Canada Soccer Deems Olympics Drone Inquiry Reveals Troubling Pattern

During the Games, Canada's women's team found themselves at the center of a controversy when New Zealand's team accused them of using a drone to disrupt their training session. The incident sparked a spying scandal that overshadowed the athletic competition.

Canada were docked six points in the Olympic tournament while head coach Bev Priestman, who steered them to gold at the Tokyo Games three years before, was banned for a year by world soccer's governing body FIFA.

Canada reached the quarter-finals where they lost to Germany.

"Our initial review of the conclusions of the independent investigator reveals that the drone incident in Paris was a symptom of a past pattern of an unacceptable culture and insufficient oversight within the national teams," Canada Soccer CEO and General Secretary Kevin Blue said in a statement.

Blue said Canada Soccer would reveal "key conclusions" from the report within a week and would outline the next steps the organisation will take to address the findings.

Peter Augruso, board chair for Canada Soccer, said they were committed to "renewing" the organisation following the embarrassing incident.

"We know that more needs to be done and change takes time," he said.