Levelling the Playing Field supported Show Racism the Red Card's 'Month of Action' in Wales to help spread their message across community sport settings.
Throughout October, the anti-racism education charity and Football Association of Wales (FAW) worked with grassroots and professional footballers and clubs to hold pre-match activations sharing the message that there is no place for racism in football or society.
LtPF supported the campaign with Show Racism the Red Card workshops at several LtPF community sessions run by our specialist partners in Newport:
- Positive Futures’ Friday Night Project in Pillgwenlly
- Newport Yemeni Community Association’s Saturday night football session
- Positive Futures’ Newport Live Op Bang session with Community Youth Project
- A refugees' football session run every Tuesday by Positive Futures and The Sanctuary (The Gap Wales)
In the New Year we will also offer training in Newport for our specialist partners before rolling this out across our other LtPF regions in London, the West Midlands and South Yorkshire.
The campaign across Wales in October included education workshops for grassroots coaches, which started on Monday 4th October with a panel discussion on challenging racism in football: beyond taking the knee. Dean Pymble, Campaign Manager for Wales at Show Racism the Red Card, was joined by special guests Jason Webber from the FAW, Anita Asante (professional footballer for Aston Villa Women and SRtRC ambassador) and Piara Powar, CEO of the FARE network.
Additional workshops covered topics including, What is racism? Inclusive language and embedding anti-racism at your club.
There were matchday actions calling for greater support in the fight against racism with players from Newport County, Bradford City, Cardiff City, Swansea City and Wrexham AFC running activities in fixtures throughout October. Both the Cymru Premier teams and Adran Premier League clubs held a 'Month of Action' fixture supporting the cause.