FIFA has banned three coaches and deducted six points from Canada in the Paris 2024 women’s Olympic football tournament after the infamous Olympics drone spying incident.
Earlier this week, non-accredited assistant coach Joseph Lombardi was caught by French police using a drone to spy on the New Zealand Football Ferns ahead of their first game against them. As part of an investigation, police reportedly found evidence that Canada had filmed a second training session, as well as text messages between Lombardi and accredited assistant coach Jasmine Mander discussing the drone use.
FIFA has now moved to ban Lombardi, Mander and head coach Bev Priestman from all football-related activity for at least one year as part of one of the biggest punishments ever seen in women’s Olympic football history.
Priestman initially dodged questions about her knowledge of the drone spying, but stepped down voluntarily from coaching the first game amid the scandal.
Ultimately, she was sent home after Canada Soccer officials recommended suspending her from the tournament after further investigation concluded that she was probably aware of the incident.
“I’ve seen some of the information they have and we gathered some additional information ourselves that made me conclude that she [Priestman] was highly likely to have been aware of the incidents here,” Canadian Olympic Committee chief executive, David Shoemaker said.
Canada Soccer was also slammed by FIFA “for failing to respect the applicable FIFA regulations in connection with its failure to ensure the compliance of its participating officials of the Olympic Football Tournament with the prohibition on flying drones over any training sites” and slapped with a fine of around AU$345,400.
While Canada won its opening match against New Zealand 2-1, those three points, as well as an additional three points have been deducted. As it currently stands, France is leading Group A, followed by Colombia and New Zealand — separated by goal difference, and Canada in last place on -3 points.
Canada Soccer now can challenge the sanctions at the Court of Arbitrations and will challenge at least the points deduction part of the sanctions.
“We feel terrible for the athletes on the Canadian Women’s Olympic Soccer Team who, as far as we understand, played no role in this matter,” Canada Soccer said in a statement.
“In support of the athletes, together with Canada Soccer, we are exploring rights of appeal related to the six-point deduction at this Olympic tournament.”
Canada may be able to appeal the points deduction for Paris 2024, but the other sanctions are unlikely to change after explosive claims of historic spying surfaced this week.
According to TSN, who spoke to two first-hand sources speaking on the condition of anonymity, filming closed-door training sessions of their opponents has been a tactic employed by Canada Soccer for years.
As per the allegations, these tactics were reportedly used during Tokyo 2020 — where the women’s national team won gold — and ahead of an important qualification game ahead of the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup.
Staff and contractors were reportedly told that filming was an expectation of their job, and feared losing their position if they did not cooperate.
“In a couple of scenarios, people have been pushed and have been told, ‘You have to give 110 percent and this is part of the job so if you don’t feel comfortable with doing this, you do not have a place on the team’,” one anonymous source told TSN.
“It’s not something that’s talked about and it’s not something there are a lot of text messages about because of how sensitive this is. Some of the people who have had to do the filming or review the filming have said to a few staff members how uncomfortable it was for them.”
The value in filming a practice session is priceless — it can provide insights into formations, starting lineups, penalty takers and set pieces.
It remains unclear if the playing group were aware of the filming, with Canada Soccer legend and former captain Christine Sinclair releasing a statement earlier this week stating that she never saw or discussed drone footage in any of the meetings she had been present for over her lengthy career.
“It’s unfortunate that the players of our National Team have had to play through condemnable actions by some of their staff as they attempt to defend our gold medal. Actions players have no control over,” the all-time scoring record holder wrote in a statement posted to Instagram.
“I want to be clear that having been a national team player for 23 years, we were never shown or discussed drone footage in team or individual meetings I’ve been present for.”
You can keep up with all of the Paris 2024 coverage on Channel 9 and 9Now.
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