'This shouldn't have happened ...we are sorry'

Dutch FA apologise for rape by 'prominent official' 35 years ago. Abuse victims give their support to bóss Vera for speaking out

- ALISON O'REILLY

IRELAND'S women's football manager Vera Pauw has received an apology from the Dutch football association after she revealed she was raped by a football official as a young player.

KNVB said it is sorry that Ms Pauw did not have a safe working environment and for the impact that it the sexual abuse has caused her.

Ms Pauw, 59, originally from Holland, revealed she was raped by a "prominent football official" 35 years ago.

She also said she suffered two other sexual assaults by two different men employed within Dutch football.

KNVB said an investigation was conducted by independent research agency, Verinorm, at Ms Pauw's request last year.

In a statement, it said: "We are very shocked by the experiences from a not-recent past that Vera Pauw told us about in a conversation last year.

ISSUES

"The KNVB should have approached issues differently.

"For example, in the past Vera was unfortunately confronted with a number of errors and harmful comments from [former] KNVB employees.

"Verinorm has also found through the investigation there was no plan or policy of the KNVB behind this."

The Dutch football association admitted it "was not sufficiently alert to Vera's first signals in 2011 about sexually transgressive behaviour".

The statement added: "The report states that these signals were veiled, but that should not be an excuse if such a theme comes up in any way.

"The KNVB did not react sharply enough to this at the time.