Jenni Hermoso has posed topless for GQ magazine while revealing how the kiss gate scandal has impacted her life.
The Spain international was caught up in a wave of controversy when she was subjected to a kiss on the lips from Luis Rubiales, the then-head of the Spanish FA (RFEF), whilst collecting her winner’s medal.
Despite the Spanish FA at first denying that the kiss was unconsensual, Hermoso later spoke up and sparked a chain of events that saw Rubiales suspended by FIFA and pressured into resigning his position with RFEF.
Rubiales was later banned from football-related activity for three years by world football’s governing body.
In the wake of the World Cup final, Hermoso took just under a month off, before returning domestic duty for her club, Mexican side Pachuca, but found the following weeks difficult as she suffered threats after speaking out.
‘For a while I forgot I was a footballer,’ Hermoso continued. ‘But you go back to a training session, to the pitch, wearing your kit, and you try to give the best version of yourself again.
‘Being a Taurus makes me see that I have to fight, but also to protect myself. If I want something, I go after it no matter how many times I fail and knock myself against the wall.
‘It has helped me to achieve everything I have set out to achieve in the world of football.’
The scale of the ‘kiss-gate’ scandal threatened to overshadow Spain’s historic win, but in her first interview since the achievement, she shared her gratitude for voices that had been on her side, and that of the players.
‘At the beginning, it was hard to understand what was going on; the movement that was unleashed,’ Hermoso told the magazine, who are honouring the player at their Man of the Year Awards in 2023.
‘I’m grateful for the fact so many people were on my side, on our side. Actresses, footballers, some of our rivals at the World Cup, like the England team, who we beat in the final.
‘It all gave me the strength to carry on and go through this for everyone.’
