Asians in Football

The Football Association is committed to ensuring that football at all levels can be both played and watched by everyone, regardless of their background. We have been at the forefront of developing women’s football and have played a major role in the Let’s Kick Racism Out of Football campaign.

However, the involvement of players from Asian communities in professional football is extremely limited, and ethnic minority fans make up just 1% of football audiences.

The reasons for this unacceptable situation are perhaps more complex than some other issues which have been tackled , but The Football Association is committed to working towards ensuring that Asian footballers are welcomed at all levels of the game.

• football was extremely popular amongst Asian youngsters;
• many people in positions of responsibility in professional football clubs viewed Asians as either not interested in football or unsuitable;
• football clubs were not engaging with local ethnic minority communities;
• Asian youngsters had great confidence that they would break through given the opportunity.

The F.A. Conference on

Arising from both the Asians Can’t Play Football report and other work going on at a local level around the country, The Football Association devoted its annual football development conference to the issue of . The conference was held in Oldham in November 1996, and brought together for the first time people involved with running local initiatives with Asian footballers and representatives of the football authorities. Speakers included Jimmy Khan, and Asian coach who played at a high level, Jas Bains, David Richardson of the F.A. Premier League and Tony Pickerin of The F.A.’s Programme for Excellence.

The F.A. Working Group

One key development from the conference was the developing of a Working Group to take forward initiatives in this area. The membership included many of the key speakers at the conference, and was led by originally by the F.A. Coaching & Education Department.

With the establishing of The F.A.'s new National game Division, the promotion of sports equity has become a major priority as part of our plans to develop football at all levels

Promtoing opportunities for peopld from Asian Communities to become involved with footall now plays a major part in the work of Football Development Officers around the country, working in together with partners at the national and locla level.

The  Working Group, now part of The F.A.'s National Game activites, has identified four key areas:

1) EDUCATION AND AWARENESS: two key issues to be tackled are ignorance amongst key people in the football structures about Asian communities, and a lack of understanding within those communities about the way in which football is structured. Seminars and workshops have been held,  and information leaflets produced, focused on different target audiences to increase levels of awareness. Diversity training is being introduced across football.

2) COACHING COURSES: the breaking down of stereotypes about Asians in football can be targeted by introducing awareness training into the courses that will be taken by everyone working in football coaching. Training coaches from the Asian communities is also a major priority.

3) FOOTBALL ACADEMIES/CENTRES OF EXCELLENCE: the new structures within professional football established under the Charter for Quality provide a great chance to open up opportunities for Asian youngsters to become involved at the earliest ages. Research has been undertaken amongst professional clubs to establish the extent of their current involvement with ethnic minority communities, and clubs are being encouraged to ensure that they are targeting the best talent from all backgrounds in their area. A seminar for professional clubs was held to share best practice in last 1999, and many clubs are now involved in their own programmes (see below).

4) GRASSROOTS FOOTBALL: the involvement of Asians in football at the local level raises a whole series of issues from combating racist abuse and violence on the pitch, to ensuring that coaching and refereeing courses are open to ethnic minority communities. A number of initiatives are being taken forward by The Football Association through its links with County F.A.s and by the bodies involved with the Let’s Kick Racism Out of Football campaign, led by Kick It Out.

To bring many of these areas together, The Football Association, with Sport England, has funded a number of projects around the country. Examples include:

Luton – a joint project involving the Borough Council, schools, Bedfordshire F.A. and English Schools F.A. to provide coaching to youngsters in predominately Asian areas, to develop leagues and to link in with Luton Town FC

Tower Hamlets – a project involving providing football coaching to 350 girls mostly from local Bangladeshi communities, involving local schools and West Ham United FC

Nottingham – a joint project between the local authority and Notts County FC involving coaching, summer camps for Asian youngsters and training coaches.

Northampton – the Northampton Town FC Community programme is undertaking work with the Bangladeshi community in providing coaching clinics, tournaments and coaching courses

Other projects are taking place in Sheffield, Middlesex, West Bromwich, Bolton, Bradford and Blackburn.

Professional Football Club Initiatives

A number of projects are now taking place around the country, with professional football clubs establishing links with local projects to provide opportunities for Asian youngsters:

• The Leicester Asian Sports Initiative (LASI) was established to offer coaching to Asian youngsters, with the most talented referred to the Leicester City FC Academy. This scheme has now developed
• Charlton Athletic have linked up with Asian club Guru Nanak FC in Gravesend, who are running a school of excellence for youngsters with a special emphasis on local Asians
• Leeds United’s Academy has based two development centres in mainly Asian area and is working with local ethnic minority youth projects
• West Ham United have launched, in conjunction with Sport England, a major scheme to work with the local Asian community, based around a new community sports facility.

Current projects

In 2001/2, The Football Association is supporting two projects at Leicester and West Ham, which aim to provide a model of best practice for adoption by clubs around the country.

Both clubs have developed the schemes mentioned above to provide a further link into local communities with high ethnic minorty populations, running development centres and training coaches, with a link for the best players into the Academy structures of the professional clubs.

Asian Role Models

One of the key factors often mentioned in chronicling the progress of footballers from African-Caribbean backgrounds has been the importance of role models. A number of Asian youngster are currently on the verge of making a break through to Premier League teams – most notably Harpal Singh at Leeds United and Michael Chopra at Derby County, who has played for England youth teams from Under 15 to Under 17 level.

In the Football League, Bury secured the services of Bhaichung Bhutia, the captain of the India national team, who became the only Asian regular first team player.

The progress of these players – backed up by the wide range of work now going on in the field - could mark the breakthrough for Asian footballers in England.