UK football is facing calls to tackle gender-based violence

Two of the sport’s most powerful bodies have received an open letter urging them to take action after numerous high-profile players have been arrested for domestic and sexual abuse.

In January, Manchester United’s Mason Greenwood was arrested on suspicion of rape, sexual assault, and making threats to kill after allegations against him went viral on social media.

Alarmingly, his case is only the latest to emerge, and a slew of similar offenders before him – namely Benjamin Mendy, Ryan Giggs, and an Everton player who cannot be identified for legal reasons – highlight the deep-rooted issue of gender-based violence within British football.

This isn’t just an internal issue tied to footballers, either. Research conducted after last year’s Euros found that domestic abuse nationwide increases by almost 40 per cent when the England national team loses a match.

This wider issue of violence is another problem in of itself, but it does highlight how large of an impact football has on British culture, moods, and behaviours. The sport can heavily shape male attitudes and serves as a behavioural model for young men across the country – for better or worse.

This, alongside the aforementioned police action involving high-profile professional footballers, has contributed to recent calls from three rights organisations for the overhaul of a culture that seems to have dropped the ball in perpetuating the notion that this kind of behaviour is acceptable.

The campaign, spearheaded by the End Violence Against Women Coalition, The Three Hijabis, and Level Up, has asked the CEOs of the Football Association and the Premier League to speak out on violence against women.

It also asks for recognition of the problem’s causal roots – inequality and a need for control – and ultimately commit to genuine change across the board.

For them, the issue isn’t solely limited to individual players, but the industry that supports them, the clubs they play for, and the academies that train them.

It’s for this reason that they penned an open letter to the two governing bodies outlining several major requests that they hope will address the ugly underside of the ‘beautiful game.’