Sheffield Wednesday’s Jordan Broadbent shares powerful and moving message raising awareness during ‘Suicide Prevention Month’.
In a video posted online by the club, he spoke of his personal experience of losing his father to suicide at 19 and emphasised the importance of connecting with young players on a human level, beyond the coach-athlete dynamic, to normalise discussions about mental health.
Broadbent wants to see more openness about difficult topics like depression and anxiety, particularly among young men, noting that suicide remains the leading cause of death for men under 50.
He also encourages a supportive environment at the club, to balance the demands of elite sport with empathy and care for young players’ mental well-being.
Tomorrow needs you 💙
A really powerful and moving message from our Under-18s manager Jordan Broadbent during Suicide Prevention Month pic.twitter.com/5OUzIdEub2
— Sheffield Wednesday (@swfc) September 24, 2025
Jordan said: “You need to connect with the young people that you’re dealing with day in, day out. There needs to be a human side to it.
“I think they need to see my behaviours as normal, not just a coach-athlete relationship, I think they need to see me as a person and me as a human.
“So September is Mental Health Awareness Month and Suicide Prevention Month, which is a really, you know, it’s a subject close to my heart. Having lost my dad to suicide as a teenager.
“So I think over the course of the years it’s just something that I’ve been really aware of and tried to raise a little bit of awareness in my own little way via social media or doing stuff like this to try and help a little bit. So again, raise the awareness of suicide prevention.
“I was 19 years old. My dad took his own life. So it was obviously a massive moment in my life and my family’s life to go through that as a young person. And yeah, it just kind of shaped me, you know, in good ways but also in not so good ways as a young man. Having to go through that and deal with that inside my own head and try and make sense of it was really tough, especially as a young person. But I think as I’ve got older, it’s something that has really motivated me to try and help young people. And I think with the role that I’m doing now, it’s got potential to be really impactful role to young people’s lives.
“Being, like I say, in the role I’m in, where dealing with young players day in, day out, I think if they see myself being willing to talk and being open and showing empathy towards them and almost making it okay to talk about the taboo subjects or talk about difficult subjects, I think if I demonstrate that role model in behaviour to the young people of our football club, then it probably normalises the ability for them to speak as young people and young men, which has historically been a really difficult thing to do.
“It goes back to normalising and making it okay to talk about difficult situations, especially in young men. I think suicide is still the biggest killer of men under the age of 50. And to me that’s not right.
“I think the more we speak about it as men and we demonstrate those role modelling behaviours that it is okay to not be okay and when you talk about depression and anxiety and stuff like that it’s a temporary feeling.
“And I think that’s what we need to promote. We need to promote that depression is a temporary thing. It can be dealt with through various means.
“So I think talking about it openly, talking about it as a young person, as a young male, is just me doing my little bit really to try and support the amazing charities that do a lot of work around it.
“You need to connect with the young people that you’re dealing with day in, day out. There needs to be a human side to it.
“I think they need to see my behaviours as normal, not just a coach-athlete relationship, but I think they need to see me as a person and me as a human.
“I think what the first team manager is doing amazingly well at this moment in time is guiding not just a young group of players but a young group of staff through what is a difficult period in our club’s history.
“And what Henrik speaks about a lot is the human behind the player. So I think if we see the human behind the player they have to see the human behind the coach as well. So for us to be able to connect with players and develop them as people not just as players is a massive part of our job as coach developers.
“When I first come into the club, Ernie Weaver would have been an under 16. Ernie’s obviously now playing in the first team and doing an outstanding job for our first team. To players like Yisa Alao and Will Granger and the other boys that are having to supplement the first team at the minute and it is a really, really challenging time for them and what potentially could be a really stressful time for them.
“So think what we have to do as members of staff is just support them all the way through. Yes, we have to make it highly challenging environment because that’s the demands of elite sport and that’s the demands of elite football.
“But I think what we do amazingly well as a group of staff is we make it highly supportive environment as well. And we’re blessed that the club at this moment in time, we have some really, really good members of staff and coming into work every day to be surrounded by the people that I’m surrounded with makes it really good place to work.
