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Rob Palmer / ESPN commentator
Malaga
Friday, 7 March 2025, 16:45
Hermoso v Rubiales - the court case that gripped Spain and beyond - is finally over... Yet it seems that nobody is content with the outcome!
Spanish footballing legend Jenni Hermoso and her team didn't get their wish for Luis Rubiales to be given a jail sentence for an unwanted kiss in front of a global audience. The Spanish football president is now a "former president" with his reputation in tatters and career over as the kiss was classed as "sexual assault".
I've been asked to participate in a film giving the background into the court case and Rubiales.
Ironically, I'm one of the few who can remember commentating on Rubiales - the footballer. He was a tall, athletic, solid left-back who made his way through the lower leagues to peak with two promotions to La Liga at Levante.
The only time he made headlines was in 2008 when the powers at the relegation-threatened club fell out with the players. As captain, Rubiales became a spokesman for a team who claimed they were not being treated respectfully. At a club that was running on a shoestring, wages were owed and he declared that they would go on strike. By refusing to play against Real Madrid. Rubiales entered the national conscience.
The next season, he headed to Hamilton Academicals, a humble club in Scotland. Former chairman Ronnie MacDonald told The Times of London: "He was always quite a specimen. I was thinking 'what's this guy doing here'. He had various aspirations and wanted a personal masseuse and stuff like that."
Rubiales retired after a handful of games at The Accies, and soon became the head of the AFE Spanish footballers' union.
Spin forward a decade and a half, and the footballer who was fighting for the rights of teammates and asking a cash-strapped club for a masseuse, was now the president of the organisation at war with footballers demanding better conditions and threatening strike action.
Jenni Hermoso was one of the senior members of the Spain women's national team who led a mutiny after the 2022 European Championships. She was one of 15 who asked not to be selected for a training camp and future matches until conditions improved. Eventually, an agreement was reached and Hermoso was content to be recalled for national service.
As we now know, the team went on to World Cup glory in 2023. The one thing that struck me when I was working on the final was Rubiales familiarity with the players. He'd delivered an inspirational speech where he asked: "Who has more ovaries, us or them?". The footage of him grabbing his crotch in the Royal Box has been shown countless times.
At the end of the game, he was on the field carrying Athenea de Castillo on his shoulder. He ended up in court for planting a smacker on the lips of Jenni Hermoso. He said it was a consensual "peck"; she said the president, her boss, "forcibly kissed" her.
The man who fought for footballers' rights was now the man who was accused of crossing the line. The court found him guilty - a kiss wasn't just a kiss!
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