The FA launch crackdown on players, referees, staff receiving discriminatory abuse

The FA launch their crackdown on the concerning trend of players, referees and staff receiving discriminatory abuse.

The Football Association have unveiled its new strategy for equality, diversity, and inclusion for the next four years.

It has been revealed that a primary objective of this initiative is to eliminate the abhorrent abuse that England footballers have faced in recent years.

In brief, the FA are also to:

– ensure 25 percent of England men’s coaching staff are black, Asian, mixed or other ethnic background (BAME). The figure is 50 percent for England women’s coaching staff

– have women make up half of their total workforce, with 20% of BAME origin

– make reporting of diversity numbers across professional football mandatory

– to grow a more diverse pool of referees

– to increase the number of players and coaches from under represented groups

In a human rights report which had been conducted by UEFA following Euro 2024, it was revealed that Bukayo Saka and Jude Bellingham were the two most seriously abused players at the tournament, while the likes of Saka, Jadon Sancho and Marcus Rashford had also been targeted with racial abuse on social media after they missed penalties in the Euro 2020 final defeat to Italy.

The FA add they have calculated a 47% rise in racist abuse across all levels and a 44% rise in instances of sexism and misogyny.

FA STATEMENT:

We have today published our new four-year equality, diversity, and inclusion [EDI] strategy, titled A Game Free From Discrimination, which sets out our long-term commitment to celebrate and promote diversity within English football, as well as our ambition to tackle all forms of discrimination in our game.

A Game Free From Discrimination will run until the end of the 2027-28 season, and focuses on three core pillars:

• Boosting representation by improving the diversity of officials, coaches, volunteers, players and our employees.

• Driving inclusion by ensuring everybody involved in the game, in whichever capacity, feels welcome.

• Tackling discrimination by creating a culture where prejudice and abuse is routinely challenged and addressed, from grassroots through to the elite level of the game.

The new strategy represents the collective efforts across the FA, with the three areas of focus deeply embedded within the grassroots game, disability football, the women’s and girls’ game, FA Learning, our County FA network, and our own people.

The key deliverables outlined within A Game Free From Discrimination, which we have committed to achieving by the end of the 2027-28 season, are to:

• Increase the number of players, coaches and referees from underrepresented groups.

• Unite leaders across professional football to tackle big EDI challenges.

• Deliver meaningful and impactful campaigns across the game.

• Drive EDI best practice into our County FA network.

• Continue to increase the diversity of the FA workforce and its leaders.

This new announcement follows the publication last month of our new four-year strategy, ‘Inspiring Positive Change Through Football’, which focuses on the biggest opportunities and challenges that need to be addressed across English football – with one of the four game changers identified being to deliver a game free from discrimination.

Mark Bullingham, FA chief executive, said: “Tackling discrimination is one of our core ambitions so we will continue to unite the game to confront this societal issue. Through our new strategy, we will work with our partners across football to boost representation, drive inclusion and tackle discrimination at all levels of our game. We have seen how the power of football can bring communities together and celebrate diversity, and we want to continue to use our influence to deliver positive and lasting change that we can all be proud of.”

Yasir Mirza, FA equality, diversity and inclusion director, said: “We know the challenge is big, but through collaboration, impactful campaigns, an effective sanctioning framework and education, we can make real progress. Our focus over the next four years will be on three core areas of boosting representation, driving inclusion, and tackling discrimination.

“From grassroots football, coach education, and the women’s and girls’ game to disability football, our England teams, and our own workforce, we will ensure this is ingrained into everything we do, to ultimately help create an environment where everybody feels welcome to take part in our game.”

Key highlights from our 2021-24 EDI strategy, A Game For All, included:

• Our workforce: Delivering gender pay gap results well below the national average, while increasing the percentage of women at each level of our organisation by at least 30 per cent, and increasing ethnic minority representation to 17 per cent.

• Coaching: Increased diversity across all FA coaching courses, with ongoing funding to increase participation from underrepresented groups and to support people from disadvantaged socio-economic backgrounds; continued growth of the England Elite Coach Programme.

