Luis Rubiales, who resigned from his Spanish post, the best football official after having forcibly kissed a player, testified Tuesday during his sexual assault trial that he made as a sign of affection in ” A situation of extraordinary joy ”.
Mr. Rubiales was also accused of coercion in the context of the episode, in which he pressed a kiss on the player, Jennifer Hermoso, on the field during the medal ceremony after Spain won the Cup of the female world 2023.
Mr. Rubiales denied doing something wrong during the meeting with Ms. Hermoso. Speaking in a courtroom near Madrid, he said: “You don’t win a World Cup every day”, and he added that he had embraced other players in moments of celebration.
He also said that he had asked for permission before kissing Ms. Hermoso, describing her as a boot. “I asked him,” Can I give you a little kiss? ” And she said, “OK”, he told a prosecutor. Mrs. Hermoso said shortly after the episode that “at no time did I agree to the kiss he gave me.”
“I could not react-it was a thousandth of a second,” she said, adding that she had immediately known that the act was not normal.
“My boss kissed me,” she said. “It shouldn’t happen.”
The kiss and the benefits that have followed have become a time of calculation in the country as well as in sport, opposing a culture of machismo to more recent progress in gender equality in Spanish football.
Mr. Rubiales, 47, risks two and a half years in prison if he is found guilty. Three other men, including Jorge Vilda, the team’s coach at the World Cup, are accused of coercion, prosecutors saying that they put pressure on Ms. Hermoso to drop her complaint and minimize the incident. Everyone could face 18 months.
The trial opened last week with the testimony of Ms. Hermoso, 34, who described the kiss as the moment which “ruined one of the happiest days of my life”.
Ms. Hermoso, who plays in Mexico, also testified that the senior football officials had put him pressure to say that Mr. Rubiales had done nothing wrong.
Ms. Hermoso was left from the Spanish team after the episode, but on Monday, the current head coach of the Spanish female team, Montse Tomé, said that the exclusion of Ms. Hermoso “was not a punishment ».
Ms. Tomé, who became the team’s coach in September 2023 after Mr. Vilda’s dismissal, appeared before the court near Madrid as a witness for the defense.
In August 2023, Ms. Tomé and 10 other staff of Spanish women’s coaches published a collective declaration condemning the “unacceptable attitudes and actions of Mr. Rubiales”.
The appointment of Ms. Tomé as successor to Mr. Vilda, however, was considered by some as a continuation of the old leadership. She had worked with Mr. Vilda as a assistant and had ordered players to attend the training camp. It was also considered by players to offer little practical support to Ms. Hermoso and ignoring the calls for a structural change in the Football Federation.
Ms. Hermoso, during her testimony, said that the Federation had practically abandoned her after her complaints. She said the officials only wanted to “save their reputation”.
In the aftermath of the kiss, Mr. Rubiales offered lukewarm apology and resisted the calls to resign. The Spanish Football Federation has published a statement that cited Ms. Hermoso calling the kiss “a completely spontaneous mutual gesture”. During her testimony, Ms. Hermoso said she had never approved the declaration.
In the midst of increasing pressure and decreasing support, Mr. Rubiales resigned from his post as head of the national football organization, the Royal Spanish Football Federation, in September 2023.
