Vera Pauw, the manager of the Republic of Ireland, claims that 3 distinct individuals associated with Dutch football sexually abused and molested her.
The 59-year-old has served as Ireland’s manager since 2019. She played for the Netherlands and spent six years coaching them.
“For 35 years I have kept a secret from the world, from my family, from my teammates, my players, my colleagues and, I can now accept, from myself,” she wrote in a statement posted on Twitter.
She claims that as a young player, a “prominent football official” physically abused her and that two more men followed.
She claimed that at the time of the incident, all three were employed by Dutch football.
According to her, she reported the offenses to the Dutch police after submitting five reports to the Dutch FA without receiving an appropriate answer. The Dutch FA was astonished by her statement.
“The KNVB should have tackled a lot of issues differently,” according to an independent study.
It was discovered that Dutch FA personnel had made mistakes and hurtful remarks regarding Pauw and that the KNVB had not implemented the proper procedures or reacted appropriately to Vera’s initial “first signals about sexually transgressive behavior in 2011.”
In a subsequent chat about Pauw’s experiences in 2017, it was claimed that she “explicitly” urged them not to react.
