Marc Overmars loses appeal over FIFA’s sexual harassment suspension

Dutch football director Marc Overmars lost the appeal he filed with FIFA after the international football association decided his two-year suspension in the Netherlands should apply globally. Frank Neervoort, a representative for Overmars, confirmed on Wednesday that the former Ajax director lost the decision after the story was first reported by Parool.

“We have received a two-sentence message. The first sentence states that the appeal has been rejected, the second sentence states that the costs incurred will be borne by Mr. Overmars,” said Neervoort. The reasoning behind the appellate decision was not yet known. “We now have to request this via a FIFA portal. It also took a while last time.”

The Sports Jurisprudence Institute (ISR) in the Netherlands had imposed a two-year suspension on Overmars on November 16, of which one year was conditional. That decision was the result of an investigation into allegations of sexual harassment during his time at Ajax. The allegations included pestering, unwanted sexual advances, and sending photographs of his genitalia in an unsolicited manner.

Shortly after the allegations surfaced in February 2022, Overmars was forced to leave his job as football director at the Amsterdam club. Soon after, he was recruited for the same position at Royal Antwerp FC in Belgium.

More recently, it emerged that Ajax twice tried to bring Overmars back after he left the team. One attempt was just days after they parted ways, the other came after his replacement at Ajax departed in a scandal of his own.

The ISR declared Overmars guilty of inappropriate behavior in November 2023. At the beginning of this year, FIFA ruled the suspension Overmars received in the Netherlands should have a global effect. That meant he had to give up his role in Antwerp.

Two months later, Overmars filed his appeal with FIFA. “There are a number of reasons to appeal against that sentence,” Neervoort said at the time. “But an important reason is that not being allowed to work worldwide for a year is disproportionate to the violation: one case of transgressive behavior, for which he was punished by the ISR.”

Royal Antwerp expressed its support for Overmars at the time the appeal was filed in January. They agreed that the appeal is not so much about the content of the sanction, but about the extension that it should have effect globally.

“As a club, we will respect the ruling, but we want to collectively support the person we have had the pleasure of getting to know as a person and as a professional over the past two years. This without making any statements about what happened in the past,” the club stated.

Neervoort said Overmars can still make one last attempt to reverse the decision by filing an appeal with the international sports tribunal CAS. A decision on whether to do so will only be made after reading the reasoning behind FIFA’s decision, he said.