SAINT ETIENNE, France – The Canadian women’s soccer team managed to keep its spy scandal shame from spilling onto the pitch.
With head coach Bev Priestman back at the team hotel, and with two staff members already sent home as punishment, Canada rallied to a 2-1 win over New Zealand on Thursday to open its 2024 Olympic tournament at Geoffroy-Guichard Stadium.
Priestman served her self-imposed one-game suspension after denying she had anything to do with drones flying over two New Zealand practices leading up to the Games, incidents that led to police intervention, the banishment of staffers Joseph Lombardi and Jasmine Mander, as well as investigations by both FIFA and Canada Soccer.
Assistant coach Andy Spence ran the team in her absence. Evelyne Viens scored the winner in the 79th minute to improve Canada to 11-0-4 in the last 15 meetings against the Ferns.
Priestman did not speak with reporters on Thursday. New Zealand Football CEO Andrew Pragnell asked for urgent action to address the integrity breach over the drone footage and asked that Canada take zero points from the encounter – the win was worth three points.
There was a sense of bemusement from Canadian soccer fans on site in France. Many are puzzled why the eighth-ranked squad in the world would put themselves in this position against a country 20 rungs lower, and a Ferns side that hasn’t won a head-to-head meeting since 1987.
“It’s a little bit embarrassing that the whole thing happened,” Aaron Walker-Duncan of Victoria, B.C., said before entering the stadium. “It’s a bit of a stupid thing to do in this day and age. Someone didn’t give it the thought they should have. No one asked what are we going to get out of this and was it really worth it?
The scandal, however, didn’t change Walker-Duncan’s opinion of the team. He refused to join a loud chorus at home calling for Priestman’s dismissal.
“I’m still supportive of Bev and it’s unfortunate she isn’t on the touch line for the team,” he said. “She’s taking her medicine and then will move on, I guess.”