During this Keeping Your Child Safe in Sport Week, which is a campaign ran by the NSPCC Child Protection in Sport Unit (CPSU) that runs from 7 to 11 October 2024, we are highlighting the key role coaches can play in safeguarding children and young people when taking part in sport and physical activity #safeinsport 

Power Of The Sports Coach

Whether it is elite or grassroots sport, coaches can help children and young people learn about skills other than in their sport such as teamwork, dedication, doing what is right and fair – ethics and dealing with negative outcomes. There coach maybe the only positive role model in a child or young persons life – they may look forward to training and match/competition day all week as sport “can have a profound and positive impact on mental wellbeing and being physically active can improve mood, decrease the chance of depression and anxiety and lead to a better and more balanced lifestyle,” Sport England.

Young people will listen to sports coaches rather than teacher or other adults (University of Exeter, Football Onside, 2020) and can have a significant impact on creating behavioural change, which is linked to our work delivering Active Bystander training over the last 2 years. We have developed the Coaches Triangle:

Know your children

Consult them

Be approachable

The training is available to the sports, leisure and physical activity sectors and covers subjects such as violence against women and girls, how to intervene in situations different techniques to use in different situations. For more information, please get in touch with me on: [email protected]

This summer has been full of sport with the Paris Olympic and Paralympic games.  We saw world records broken and personal bests beaten but none of these would be possible without grassroots coaches and sport – no-one starts out as a top athlete; they started as beginners.  In so many interviews with the athletes after their events you heard the phrase “thanks to my first coach,” coaches can create that lifelong love or loathing of sport and physical activity.  Qualities of a good coach include: being organised, being adaptive in your practices to suit your athletes and being both a great listener and a great communicator. Coaches need always to put welfare before medals.

Safe to Play

Safe to Play is our campaign utilising Augmented Reality technology as a new method of engaging parents whose children play community sport. The campaign video is based around a family scenario and features three short vignettes from a sports coach, a parent and a child based on an incident involving a sports coach.NWG Network also have downloadable resources for clubs and coaches on the website: www.stop-ce.org/tackling-cse-in-sports

The safe to play films can also be accessed by using the QR on a credit card-sized resource, available from NWG Network.

The NWG Networks sport team are happy to speak to colleagues from the sports sector, leisure or physical activity sectors.  Contact Angie, Sports Engagement Lead on [email protected]

Angie Harper

Sports Engagement Lead

NWG Network