Respect is Integral to Football

The FA’s Respect campaign was launched in the 2008/9 season after a build-up of behavioural problems in the National Game. Following its success, The FA want to spread the message of Respect even further across English football. The new campaign - ‘We Only Do Positive’ - aims to do just that.

The new campaign highlights the importance of positive behaviour towards young footballers, specifically looking at the impact parents and coaches can have. The campaign is rooted in extensive research carried out in 2017/18 to understand more clearly the effect of negative behaviour on Under 7s - Under 18s and where Respect interventions would be most effective.

The research provided clear evidence of why positivity was so important in the youth game. The stand-out insight was that 9 in 10 children played better with positive encouragement. In addition, the research highlighted that negative experiences on children had a serious adverse effects on both in their footballing ability and more widely to their enjoyment of the sport.

FA Best Practice Guidance

The FA have a page dedicated to best practice guidelines with all things safeguarding. There are many documents to help with this via this link.

#WeOnlyDoPositive

‘We Only Do Positive’ is a response to this research and uses an all new strategic approach to target coaches and parents specifically around mini-soccer and youth football. It aims to promote and educate coaches and parents on their roles in creating a fun, safe and inclusive environment for all the players, ensuring they have great experiences throughout their football journey.

As part of the campaign, the FA have launched the new "We Only Do Positive Handbook which focuses on Gareth Southgate’s five positive principles of coaching:

• “Create the right environment”
• “Lead by positive example”
• “Understand your players”
• “Build a positive team around you”
• “Instil an ‘anything is possible’ attitude”