On Saturday, 27th March, the Football Association launched a new strategy for grassroots football in England. Whilst there is much to commend in what the FA describe as an “ambitious” plan for the next four seasons, their document also raises questions on both the challenges they have identified and how they intend to address them.

As with everything in society today, it is impossible to avoid mention of the Coronavirus, but to be fair to the FA, an acknowledgement of the impact of the pandemic on the grassroots game sits at the very heart of this strategy. No matter how detailed the FA’s plans for football might have been pre-pandemic, now is the time to reassess every priority to ensure that it’s fit for purpose in the post-pandemic era. A fact that is as true for the FA’s restructuring of the National League System, as it is for their ambitions for the grassroots game.

The FA say they “believe grassroots football can be a re-igniting force for community life everywhere – towns, cities and rural villages”. The reality is that many Clubs that sit at the heart of their local community will have multiple relationships with both the FA and their County FA, because of the different levels of the game their sides compete at. The Coronavirus pandemic has highlighted how challenging this confused relationship can be, with the FA informing Clubs their “grassroots” sides can welcome fans back on April 12th, whilst their First Teams will need to wait until May 17th, if they are to play in front of spectators at the same stadiums.

The FA’s “Survive. Revive. Thrive.” strategy highlights seven key objectives, including retaining more male players, giving girls the same access as boys to football in schools and clubs, and improving the quality of pitches, with the aim of seeing five thousand new good-quality pitches created by 2024.

The four-season long strategy will see the FA invest £180m into grassroots football, to encourage new participation at every age group, including historically under-represented groups, as well as ensuring the game is played in a safe, welcoming and inclusive environment. The FA have also expressed their desire to create an “efficient grassroots digital ecosystem to serve the administrative and development needs of players, parents and the workforce.”

Whilst the narrative is compelling, particularly the desire to inspire, support and retain volunteers in the game, the evidence presented in support of the strategy requires closer scrutiny. In making the case for the value of grassroots football to the UK economy, the FA state that “14.1m people play grassroots football in England across all forms and frequencies, including 13.5m regular participants, contributing £10.16bn to society each year”.

However, the latest participation data published by Sport England would suggest this number is actually closer to 4.4m. This figure is made up of 1,866,200 adults (aged 16+) who have taken part in sport and physical activity at least twice in the last 28 days, for the period May 2019/20 and 2,525,300 Children & Young People in School Years 1-11 for the Academic Year 2019/20. This isn’t simply a case of being pedantic, this is a question of recognising the true scale of the problem football faces with participation and retention. The FA are correct to want to address this matter in their strategy, but I’d argue that suggesting a quarter of the English population play football is not the way to do it.

The Sport England research shows that participation in adult football has fallen by 0.4% in the twelve months since May 2018/19. The data for children and young people is more startling, showing a fall of 5% from that recorded for the Academic Year 2018/19. The fact that Sport England have recorded a decline in the number of adults playing football for each of the past four years shows that this is not a pandemic problem.

Encouraging the playing of different formats of the game (e.g. small-sided or walking football) to suit modern lifestyles is certainly one way of approaching this, as well as working to improve participation amongst under-represented groups, such as disabled players and the Asian community. Yet whilst these are worthy objectives, the FA must be realistic about how these are to be delivered on the ground.

The FA might appear to be taking the initiative with this strategy, but it’s the County FAs who have been charged with delivering it. The “partnership” the FA describes it has with its County FAs involves it providing “funding and support”, whilst the County’s are responsible for: “Participation, coach and referee education and development, quality grass pitches and equality, diversity and inclusion”, pretty much everything this strategy is about.

However, the County FAs are only as good as the Club infrastructure and volunteer pool they can work with. Top-down diktats will not deliver this strategy, it requires a realistic bottom up approach.

One common theme running throughout the strategy is that there is very little baseline data setting out where we are today. Improving male player retention, with 25% fewer leaving football, would mean more if we understood what the current rate of attrition is today, not to mention an accurate picture of the total number of people currently playing the game.

Equal access to football for girls in 90% of primary and secondary schools and in 75% of clubs, is a worthy objective, but it raises the worrying question of what the current level of inequality in our schools and clubs looks like today. Indeed, is it fair to put schools and clubs together in this way? Access to football in schools, as part of the physical education curriculum, should be a matter of Government policy, subject to scrutiny by Ofsted. In terms of Club provision, we are back to the question of resources and volunteers. Without access to a magic wand, the FA need to be realistic about where grassroots clubs will find the volunteers and coaches needed to improve equality of opportunity.

The most challenging of the key success measures is the creation of five thousand good-quality pitches by 2024. Like much of this strategy, the aim is entirely worthy, but what is far from clear is the logic that underpins it. How many pitches do we have today and where are they located, is the obvious place to start?

Active Places Power is an interactive mapping and reporting tool for community sport development provided by Sport England. The website lists a total of 42,975 football pitches across adult, junior and mini football – 32,302 of which are publicly accessible. The strategy says: “We want to demonstrably respond to what those across the grassroots game tell us is their number one challenge and ensure no-one looking forward to the weekend suffers from the disappointment of matches being postponed because of the poor state of pitches”.

So, is the solution to this problem really to increase the number of pitches by 15%, or wouldn’t the FA be better off improving the quality of what we have already? As with player retention and the issue of equality of opportunity, a realistic appraisal of the number, location and quality of pitches and facilities is surely essential to addressing this challenge.

Ironically, the one area where the FA have been specific is their target concerning affiliated teams playing within FA Accredited clubs, where currently less than half (49.7%) of adult teams are affiliated.

To be fair to the FA, this data is something they will be acutely aware of. Using data where you have it and choosing to ignore it where you don’t doesn’t feel like an evidenced-based approach to decision making. The FA would be better highlighting where they struggle to account for participation and facilities, addressing those issues in their strategic goals.

Despite this criticism, I maintain there is much to recommend this approach to meeting the challenges of the grassroots game. Equality of opportunity should be extended to all members of our society, not simply seen through the prism of gender. The safeguarding of children has never been a more important issue, not simply in terms of addressing the atrocities of the past but giving young players and their families the confidence that participating in football is a safe and desirable thing to do. Whilst it is hard to argue against investment in facilities, the FA should provide more detail on what this is intended to achieve, if their leadership in this area is to have credibility.

However, one priority that is without question is the importance of supporting everyone in football’s nationwide grassroots workforce. I would argue the issue of volunteer recruitment and retention is the single biggest challenge facing grassroots football today. The fact that the FA are still “developing a detailed plan with an associated key success measure for our volunteer workforce, to ensure they receive effective support” is not a weakness in this strategy, it is an opportunity.

Pre and post pandemic, recruiting volunteers is the difference between life and death for grassroots teams and Clubs. These people don’t grow on trees, they are recruited on the frontline, by people who already volunteer themselves. This is the reality of this challenge and a top-down approach from Wembley simply won’t work. As with so much the FA aspire to achieve through this

document, success can only be achieved through true partnership working, not just with County FAs, but Leagues and Clubs.

This is a football family problem and never has it been so important for that family to pull together.

Ian Nockolds