A 17-year-old lineswoman was called a “f*****g slag” after she complained about being bombarded with sexist abuse. The youngster was assistant referee at a play-off game between Easington and Newcastle Blue Star last May.
She reported receiving comments from the visiting Easington fans including “Who’s the fitty with the flag”, ”the Lino is on tinder, messaging every person’s brother”, “He’s staring at your a***, he’s staring at your a***” and “lino, lino, give us your snap”. She said that an announcement was put out on the Tannoy warning Easington fans but that during the second half she was called a “f*****g slag” from another part of the stand.
A Newcastle Blue Star official said he heard Easington fans shout “get your t*ts out” and those fans were ejected from the ground. The club had employed six stewards but 1,700 spectators turned up. There were fights, including headbutting, and further sexist comments from Newcastle Blue Star fans. Easington was fined £300 while Newcastle were fined £160 by the Durham and Northumberland FAs.
We found another FA report for a match the previous month, where the same young ref reported comments like “lineswoman … its only ever been a linesman”. Even though she was wearing a yellow armband identifying her as under 18, one fan was goaded to “invite her for a steak dinner”, leaving her “distressed”.
She was to face further sexist abuse in October, the third time in six months, at Billingham Town where between ten and 15 youths, thought to be aged between ten and 14 years old barracked her every time she gave an offside decision with comments like “f*****g slag”,” get your t*ts out” and “she’s defo a slag, I’d give her a shag”. They refused to leave the ground and police were called.
A spectator at one match in Lincolnshire abused the opposition physio with many comments too awful to publish. They include vile threats of violent sexual assault, including “get your physio’s mouth under control, otherwise I will shove my d**k in it to keep her quiet” and “she needs to get her brains f****d out to calm her down”. Immington Town pleaded guilty and were fined £200.
A breast cancer survivor on her first game back after chemo, was called a “skinhead b***h” by a spectator at Skelmersdale United last January. Skelmersdale denied the charge but, with 18 other misconduct charges in five years, were fined £300.
Abuse of one young female lineswoman began when she was checking the nets before the start of the game in November 2023 and fans started chanting “her t*ts are offside”. The match referee wanted to report the abuse to Droylsden FC officials at half time but the woman “did not want further attention drawn to her”. The club was fined £180.
Members of a boys squad who turned up to watch their female teammates play against a local under-19s girls team refused pleas to stop sexist abuse of the opponents. Comments included “look at her arse”, “that’s a good angle”, “give him a try he wants you” and “look how it jiggles”.
Procision FC denied the charges but one of their officials deleted video of the match because it contained an inappropriate comment – “f****g hit her” – that she did not want to be uploaded onto social media. The FA’s disciplinary commission said there was a “high number of convincing and consistent” witnesses and fined Procision £200.
We’ve analysed nearly 500 reports from the FA’s disciplinary hearings over the last three years, which reveal the abuse and anger which mar games, mostly played for fun by children, across the country, every weekend.
The FA told us there were 276 serious cases of crowd disorder last season, up 28% in a year. So far this season there have already been 177 upheld. Growing numbers of these are from matches involving under 18s. This was up 45% last year and so far this year nearly two-thirds – 62% – of the most serious cases investigated by the FA were at children’s matches.
An FA spokesperson said: “We strongly condemn any abusive or unacceptable behaviour, either on the pitch or from the sidelines, and we have clear standards of behaviour which we expect all grassroots football clubs, coaches and players to follow.
“This is a collective responsibility and we welcome and fully support action taken by leagues and clubs to help tackle this unacceptable behaviour in our game.”
* Have you experienced abuse at football matches? Email nick.sommerlad@mirror.co.uk
At Reach and across our entities we and our partners use information collected through cookies and other identifiers from your device to improve experience on our site, analyse how it is used and to show personalised advertising. You can opt out of the sale or sharing of your data, at any time clicking the “Do Not Sell or Share my Data” button at the bottom of the webpage. Please note that your preferences are browser specific. Use of our website and any of our services represents your acceptance of the use of cookies and consent to the practices described in our Privacy Notice and Cookie Notice.
