Openly condemning sexual violence, football’s unfinished business

On the final day of the championship, two young footballers made headlines for their debuts with the first team of their respective clubs: Raúl Asencio at Real Madrid and Ferran Ruiz at Girona FC. Not only did they occupy the media stage on the same weekend, but they also shared a dressing room in the Madrid youth academy and, in addition, both men have criminal proceedings opened for the crime of revealing secrets to sexual nature and child pornography.

The case dates back to September 2023, when the Civil Guard arrested three young Real Madrid players for recording and distributing without consent a video in which they had an intimate relationship with a minor. The defendants’ cell phones were tapped and it was discovered that the players in question had sent the video to five teammates and 32 other people.

While awaiting their trial, this event is reminiscent of another that occurred in 2016, when two SD Eibar footballers, Antonio Luna and Sergi Enrich, were arrested and then sentenced to two years in prison for the broadcast of a similar video .

The sentence was handed down in 2021, five years after the events, and neither before nor after this sentence did any of them have any problems continuing to play for different teams. In these cases, it is worth finding out about club protocols.

If we do a quick count, we find in Spain no less than half a dozen cases in which football clubs have acted in an elusive, even complicit, manner with players accused of some form of gender-based violence. .

This same season, last September, footballer Rafa Mir was arrested and charged with two sexual assaults while awaiting trial. His club, Valencia CF, resolved the problem with a financial sanction and two matches without playing. Another case is that of Getafe CF, which did not hesitate to recruit Mason Greenwood last year, an English player accused of sexist violence against his partner.

FC Barcelona is not exempt either: it stripped Dani Alves of his status as a legendary player when the sentence sentencing him to four years and six months in prison for sexual assault was known. But it was granted again a few hours later.

For its part, RC Celta delayed the dismissal of its player Santi Mina until the Andalusian TSJ ratifies the conviction for sexual abuse. The Vigo team also did not take legal action against its then captain, Hugo Mallo, who was accused in 2019 of sexual abuse for touching a woman who worked as a mascot cheerleader for RCD Espanyol at the The match between the Catalans and Galicians is approaching.

The player did not apologize to the victim or show remorse; not even after the Barcelona Provincial Court ratified the sentence. Even though Celta took no action, Espanyol accompanied its employee and provided her with legal support during the five years that the legal proceedings lasted, as she herself admitted on several occasions before the media.

Returned to the court file

“I am not dedicated to being a judge. As long as there is a presumption of innocence, I respect it. This was stated by Quique Cárcel, the sporting director of Girona FC, during a press conference, in the face of the avalanche of criticism on the networks of supporters unhappy with the signing and participation in the first team of Ferran Ruiz.

Valencia also hid behind the presumption of innocence in the case of Rafa Mir. And, in addition, he also made use of the sports law, which includes the right of effective occupation, which states that players can only be expelled from the field in the event of injury or sanction.

The club has shielded itself from criticism and defended its decision not to fire Rafa Mir under the pretext of avoiding problems for breaking the law, as recently happened to Manchester City. At the beginning of November, a judgment from the Manchester employment court was made public, forcing the club to pay nearly 13 million euros to Benjamin Mendy.

This French player has been accused of six cases of rape in 2021, which is why City have decided to freeze his salary for the remainder of their contractual relationship. But the defender was acquitted and took the club to court. In the end, Mendy won the legal battle and Manchester must pay him everything he did not receive.

Due to precedents like this, clubs tend to be very cautious when accusations become known once the contract has already been signed. Another case is that of Girona, which appealed to Ferran Ruiz when the legal proceedings had already started and charges were already being made against the player. The club still decided to hire him, but included a clause in his contract: it could be broken in the event of a conviction.

Codes of conduct, a possible tool

Júlia Humet, a lawyer specializing in gender-based violence, recognizes that when legal proceedings are initiated, it can be problematic for the club – or any company – to make drastic decisions until there is a decision. But he assures that “there are other ways to position yourself firmly. “There could be a stronger public stance.”

