By Faye Hackwell
Shrewton United have partnered with the campaign group Her Game Too, to promote the club as a welcoming and inclusive place for all.
The new partnership follows the club being forced to delete a social media post announcing Shrewton United’s new physiotherapist Issy Anderson in her role last week, after it received numerous inappropriate and offensive comments relating to her being female online.
Her Game Too reached out to both Issy and the club to offer support during the aftermath of the incident, and now Shrewton United has joined 73 Premier League and English Football League clubs, as well as hundreds of other non-league and grassroots clubs, leagues and organisations, as an official partner of Her Game Too.
By becoming a Her Game Too partner club, Shrewton United is taking a stand to show sexism and misogynism will not be tolerated; it will promote the Her Game Too reporting line to anyone who experiences or witnesses incidents of sexism at the club and pledge to celebrate women’s involvement in all roles in football.
Caz May, Founder of Her Game Too, said: “We are delighted to have Shrewton United on board in our journey to stamping sexism out of the game.
“We felt it was necessary to reach out and offer our support to both Issy and the club after the inappropriate and unacceptable comments she received after the announcement of her new role.
“The club were quick to respond and become affiliated with Her Game Too - and we look forward to working with them further.
“We hope this partnership and strong stance from Shrewton United encourages more men’s football teams at grassroots level to get involved with Her Game Too, as the message will be more powerful if we stand together.”
Issy has also joined Her Game Too as a volunteer advocate of the campaign, as she doesn’t want incidents like this to stop other women and girls being inspired to work in men’s football.
She welcomed Shrewton United’s move to become a Her Game Too partner club, saying: “The club have been absolutely brilliant with me, right from my first day working for them, and I’m pleased that from this whole situation, the club will now be official Her Game Too partners to show this behaviour is not acceptable at any level of football.
“I now feel that I could go to someone at the club and say ‘I’ve received this comment online’, or had something said to me at a game, and they would sort it out, which is really positive and makes me want to work for a club like this, where I feel supported.
“These types of sexist, vile and misogynistic comments would be unacceptable in any other working environment, but for some reason people can get away with it in football.
“Despite all the progress we’ve made in this country with women’s football, it’s clear that we’ve still got a very long way to go before women are accepted to work within the men’s game.”
But Issy feels that having organisations like Her Game Too, that will listen to reports and help clubs to investigate and deal with incidents of misogyny and sexism within football, is vital to stamping out unacceptable behaviour, so people don’t just turn a blind eye.
She added: “It’s important to speak about what’s happened, to show that women shouldn’t be scared away from the jobs that they love and to call out this behaviour as unacceptable.
“I’m happy to say that I’ll still be working in football because I couldn’t see myself doing anything else, and to start this new adventure with Her Game Too and Shrewton United.”