diogo Jota and Andre Silva have laid their boys to rest on Saturday, following the tragic car accident that took both of their lives early on Friday morning. Liverpool players, both current and former, came together in Portugal on Friday and Saturday to honor their fallen teammate and support the families they left behind, including Jota’s new wife Rute Cardoso and their three young children.
Many of us here at TLO Towers are still grappling with this grief, where to put it and how to express it. If we’re doing the coverage of this tragic moment for the club and the sporting world as a whole the service it deserves. Now that the immediate aftermath is handled and the weekend winds to a close, most everyone will be looking to the future.
How does the club honor and support those we’ve lost, in a way that is satisfying and helpful to not just the fans, but Jota’s family?
Front Office Sports is reporting by way of Portuguese publication Record that the club has decided to pay out the remainder of Jota’s contract to his wife and children. While there are conflicting reports of how this can be done, no real reliable source, and the Record publication being in Portuguese, this can only be listed as a very nice rumour at the moment.
Jota signed a new contract in 2022 that would have taken his tenure with the squad all the way to 2027. It is speculated that the contract would’ve included a “death in service” clause that had triggered the decision (an extremely common clause in the UK allegedly), and would’ve outlined the payment of his contract to his beneficiaries. Thankfully, in this case, it would be his new wife Rute, and come out to around $15 million according to Spotrac.
The club had announced they will look to immortalize the number 20 shirt, and have already paid tributes in the immediate space following the tragedy. No word yet on what that means, if that means the shirt number will be retired for good or not.
It is also extremely unlikely that they would announce something of this sensitive nature, so we may never get a real confirmation from the club of this action. We can only hope that the kind and supportive nature of the club does win out, and that is indeed what happens behind closed doors.