“Every person is going through their challenges and no one’s here to judge what people are going through but I think taking myself back to when I was the ages now of the boys that I’m working with, I did go through a really really difficult period within my life and I don’t ever want to go through that again. So although there are challenges that our boys are going through and it’s a sort of poignant time in their lives, we want to make it the best moment we can for them and almost take the stress away from them and just hope that they enjoy this period that they’re getting because it is a difficult time for the football club.
“But in adversity becomes opportunity. And I think our young people and our young players at this club at this moment in time are doing an outstanding job for our football club.
“My biggest learning having to go through what I went through as a young person is I didn’t get it right all the time.
“In fact a lot of the time I got it quite wrong in my behaviours when I was a younger person but I think that shaped me in what I am as a more mature adult now.
“So I think all I’m trying to do is maybe use my lived experiences of what I got right but also what I didn’t get right as well.
“And I think trying to shape the young people that we have in and around the club by maybe learning from things that I didn’t do okay is trying to shape them and put it into them of maybe how they should act moving forward in their lives.
“There was a really simple message that I saw on social media and it said, tomorrow needs you. And it does.
“So my message to young people who are maybe going through a difficult time is it’s okay to not be okay.
“You know, that’s not just a slogan, it is okay, it’s a completely natural feeling to not feel okay at times, but I think what you need to understand is it’s a temporary feeling and it will subside and it will go.
“I think to those people who are maybe not feeling themselves but they might have a friend who’s going through it, dig a little bit deeper.
“When you ask if people are okay, it might need two or three attempts to really dig deep down and sort of get beneath the skin of a friend to ask if they are okay because the natural response for a young male in my opinion is, yeah, yeah, I’m fine, it’s not a problem, move on, we’ll talk about something else.
“And I think when you look at a lot of sort of reports when you see someone has maybe taken their own life or committed suicide, well, he seemed completely normal the day before, he seemed completely normal when I last saw him.
“And that is normal behaviour to young men as we mask things, we put things to the side, we try and deal with them in silence and it’s not the right way to deal with it. You need to talk about things and we need to normalise talking about things.
“And like I’ve said previously, if the young players here can see me openly talking about things that I’ve struggled with in life, then hopefully it normalises things for them also.”
Here’s how fans reacted on Twitter as Sheffield Wednesday’s Jordan Broadbent shares a powerful and moving message raising awareness…
@bennyc06: Best thing the club has posted for a very long. Not dismissing all the shit that’s gone on over late and how peoples lives have been affected. Posting videos like this just shows how easy it is to do the right thing. Videos like @NorwichCityFC & @OfficialBHAFC are more than 3pt💚
@owl_southyorks: Brilliant video. Great to see. Well done team 👏💙 If only we saw the same care for the mental health of fans, many so deeply impacted by this mess. They’ve lost their release, their pleasure, their coping strategy. It’s not ok. @SWFCTrust have links if anyone needs to talk
@swilko84: For the fucking shit and mess this clubs created this year. This is absolutely unbelievable work and well done to the people/club to promote this. Absolutely top fucking class well done Sheffield Wednesday football club 💙🦉
@bradwoodcock91: I love this video, I love the sentiment, I love the awareness its spreading. I HATE the fact that our “Owner” is causing these exact subject silently on the fans, the people that love and live for this club. Quite the Irony. Fuck you DC
@kburton95: The irony is that the majority of the fan base is feeling it because of 1 man. However, that aside.. fair play for bringing it to peoples attention. There needs to be more of it 👌
@swfcmunch: Please can you show this to the chairman as he is causing people to feel really low about what he’s putting people through, well done for bringing this to people’s attention but bit rich coming from this c*nt of a chairman
@swfccom: First time ive ever seen/heard of our U18’s manager & what a first impression 👏🏼
@nelsonjd76: Thank you for this message and especially Jordan for his openness of a very personal story. With people like him leading our young lads they are fortunate and have a tremendous role model setting them forward in life not just football. It’s ok to not be ok. 👌🏼 💙
@RyanGoodo: Luckily I’ve two kids that stop me falling into the bracket… but has anyone mentioned to old DC any of this stuff… there are literally people who rely on match days etc and he’s killing it for them and destroying people mentally. Keep preaching tomorrow needs you though 👍
Brighton praised for emotional yet heartfelt video with important message raising awareness
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