{"id":35734,"date":"2025-07-31T01:26:08","date_gmt":"2025-07-31T01:26:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/35734\/"},"modified":"2025-07-31T01:26:08","modified_gmt":"2025-07-31T01:26:08","slug":"bev-priestman-says-she-had-to-get-out-of-canada-after-drone-spying-scandal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/35734\/","title":{"rendered":"Bev Priestman says she \u2018had to get out\u2019 of Canada after drone-spying scandal"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Bev Priestman (R), new head coach for the Wellington Phoenix women’s football team, attends a press conference on her new appointment with Wellington Phoenix’s director of football Shaun Gill in Upper Hutt near Wellington on Wednesday.YUXIN LIU\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Bev Priestman, the former head coach of Canada\u2019s women\u2019s national soccer team \u2013 who was banned by FIFA for her role in a drone spying scandal at the Paris Olympics \u2013 has been hired<\/a> as head coach of New Zealand\u2019s only professional women\u2019s team.<\/p>\n

Priestman made her return to soccer this week after her one-year ban. The ban expired the day before New Zealand\u2019s Wellington Phoenix announced Priestman would be the new coach of their women\u2019s squad.<\/p>\n

Priestman will be returning to football to work in the country the Canadians were caught spying on. She has signed a two-year contract with the club. <\/p>\n

Priestman, who was raised in Consett, in Northern England, was visibly emotional as she discussed her suspension and what it meant to be returning to the sport. <\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t feel safe,\u201d Priestman said of living in Canada after the Olympics. \u201cThat\u2019s being brutally honest. It was very difficult for my family, and I have to live with that.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously it was an absolute media frenzy. You\u2019ve got people knocking at your door and everything, and I\u2019ve got a little boy. Without going into too much detail, it was very difficult. We knew we had to get out of that country.\u201d<\/p>\n

Investigation: Canada Soccer\u2019s culture problem<\/a><\/p>\n

Priestman was named Canada women\u2019s coach in October, 2020, and was a nominee for FIFA Women\u2019s Best Coach in 2021 \u2013 the year Canada won gold at the Toyko Olympics<\/a> \u2013 and in 2022. <\/p>\n

The drone-spying scandal<\/a> shook the national soccer federation and tarnished the reputation of a women\u2019s program that had been a jewel in Canadian sport \u2013 winning three Olympic medals in 10 years, and produced Christine Sinclair, the world\u2019s all-time leading scorer in international soccer.<\/p>\n

A Globe and Mail investigation<\/a> published last year found multiple problems at Canada Soccer with the women\u2019s program, including a toxic work environment that prized winning at all costs. Spying on opponents was tolerated, The Globe found, and analysts who didn\u2019t want to spy ended up leaving the organization.<\/p>\n

Priestman has coached in New Zealand before <\/p>\n

As a child in 1998, she attended training sessions in Consett, England run by John Herdman, who would eventually become coach of the Canadian women\u2019s team. In 2009, she joined Herdman when he was head coach of the women\u2019s team in New Zealand. And she joined him again in Canada as a technical assistant in 2013 after he became head coach of the Canadian women.<\/p>\n

In 2018, Priestman was named assistant coach of England\u2019s women\u2019s national team. In October, 2020, at age 34, Priestman became the new coach of Canada\u2019s senior women\u2019s team. <\/p>\n

The new gig marks a step down for her.<\/p>\n

Wellington finished ninth in Australia\u2019s 12-team A-League last season. The country\u2019s top talent is being drained by England\u2019s Women\u2019s Super League, the U.S. National Women\u2019s Soccer League, the U.S. second tier and Canada\u2019s new professional league, the Northern Super League, Beau Busch, chief executive of players union Professional Footballers Australia recently told SBS News. <\/p>\n

Priestman, now 39, has ties to the Wellington club through her wife Emma Humphries, a former New Zealand international who is the club\u2019s academy director. Priestman also headed up coach development in Wellington some 16 years ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re really pleased to be able to welcome Bev back to football,\u201d Wellington chairman Rob Morrison said this week. \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.\u201d<\/p>\n

Canada Soccer declined a request for comment about Priestman\u2019s new job.<\/p>\n

Priestman said she had learned from her ban, and her experience with Canada, and would be a better coach for it.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s certain values that I hold and unfortunately, you know, things around me have clouded my judgement,\u201d Priestman said. <\/p>\n

\u201cSo for me personally, I just want to get back to… I love working with people. I love getting the best out of people. I love being on a football pitch.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Bev Priestman (R), new head coach for the Wellington Phoenix women’s football team,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":35735,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[901,888,902,879,877,903,49,48,876,895,896,891,878,875,46,549,295,894,887,914,880,881,893,889,890,884,904,885,909,910,44,912,907,911,905,908,882,898,899,714,897,906,865,61,900,892,886,883,913],"class_list":["post-35734","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-canada","tag-alberta","tag-arts-news","tag-bc","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-british-columbia","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canada-news","tag-canada-sports","tag-canada-sports-news","tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","tag-canadian-breaking-news","tag-canadian-news","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-environment","tag-federal-government","tag-foreign-news","tag-globe-and-mail","tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","tag-government","tag-life-news","tag-lifestyle","tag-local-news","tag-manitoba","tag-national-news","tag-new-brunswick","tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","tag-news","tag-northwest-territories","tag-nova-scotia","tag-nunavut","tag-ontario","tag-pei","tag-photos","tag-political-news","tag-political-opinion","tag-politics","tag-politics-news","tag-quebec","tag-sports-news","tag-technology","tag-travel","tag-trudeau","tag-us-news","tag-world-news","tag-yukon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35734","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=35734"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35734\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35735"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35734"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35734"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35734"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}