{"id":33470,"date":"2025-07-30T04:35:16","date_gmt":"2025-07-30T04:35:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/33470\/"},"modified":"2025-07-30T04:35:16","modified_gmt":"2025-07-30T04:35:16","slug":"canada-coach-banned-in-olympic-drone-spying-scandal-set-to-resume-her-career-in-new-zealand-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/33470\/","title":{"rendered":"Canada coach banned in Olympic drone spying scandal set to resume her career in New Zealand"},"content":{"rendered":"

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) \u2014 The Canada coach banned for her role in a drone spying scandal<\/a> at the Paris Olympics has been hired as head coach of New Zealand\u2019s only professional women\u2019s team.<\/p>\n

Bev Priestman<\/a>, who recently finished a one-year suspension from all soccer-related activity, signed a two-year deal with Wellington Phoenix in New Zealand\u2019s capital city.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a twist of fate for Priestman, who was suspended after a FIFA investigation found that she along with other coaching staff had used drones to spy on the New Zealand women\u2019s national team prior to Canada\u2019s first match at the Paris Olympics.<\/p>\n

She was fired as head coach of Canada\u2019s women’s national team<\/a> after as review by Canada Soccer.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re really pleased to be able to welcome Bev back to football<\/a>,\u201d Phoenix chairman Rob Morrison said Wednesday. \u201cWe all know she\u2019s had a period of time away from the game. But we understand the circumstances and we\u2019re really comfortable with this appointment.”<\/p>\n

Priestman guided Canada to a gold medal at the Tokyo Olympics and has coached at four Women\u2019s World Cups, three Olympic Games and three FIFA youth World Cups. She also has previously worked in New Zealand, in coaching development in Wellington and then as New Zealand Football’s development director.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

In a statement, Priestman thanked the club and officials for “giving me this chance to come back to the game I love and hopefully bring some special moments to not only this city, but this country.\u201d<\/p>\n

Phoenix \u201cis a fantastic club with big ambitions, world-class facilities and a phenomenal fan base,\u201d she said. \u201cWe have a responsibility now to fly the flag for this country and try to do something special.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wellington Phoenix plays in Australia’s top-flight women’s competition, A-League Women, and Priestman is targeting the title.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere’ll be a hunger and a desire there because we know we want to achieve a first for this club and to do that is going to take something special,\u201d she said in the club’s statement.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

Stephen Conroy, chairman of Australian Professional Leagues, said Priestman’s signing was a \u201cfantastic endorsement\u201d for the competition.<\/p>\n

\u201cBev is a world-renowned national team head coach and Olympic champion,” Conroy said, “and her experience and expertise will be a huge boost for the up-and-coming squad at the Phoenix.\u201d<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

AP soccer: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/soccer<\/a><\/p>\n

Steve Mcmorran, The Associated Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) \u2014 The Canada coach banned for her role in a drone spying scandal at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":33471,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[2840,25354,49,48,7941,25358,5441,25355,44,25357,25359,2070,25353,25356],"class_list":["post-33470","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-canada","tag-australia","tag-bev-priestman","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canada-soccer","tag-head-coach","tag-new-zealand","tag-new-zealand-football","tag-news","tag-paris-olympics","tag-stephen-conroy","tag-wellington","tag-wellington-phoenix","tag-womens-national-team"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33470","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33470"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33470\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33471"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33470"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33470"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33470"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}