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PROFILE: Who is Spain’s disgraced football chief Luis Rubiales?

Spain's football federation chief Luis Rubiales, under fire over his kiss on the lips of a Women's World Cup player, is a former attacking midfielder who went on to become a combative players' union head.

PROFILE: Who is Spain's disgraced football chief Luis Rubiales?
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez receiving a signed Spanish football jersey and an official 2018 World Cup ball from Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) president Luis Rubiales (R) during a meeting at the Moncloa Palace in Madrid on September 12, 2018. (Photo by Fernando CALVO / LA MONCLOA / AFP)

The controversial 46-year-old is facing calls for his resignation after he cupped star player Jennifer Hermoso’s head and forcefully kissed her after Spain beat England 1-0 in the final on Sunday in Australia.

Born on Spain’s Canary Islands but raised in Motril on the country’s Mediterranean coast, Rubiales played for various lower division teams before finishing his football career in 2009 at Scotland’s Hamilton Academical.

“He was a modern defender, physically very strong. He liked to attack. He was always a model of dedication and loyalty with everyone,” former Levante coach Manolo Preciado once said of Rubiales, who played for the Valencia-based side between 2003 and 2008.

At Levante Rubiales led a player revolt against unpaid wages, possibly inheriting a taste for public life from his father who served as the Socialist mayor of Motril in the mid-1990s.

Luis Rubiales playing for Levante in 2007. (Photo by JOSE LUIS ROCA / AFP)
 

The team went on strike and the players eventually collected their wages, a success that likely encouraged him to fight for his colleagues at Spanish football players’ union AFE which he headed between 2010 and 2017.

Under his watch AFE called two national players’ strikes – in 2011 and 2015 – and oversaw the creation of a fund to cover unpaid salaries. He also persuaded La Liga to agree to pay AFE a percentage of its TV broadcast rights.

 ‘Win for sure’

His first clashes with La Liga president Javier Tebas began during this time, and they continued when Rubiales was elected president of the football federation in 2018.

Tebas once said he felt Rubiales was “not qualified” for the post.

Rubiales defeated Juan Luis Larrea, the federation’s former treasurer and interim chief, in the election to become president.

Larea had taken the post on a temporary basis after the federation’s longtime president, Angel María Villar, was suspended on suspicion of embezzlement and other offences.

“I’m going to win for sure,” Rubiales, a divorced father of three girls, told reporters before the vote.

Shortly after he was elected, Rubiales in a surprise move sacked Spain’s men’s national coach Julen Lopetegui just two days before the start of the 2018 World Cup.

Re-elected president of the federation in 2020, Rubiales angered Spanish football traditionalists by expanding Spain’s Super Cup contest between the league champions and Copa del Rey winners to a four-team format.

He also faced a huge backlash for signing a lucrative deal to play the competition in Saudi Arabia, which is frequently accused of human rights abuses.

Rubiales talks to Spanish Princesses Sofía and Leonor during a Euro match in 2022. The RFEF head was sat next to Sofía again at the Women’s World Cup final Spain won in Sydney, a victory he celebrated by clasping his privates. Photo: Justin Tallis/AFP
 

‘Falsehoods’

In 2022 Spanish media published leaked audio recordings from 2019 that suggested a company called Kosmos owned by former Barcelona defender Gerard Piqué made millions of euros in commission over the deal to relocate the Super Cup to Saudi Arabia.

Rubiales dismissed the allegations as “falsehoods” and said he was “extremely angry for having information illegally stolen from my mobile”.

At the same time Rubiales won praise for boosting the number of sponsors of the federation and its revenues, and improving the conditions of lower-tier teams, which won the support of regional football federations.

“He has achieved a sea-change. He put a 19th century institution in the 21st century,” the president of the football federation in the northeastern region of Aragón, Oscar Fle, told sports radio Marca last year.

Rubiales tripled the budget for women’s football to €406 million ($439 million) in 2022 but at the same time he sided with the national women’s team coach Jorge Vilda when 15 internationals staged a mutiny last year over the manager’s methods.

The bet paid off with the squad winning the Women’s World Cup but the way Rubiales celebrated has put his job on a razor’s edge.

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Rubiales to go on trial in February in Spain over unwanted kiss

Disgraced former Spanish football federation chief Luis Rubiales will stand trial in February next year for his unsolicited kiss on the lips of Women's World Cup winner Jenni Hermoso, the court overseeing the process said Monday.

Rubiales to go on trial in February in Spain over unwanted kiss

Rubiales, 46, provoked worldwide outrage by kissing Hermoso during the medal ceremony after Spain beat England to win the World Cup in Australia last year.

In May a court had ruled Rubiales should be tried for sexual assault over the kiss, and for the alleged coercion subsequently exerted to make her say that it was consensual, without setting a date.

The trial will be held at the Audiencia Nacional, a Madrid court in charge of complex cases, from February 3 to 19, the court said in a statement.

Public prosecutors have requested a sentence of two-and-a-half years in prison for Luis Rubiales — one year for sexual assault and 18 months for coercion.

The prosecution is also asking for two years’ probation once the sentence has been served and for him to pay €50,000 ($54,000) in compensation to the player.

Rubiales is also under investigation in a separate alleged corruption case involving his reign at the federation, has denied any wrongdoing.

Three of his former associates are also being tried for putting pressure on Hermoso: former women’s coach Jorge Vilda, men’s team director Albert Luque and federation marketing boss Ruben Rivera.

The kiss took place live in front of the world’s cameras, provoking widespread outrage and prompting his suspension by world football governing body FIFA.

At the time, Rubiales brushed it off as “a consensual” peck on the lips, but Hermoso, 34, said it was not.

Under Spanish law, a non-consensual kiss can be classed as sexual assault — a criminal category that groups all types of sexual violence.

Rubiales told private Spanish television station La Sexta in April that he could not understand how the kiss he gave Hermoso could be labelled as sexual assault, saying there was “no sexual context” to it.

He denied accusations that he and other federation officials coerced Hermoso by pressuring her to speak out in his defence after the scandal erupted.

“I have a clear conscience, things have been blown out of proportion,” Rubiales said.

Hermoso filed a lawsuit against Rubiales in September, telling the judge she had come under pressure to defend him both on the flight back from Australia and on a subsequent team holiday to Ibiza in the Balearic Islands.

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