John Herdman, the previous head coach of each the Canada males’s and ladies’s nationwide soccer groups, is turning into a central determine in a brewing scandal over Canada Soccer’s makes an attempt to spy on opponents that was uncovered shortly earlier than the beginning of the Olympic Video games in Paris.
Information broke on Wednesday that Canada’s ladies’s nationwide crew despatched a drone over New Zealand’s coaching periods on a number of events earlier than the groups’ opening sport of the competitors on Thursday, which Canada gained 2-1. FIFA have since docked Canada six factors, banned head coach Bev Preistman and assistant coaches Jasmine Mander and Joseph Lombardi for a 12 months and fined the Canadian Soccer Affiliation $226,000 for that particular incident. Because the preliminary story broke, although, a number of reviews have emerged that spying has been a years-long behavior for each Canada’s males’s and ladies’s nationwide groups.
ESPN reported on Saturday that the U.S. Soccer Federation was conscious of Canada’s makes an attempt to spy on them, together with in January 2021 when each nations’ males’s groups had been coaching on the IMG Academy in Bradenton, Fla. As a substitute of sending a drone on that event, a Canada Soccer workers member pretended to be on the IMG Academy’s payroll whereas watching a U.S. coaching session earlier than a safety guard verified his employment and instructed him to exit the apply.
U.S. Soccer didn’t report Canada on the time, in keeping with ESPN, due to the federations’ relationship in eager to co-host the 2026 World Cup alongside Mexico.
ESPN additionally recognized Herdman as a “widespread denominator” in each groups’ makes an attempt to spy on opposition, regardless of himself publicly and privately appearing paranoid that different groups had been spying on his squad. Herdman, now the top coach of MLS facet Toronto FC, stated in a press convention Friday that he didn’t spy on opponents at World Cups or on the Olympics, however would cooperate with any investigation. The ESPN report says officers at U.S. Soccer, although, count on Herdman to be implicated within the scandal.
Whereas FIFA has issued a punishment strictly for the incident involving New Zealand on the Paris Video games, investigations into an alleged behavior of spying are ongoing. Reviews recommend that Canada’s groups have tried to spy on the opposition as way back as 2019 and as lately because the Copa America, the place the boys’s crew completed in fourth place this month.
Most importantly, reviews point out that workers spied on opposition throughout Canada’s ladies’s crew’s run to the gold medal on the pandemic-delayed Tokyo Olympics in 2021. Gamers have denied seeing drone footage throughout that event.
