Spain’s World Cup victory was once supposed to be a second of birthday party for the nation. But now, avid gamers are boycotting the nationwide crew, and staffers of the Spanish football federation are resigning in protest in opposition to its president, Luis Rubiales, who was once provisionally suspended via FIFA, football’s world governing frame, after he kissed a participant on the lips, allegedly in opposition to her will.
Midfielder Jenni Hermoso, 33, says she didn’t consent to the kiss, which took place at the post-match rite, and that she and her circle of relatives have confronted power from the Royal Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) to absolve Rubiales, 46. Players round the global, and Spain’s executive, have expressed their give a boost to for Hermoso, and protesters have stuffed downtown Madrid over the weekend calling for his resignation. Elsewhere, Rubiales’s mom has fixed a starvation strike from her native church in give a boost to of her son. The factor stays on the entrance pages of European newspapers and is a heated speaking level for plenty of on the remedy girls in sports activities.
But Spain’s football federation has accused Hermoso of lying and stated it is going to take criminal motion. It additionally launched a sequence of pictures of Hermoso and Rubiales in a remark that native media described as “strange.”
Here’s what to know about a controversy that has sparked a disaster in Spanish football.