The Royal Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) announced on Tuesday that it has dismissed the coach of the country’s women’s soccer team, Jorge Vilda, after the controversy with the ousted president of the federation, Luis Rubiales.
“In one of the first renewal measures announced by President Pedro Rocha, he decided to dispense with the services of Jorge Vilda as sports director and women’s national coach,” read in a statement released this afternoon.
Vilda has been the coach of the main Spanish women’s soccer team since 2015 and led the team to win the World Cup last August, a fact that the RFEF highlights and whose cause it attributes to the coach’s work, which was “key to the remarkable growth of women’s football in Spain”.
“We value her irreproachable personal and sporting conduct,” also reads the statement from the Spanish federation, which highlights Vilda as “a promoter of the values of respect and sportsmanship in football.”
In the statement announcing the coach’s dismissal, the RFEF also appreciates the “professionalism and dedication throughout all these years” and highlights the “extraordinary sports legacy” that stems from the “implementation of a game model recognized and which was the driving force behind the growth of all the women’s categories of the national team”.
Renovation publicly proposed by Rubiales
The day that Rubiales announced that he was not resigning as president of the Spanish federation, Vilda also ended up being the center of attention when he found out, in a public act, that he would be invited to renew his contract as coach.
“I activated the mechanisms for Andreu to start negotiating with you and I invite you to stay with us for another four years, earning half a million euros a year. It’s because you deserve it,” Rubiales revealed in his speech.
Luis Rubiales is provisionally suspended by FIFA for 90 days, due to the events that occurred in Sydney during the match and the celebrations of Spain’s victory that earned him the world title.
Numerous criticisms of Rubiales followed, with the player Jenni Hermoso stating that she had not consented to the kiss, contrary to what the RFEF president guarantees.
The announcement that he would not leave office caused a new peak of response and extreme positions, with the players of the national team announcing that they are not available to represent Spain again, while the current leaders of the RFEF remain in their positions.
Following Rubiales’ sanction, 11 members of coach Jorge Vilda’s coaching staff resigned, while the coach condemned the “inappropriate behavior” of the RFEF leader.
Source: TSF
