Canada progress at Olympics despite six-point deduction over drone scandal

Vanessa Gilles scored in the 62nd minute to give Canada a 1-0 win over Colombia, advancing the team to the quarterfinals of the Paris Olympics on Wednesday despite a six-point deduction over a drone scandal.

“The odds were against us, but we managed to pull through. We stayed together the whole time and we saw the results,” Gilles said after the win.

Canada, the reigning Olympic champions, will face Germany in the quarter-finals in Marseille on Saturday.

Earlier in the day, Canada lost its bid to overturn a points deduction imposed by FIFA for filming a New Zealand training session ahead of the Olympics.

Canada, which won its first two games, went into Wednesday’s match in Nice with zero points after deductions and needs a win to have a chance of continuing.

“Going into the game, we wanted to win, regardless of what that decision was,” said Canada captain Jesse Fleming. “It didn’t change our game plan or what we wanted to do.”

In the other group match, Marie-Antoinette Katoto scored goals in the 22nd and 49th minutes for France to beat New Zealand 2-1. France finished top of the group and will face Brazil in the quarterfinals. Colombia came through as one of the best teams in third place and will face Spain. The US and Japan will play each other in the remaining last eight.

The drone spying scandal threatens to spread from the Olympics to the men’s team at the 2026 World Cup, which Canada will host along with the United States and Mexico.

FIFA on Wednesday released the judge’s document detailing the evidence to explain the far-reaching Olympic punishments. In addition to the points deductions, there were one-year bans from world football for head coach Bev Priestman, an assistant coach and a performance analyst who flew the spy drone.

Espionage was something the Canadian women’s team had “always done and it was the difference between winning and losing,” FIFA appeals judge Neil Eggleston wrote in a 26-page document of evidence and witness statements to help explain the verdict. Actions by the Canadian team at the Olympics were “inexcusable and unacceptable,” Eggleston wrote.

Canada Soccer wrote in its submission to the FIFA hearing that “Bev Priestman indicates that the men’s national team may have employed similar scouting tactics.”

In an earlier internal email about drone spying on opponents’ training sessions, Priestman wrote: “I know there is a whole operation going on on the men’s side regarding this topic.”

The FIFA document, even with redacted sections, appears to link Priestman to John Herdman, the coach of Major League Soccer club Toronto. Herdman coached Canada’s women’s team from 2011-18, then took over the men’s team and led them to the 2022 World Cup, the country’s first appearance at the tournament in 36 years.

The Canadian Press quoted Herdman last week as saying, “I am absolutely certain that during my time as head coach at the Olympics or the World Championships, we were never involved in any of those activities.”

Priestman was Herdman’s assistant on the Canadian women’s national team and became head coach in 2020. Canada won the Olympic title the following year at the Tokyo Olympics.

Priestman has apologized to the Canadian players and said she was “absolutely devastated” by the scandal. Canadian team officials have said the players were unaware of any attempted cheating.

“While we are disappointed with the outcome of our appeal, we commend the players for their incredible resilience and perseverance throughout this tournament,” the Canadian Olympic Committee said in a statement Wednesday.