What if the little affair of spying on the Canadian women’s football team at the 2024 Paris Olympics was only the tip of the iceberg? The media outlet The Globe and Mail has just published an edifying investigation into staff practices, which go far beyond this simple matter. If coach Bev Priestman, her assistant Jasmime Mander and Joey Lombardi, an employee of the federation, were sentenced to one year of suspension, their actions would not have stopped there.
On the basis of several testimonies and documents, the investigation by the Canadian media explains that the use of espionage was cultural among coaches and that it was not always to the taste of certain members of the staff who had already resigned or even been sacked for grinding their teeth. A year before the Olympic scandal which caused them to receive six penalty points in the group, a member of staff had expressed his concerns about espionage to his managers, with no reaction from them.
Sex toys thrown at staff
But espionage isn’t everything. The Globe and Mail’s investigation reveals a set of intriguing practices within the Canadian selection. The staff allegedly organized moments of “obligatory drinking the day before matches”, called “staff social evenings” to which the players were not invited. These social evenings, otherwise called “Match Day Minus One” (D-1 before the match), sometimes got out of hand. Two witnesses reported that sex toys were thrown at staff members, and three others, sexually explicit questions asked. in the context of games.
The behavior of assistant Jasmime Mander, very close to her coach Bev Priestman, would also have caused tensions. Three former staff members said they ended up in tears after being sharply reprimanded by the latter, another even revealed having had a panic attack. A beautiful atmosphere which ended up crashing in Paris this summer.
