A former Czech football coach has been handed a lifetime ban from all football-related activities by UEFA, after he was found to have secretly filmed female players in changing rooms and showers over a period of four years.

Petr Vlachovsky, the former women’s head coach at 1. FC Slovacko, was arrested in September 2023 after police discovered covertly recorded footage of his players online. The case, which has sent shockwaves through the football community, culminated in UEFA taking decisive action after months of mounting pressure from players’ unions and victims.

Vlachovsky, who was once voted the best women’s coach in the Czech Republic and also previously led the country’s Under-19 women’s national team, had concealed a miniature camera inside a backpack to carry out the recordings.

A total of 14 players were filmed without their knowledge in the most private of circumstances, with the youngest victim just 17 years old at the time. He was also found guilty of possessing child sexual abuse material, compounding the gravity of his crimes. Despite the severity of the offences, a Czech criminal court in May 2025 handed him only a one-year suspended sentence and a five-year domestic coaching ban, without holding a public trial and in circumstances that denied the victims the right to appeal.

The lenient criminal punishment provoked outrage among players past and present, several of whom spoke publicly about the lasting psychological trauma they had suffered. One former Slovacko player described being consumed by anxiety after the arrest, saying that in every gym or locker room she visited, she found herself checking obsessively for hidden cameras. She added that the experience had profoundly damaged her relationship with her own body. Another player called the suspended sentence a mockery, noting that she had been forewarned by investigators not to expect harsh punishment, given that Czech law does not classify child sexual abuse material or non-contact sexual offences as serious crimes.

The Czech Association of Soccer Players, backed by global players’ union FIFPRO, mounted a sustained campaign for a stronger sanction, arguing that the criminal verdict was wholly inadequate and that Vlachovsky posed a continued risk to players. Under the terms of the original domestic ban, he could have returned to coaching in Czechia as early as 2030, while facing no legal restrictions whatsoever on taking up a coaching role abroad in the interim. UEFA’s lifetime ban from all football-related activity has now addressed that loophole, and the European governing body has further requested that FIFA extend the ban globally, while also calling on the Football Association of the Czech Republic to revoke Vlachovsky’s coaching licence entirely.

FIFPRO welcomed the UEFA decision as a necessary and overdue outcome, stating that it sends a strong message that abusive behaviour has no place in football and that safeguarding the wellbeing of players must remain a priority at every level of the game. The union also confirmed it would continue pressing for a worldwide ban to ensure that Vlachovsky cannot exploit any jurisdictional gaps to resume a career in the sport. The case has reignited broader calls across European football for mandatory lifetime bans for all sexual offenders, with advocates arguing that a strict one-strike policy is the only credible deterrent against the abuse of trust that lies at the heart of the coach-player relationship.