Steven van de Velde spent 13 months in prison for rape, and played as part of Netherlands pair in Paris
Steven van de Velde of the Netherlands during the preliminary phase of the beach volleyball in Paris. Photograph: Carl Recine/Getty ImagesThe Dutch beach volleyball player Steven van de Velde, who was convicted of raping a 12-year-old British girl in 2016, has said that he considered quitting the Paris Olympics amid the controversy surrounding his participation.
Asked in an interview with the Dutch national broadcaster NOS if he thought about quitting, Van de Velde said that he considered it before and during the Olympics, but ultimately decided to compete. “I thought: ‘I don’t want that. I’m not going to give others the power to decide they can bully me away or get rid of me,’” he said in Dutch. Van de Velde did not speak to reporters during the Olympics.
In a statement posted on the website of the Dutch Volleyball Federation before the Olympics Games, Van de Velde said of his past: “I cannot reverse it, so I will have to bear the consequences. It has been the biggest mistake of my life.” “There is certainly a very good chance that it has had an influence on our game,” he told NOS. “If I think about how much I was focused on peripheral matters – with how I want to be on the field instead of with tactics against the opponent – then you can say that that has had an influence, but there is no point in passing the buck.”
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