Psychologist specializing in violence Núria Iturbe highlights the code of conduct, a tool with which teams could be much stricter if they wanted. “Sport is becoming more and more sensitive to the fight against racism and no one is surprised that a club expels a supporter from the field when it has indications that this supporter has uttered racist insults,” explains Iturbe .

This expert assures that companies have the capacity to impose certain standards of conduct and that, when legal excuses are used, “basically it means that they are looking for a period of two or three years to show that nothing happened.”

Furthermore, Humet recalls that “contracts can be terminated provided that you are prepared to pay compensation. Another thing is that the club does not want to spend this money but, just as it invests it in advertising campaigns, does it not want to use it to dissociate itself from the causes of gender-based violence?

And the image that clubs project is important, as actors who exercise great influence in society. In addition, accusations of violence linked to footballers always have a wide scope, which means that, according to Iturbe, clubs have a responsibility towards the victims.

“The media impact makes victimization permanent. Especially because in media affairs, there is a double judgment,” explains the psychologist. Even if the female version is generally questioned, in cases where she denounces – generally anonymously – a famous and admired man, the questioning intensifies.

The clearest example in this sense is that of footballer Rubén Castro, accused in 2013 of sexist violence against his ex-partner. The then Real Betis player received widespread support from his fans. So much so that some of the stands created a chant that they chanted during the matches: “Rubén Castro alé, Rubén Castro alé. It wasn’t your fault. She was a whore, you did it right.

The club did not act forcefully and even chose Castro as one of the protagonists of an initiative to change the white of the Betis jersey to pink on the occasion of “Betis Women’s Week”. Although he did call the chants “disgusting”, he criticized the sanction imposed by La Liga and the National Anti-Violence Commission, calling it “unjust, opportunistic and discriminatory”.

“There is a pact of intra-gender complicity between men to legitimize their power. And this is partly due to the lack of consequences on the part of the clubs,” explains Laura Castells, member of the Noctàmbules sexual violence observatory.

And there are cases where clubs not only remain silent, but openly take the side of their players, as is the case of Paris Saint-Germain player Achraf Hakimi. While in March 2023 the French prosecutor’s office formally accused the Spanish-Moroccan of rape, the former coach of the Parisian team, Christophe Galtier, declared during a press conference on behalf of the club that “PSG supports Hakimi and trust in justice.” Since then, and even if the affair continues, neither the club nor its current coach, Luis Enrique Martínez, have changed their position.

The result of this silence from the teams has the consequence of placing the blame on the complainant, “as if it was she who could have done something to avoid it”, affirms Castells, who insists on the fact that responsibility does not It is not just the responsibility of the clubs. “Also from the media or fans who decide to separate ‘the other’ from what is really important, namely football, as the players of the Spanish national team said in this statement about Rubiales.”

The multiplication of cases in men’s football

Various studies have confirmed that the increase in the number of complaints is partly explained by the awareness-raising tasks and the tools available to victims to make their voices heard in these types of situations. It is therefore not surprising that more and more cases of footballers being accused of some form of gender-based violence are being reported.

Last week, the two-year prison sentence for sexual assault of former Sevilla FC footballer Wissam Ben Yedder was made public; Also last week, the BBC revealed that a Premier League footballer, whose identity has not been revealed, is being investigated following complaints from five women of sexual assault.

Faced with this increase in cases, can we conclude that football is a place particularly conducive to gender-based violence? Castells only half agrees: “It is true that football has traditionally been a very masculine and masculinized world. But this does not prevent the reproduction of patterns that occur in other spheres of society. Even so, it is true that there is something that stands out in football and that is the feeling of impunity.

Núria Iturbe completely agrees with this: “Sexual violence is linked to inequalities of social power and being a footballer, young, rich and famous is a form of social power. »

Whether out of conviction or simple commercial strategy, football clubs are taking small steps to support society’s progress in terms of equality, feminism or anti-racism. However, the experts consulted highlight the lack of will to put an end to impunity in matters of gender-based violence. At present, the majority of clubs – at least in Spain – refer to legal proceedings as a scale to decide to what extent they should be involved.