I wrote in this same column in May 2022: “The Federation is in the hands of someone who manages the institution like a capo rules his family in shady business movies. That said, and seeing how all the bodies in charge of governing football are doing, perhaps what happens is that this and no other is the ideal profile for these institutions. I place a bet on them: if Rubiales falls, a Rubiales with a different last name will arrive ”.
But Rubiales did not fall. He accumulated a vast collection of scandals. Espionage, vacations paid by the federation, risqué parties and questionable personal perks paying the federation treasury, conversations and negotiations with active players like Gerard Piqué to manage the distribution of commissions for selling the Spanish Super Cup to Petrolandia , etc.
We were before an armored man politically and almost also in the media. The scandal girl didn't even tickle him. It is already known that if one manages money and secrets, he can cling to the position with total impunity. Wills are bought with tickets and with confidential information conspiracies are deactivated and silences are guaranteed. Hence the silence and coldness with which the media, most of them, and the institutions welcomed each new scandal associated with the character.
In the calculation of interests that politics always practices, a large part of journalism and the most buoyant segment of the soccer industry has now prevailed, except for a twist in the script, the beheading of Rubiales. The abuse of power practiced in full view of the whole world in the final of the women's soccer cup could not be managed this time with the formula that it will subside. Except that this being a most reprehensible episode, it does not reach the severity of the others that we already knew and that nevertheless did not serve to achieve even a slight blink of an eye from the victim. Despite the character's castling maneuver, it will soon be the turn of another Rubiales who will take over with the lesson learned. It is to be assumed that he will not go showing off his package through the boxes of the stadiums and that he will not snog anyone without his permission either. But if he is a little studied, or rather smart, whoever ends up occupying the throne of the RFEF will have internalized other useful lessons along the way.
Of all of them, the most important to know that in the federation you only risk losing your position if your misdeeds, large, small or medium, are televised. For everything else, impunity is more or less guaranteed. Provided, of course, that you have known how to weave a sufficiently wide and dense clientele network to turn your permanence in the chair into a private benefit from which many others, in addition to yourself, take direct or indirect advantage. Those many will be the ones who will defend you whatever you do. Silent most of the time. Until they reach the conclusion, applying the pure logic of the expected benefit, that you no longer pay off. And that the time has come to saddle another horse. That moment, with or without resignation, is already here for Rubiales.
