70% rise in football racial abuse reports

According to the Football Association’s head of judicial services, Mark Ives, the FA has seen an increase of 70% in their total reported racial abuse and discrimination claims this season in grassroots amateur football. Ives expects that by May, a total of 800 incidents will have been reported.

Kick It Out, the game’s anti-discrimination campaign, reported 184 incidents of racial abuse by 28 December. Around 64% of the cases involved alleged racial abuse, whilst another 17% involved anti-Semitic complains, the greater majority of which were encountered through social media. 8% of the cases reported involved abuse against sexual orientation, 4% of complaints filed regarded discrimination against disabilities and 7% involved sexism complaints, a significant increase from last season’s numbers.

Kick It Out and the FA regard the increase in reported incidents positively. Rather than taking the complaints as an indication of increased racism, Kick It Out and the FA are viewing them as a sign of the public’s unwillingness to accept discriminatory abuse and its ability to report perpetrators to authorities.

Racial and discriminatory abuse has made headlines worldwide, with incidents being reported in Paris and London. A video surfaced demonstrating a group of Chelsea fans pushing Souleymane Sylla, a black man, off a Paris Métro and chanting racist abuses, while another incident involving another group of Chelsea fans highlighted racist and abusive behaviour on a London train to Manchester.

However, with efforts like that of Kick It Out’s, reporting instances of racial and discriminatory abuse is becoming easier. 27% of discriminatory behaviour complaints were reported by fans during professional matches via Kick It Out’s app. The app allows for users to report the abuse as they witness it. After an incident is reported, the app sends an email to the stadium’s safety officers, who then alert stadium stewards.

The FA also partakes in the elimination of racial and discriminatory behaviour. Regulations require that every FA county must have a local football anti-discrimination panel which hears disciplinary charges. The chair of the panel is trained to consider these issues and once a decision is made, the panel releases this on their website.

Helen Grant, the Sports Minister, has said:

The rise in the number of incidents reported is a concern; however it does also highlight that Kick It Out and the football authorities’ zero tolerance approach at every level of the game is cutting through, with people not willing to stand by and ignore or tolerate disgusting, deplorable abuse.”

Andi Guede