PHILADELPHIA — In the vast swirl of emotions that followed U.S. Soccer’s investigation of alleged abuse in the NWSL, two similar forms flowed next to each other.
There was surprise and anger about how many people in power knew of the allegations but did not act on them. And alongside that, there was ample shock and heartache for people who did not know, even if they were close to the people involved.
When it comes to the sexual coercion allegations leveled at former Philadelphia Independence manager Paul Riley, even one of the team’s stalwart players back then says now that she didn’t know at the time what he allegedly was doing behind closed doors.
Former Independence midfielder Joanna Lohman told The Philadelphia Inquirer that she was taken aback by the scale of what has been published — not just the accusations of abuse, but of cover-ups.
“The normalization of these controlling tactics is something that is very real,” Lohman told The Inquirer. “These things were going on and we didn’t even necessarily notice, or the alarm bells didn’t go off loud enough, because it was normalized.”
The recent investigation published by former acting U.S. attorney general Sally Yates alleged that on top of The Athletic’s existing allegations that Riley sexually coerced Sinead Farrelly, Riley also had relations with another unnamed Independence player “for over a year” starting in 2010, the first year of the team’s existence. Riley has denied the allegations.
Farrelly told the Yates investigation that Riley’s alleged coercion of her started in 2011, her rookie season with the Independence. She also told the investigation that she first decided to report Riley’s alleged conduct toward her with the Independence and Portland Thorns in 2015, when the Thorns began their own investigation during her second year in Portland. Farrelly said she “was so scared” of speaking up because it “would hurt my career, my reputation, my standing with these people.”
In 2021, Farrelly wrote a letter to then-NWSL commissioner Lisa Baird in which she claimed that in addition to what she reported in 2015, “Mr. Riley repeatedly made harassing comments about my personal relationships and sexual orientation to other players and directly to myself.”
Farrelly also said in the letter that “no one from either the team or the NWSL ever independently investigated my allegations that I raised in the 2015 investigation, despite their serious nature.”
Lohman, now 40, was a fan favorite with the Independence: a former Penn State star who was a constant in midfield and an engaging presence in the community. But that didn’t mean she was well-off away from the field. Like many players, she lived in an extended-stay hotel that was paid for by the team at a time when the average player salary was around $32,000.
And back then, Lohman said, Riley lived in the same hotel.
“Because of the circumstances which the league was in, you don’t necessarily ask questions, because you’re like, ‘I’m happy I have a team, I’m happy I have a free place to live, and I’m happy I have a chance to extend the dream I have of being a professional soccer player,’ ” Lohman said. “I don’t necessarily think, ‘Wait a minute, the coach is in the hotel room next to me — lines could be crossed.’ And lines were crossed.”
But in Women’s Professional Soccer, a league that collapsed after only three seasons of play (2009-11), there were no formal ways to report improper behavior.
“There was a blurring of lines when it came to boundaries, and the lack of protection when it came to policies and avenues to report abuse — [they] were nonexistent,” Lohman said.
Red flags
She gave another example: Riley’s office space was within the players’ lounge area at their practice venue.
“Where the players are supposed to have space to relax in between double [practice] days, bond with one another,” Lohman said. “There was no piece of his organization that he didn’t have his hands all over, and that’s purposeful. You would never see that in, I would say, a men’s sport.”
Yet even with all this, in a team renowned for its chemistry, she didn’t know of the worst of Riley’s alleged misdeeds.
“I was fooled by Paul Riley,” Lohman said.
She also admits now that back then, she didn’t know all the signs to recognize that were red flags.
“Many coaches, they’re volatile, they can erupt, they have favorites, and that just seemed part and parcel with playing in the league,” she said. “So there were days where you didn’t want to cross Paul Riley; there were days where he was flying high. If Liverpool [Riley’s favorite English Premier League team] won, he was happy as a clam.”
‘I couldn’t fully comprehend’
Lohman saw that Riley pushed some players “all season long — they couldn’t do anything right. Or [other] players couldn’t do anything wrong.”
But in the moment, sometimes it was necessary to ignore all of that just to keep going.
“A lot of times when you have a coach that’s that volatile, you can’t look outside yourself,” she said. “You’re showing up every day to survive, and not to get yelled at, and not to make a mistake. And when you’re in that narrow focus where your head is down — because for the love of whatever’s above, you don’t want to make a mistake, you don’t want to be that person he screams at today — it’s very difficult to look around to see how other people are feeling.”
Which led her to this conclusion: “The toxicity wasn’t the shark, it was the water that we were swimming in.”
Though Lohman didn’t get to know Farrelly well, those years together in Philadelphia came back to mind in the winter of 2013-14. By then, Lohman was with the NWSL’s Boston Breakers and Farrelly was with FC Kansas City. They were reunited when they made winter-loan moves to Apollon Limassol in Cyprus, a club team playing in that season’s Champions League.
At the time, quite a few Americans were on the squad, including five other former Independence players.
Lohman said she now sees that some of Farrelly’s behavior back then may have been “self-destructive.” But back then, Lohman admitted, she “just thought, you know, maybe that’s who [Farrelly] is.”
Farrelly could not be reached for comment.
”Looking back, she was probably really struggling,” Lohman said. “She seemed to be, from an outside perspective, someone who was in a lot of pain, and I didn’t fully understand, I couldn’t fully comprehend.”
And it so happened that during that spell in Cyprus, Kansas City traded Farrelly to Portland — meaning a reunion with Riley.
Seeking deep change
Lohman hasn’t spoken to any of her former Independence teammates since the Yates report was published, though she did talk with some of them after The Athletic’s big report last year.
Coincidentally, The Athletic’s report was published not long after Lohman published a book on the life lessons that soccer can teach young players, especially girls. The book has a page full of praise for Riley. After the reporting came out, Lohman issued a public apology. She said she “could not have been more wrong” about Riley and removed the page from future printings of the book.
“After recently learning and listening to the stories of Sinead Farrelly and Mana Shim, I instantly realized Paul had a true dark side,” Lohman wrote on the page that’s now there instead. “I regret everything I said about Paul Riley.”
Lohman ended her playing days in 2018, and has remained involved in the sport as a coach and speaker. She has traveled with the U.S. State Department’s Sports Envoy program and is involved with a range of charities in the D.C. area.
If a call came to help the NWSL make things right, would she take it?
“It depends who asks, and where is their intention, where’s their heart — and if they’re serious about actually creating change,” Lohman answered. She said she’d like to focus her efforts on improving the culture in youth soccer, an area the Yates report spotlighted as having issues that flowed up to the professional game.
“It’s obvious, yet no one’s ever said it, that we’re normalizing this,” Lohman said. “We’re teaching our kids that leadership is screaming … leadership is abuse from coaches. And so as you get older, you see this behavior yet again, because it’s consistent throughout. You see nothing wrong with it.”
And like so many people around the sport, she has seen enough.
