The Wellington Phoenix coach reflects on the aftermath of the Olympic spying scandal and leading her team into a first A-League Women’s finals campaign
F
ootball is not the kind of profession that lends itself to time off for birthdays and the like. Especially when one is preparing to lead the Wellington Phoenix into their first A-League Women’s finals campaign, as Bev Priestman was last week. Yet, especially when contrasted with the year prior, when she was still in the midst of a one-year Fifa ban after the spying scandal that engulfed Canada women’s football team during the Paris Olympics, being among “her people” turned out to be a gift in and of itself.
“It was my 40th birthday [last week],” Priestman tells Moving the Goalposts. “And it’s those moments, I think to a year ago, and how I felt. And then how I felt in the club [this year], around my staff, around the team. I do this job because I love people. I love the game, obviously, but it’s working with people, getting your energy with people, and trying to inspire people and help them find a better version of themselves.
“What happened in Paris, and off the back of that, and the media runaway stories that you know necessarily aren’t accurate. You just become very isolated, very, very quickly in a job where it is about being part of a team. That isolation hits you really, really hard, as well as things playing out in the public domain. The biggest joy I’ve had the most this year is just again, getting back on the pitch, working with people who want to be better. I’ve loved that.”