• Grassroots football: Welcoming a record number of Black, Asian, Mixed and Other Ethnicity players; launching Enough is Enough to raise awareness of discriminatory behaviour and the significant consequences that will face perpetrators of hate; ongoing collaboration with Kick It Out to tackle serious misconduct and build trust in reporting mechanisms.

• Women and girls: Campaigned for better access to football for girls in school and increased participation levels.

• LGBTQ+ inclusion: Marching in Pride in London for the third successive year, with FA employees also participating in Manchester Pride for the first time in August 2024; 10-year anniversary of support for the Rainbow Laces campaign.

• Faith and football: Bringing faith and football closer together with regular events to mark Vaisakhi, Ramadan and Chanukah at Wembley Stadium, while also forming an antisemitism working group to focus efforts on tackling this issue across English football.

• South Asian inclusion: Convening a group of key stakeholders from across English football to help develop The FA’s first ever strategy targeted at South Asian communities, to be published later this season.

• Disability football: Ongoing support for disability football, successfully hosting the FA Disability Cup at St. George’s Park for the eighth time, including finals across partially sighted, amputee, blind, cerebral palsy, powerchair and deaf football.

• Match officials: Launching an ambitious recruitment plan for more diverse referees

• Online Safety Act: Lobbying UK Government on the Online Safety Act 2023 to ensure that social media companies can be held to account for the content on their platforms

• Mandatory reporting: Using the landmark Football Leadership Diversity Code as a foundation to introduce mandatory diversity reporting across the professional game, which will help to provide greater transparency and maintain the pressure for positive change.

You can download the full strategy below, also available in an easy-read document.

Report discriminatory abuse

If you’re a SPECTATOR AT A PROFESSIONAL MATCH 

The guidance below applies to domestic matches not at Wembley Stadium.

• If you’re a spectator at a professional match and witness discriminatory behaviour from another spectator at any point whilst inside the stadium, please report it to the nearest steward or police officer.

• Many professional clubs also offer fans at their stadium a confidential text service to contact during the match – similar to the one operated by Wembley Stadium.

• If you’re outside the stadium, on the way to/from a match or on social media then report it to Kick It Out through their online reporting form or via their reporting app available on both iOS and Android. Alternatively, email Kick It Out at report@kickitout.org

• You should also report it to the police, either:

– In person

– By calling the local police on 101

– By completing the online reporting form you’ll find here

– By calling 999 if you are in an emergency

– You can also report it to The FA at integrity@TheFA.com

To report discrimination witnessed at Wembley Stadium, click here.

If you are a PROFESSIONAL PLAYER

The guidance below applies to any player in the Premier League, English Football League, National League System (steps 1 to 4), the Barclays FA Women’s Super League or FA Women’s Championship.

• If you or another player is subject to discriminatory abuse at a game by either the crowd or another player, report it to a match official as soon as possible.

• If for any reason you cannot report it to a match official at the time or after the game, you can email integrity@TheFA.com

• Further details on reporting discrimination and the process that is followed in these instances are also provided on pages 26-29 of The FA’s ‘Essential Information for Players’ guidance, which you will have been given at the start of the season and which you can also download below.

• If you are a member or associated member of the Professional Footballers’ Association (PFA), you can report discrimination incidents via equalities@thepfa.com or for online abuse at enough@thepfa.com  The PFA has support systems in place. You can read more about the PFA’s work on reporting discrimination in football here.

If you are a club employee at a PROFESSIONAL GAME

• If you are a manager, coach, physio, kit supervisor or any other member of broader team operations and experience discriminatory abuse from another participant connected to the match (e.g. a player or staff member of the other team), you should report it to a match official as soon as possible. In practice this would ordinarily be the fourth official.

• At games where no fourth official is present, you should report it as soon as possible to another one of the match officials.

• If the discriminatory abuse has come from a spectator and there is no fourth official, you should bring it to the attention of either: one of the other match officials, the security officer or senior steward or the person responsible for the security of the game.