Two years ago, I made a post about Stotfold FC. I was scrolling on Instagram one day, and saw a comment that didn’t sit right with me.
On a perfectly innocent post announcing a transfer, a man had commented – objectifying the athlete in the post. When I clicked on his profile, I saw that, right at the top of his bio, he had tagged Stotfold FC Women – stating that he was a coach for them.
Naturally, I was shocked about this. I reported the coach immediately to the chairman, Rob Parkin, via email – after initially reaching out to the team’s official Instagram page.
4 months later, I had not only been blocked by them on Instagram, but I had not even received an acknowledgement from Rob Parkin (or anyone at the club, for that matter) about my concerns. At that stage, I decided to make a post about the whole ordeal. I don’t want to risk repeating myself too much, so if you want to know my (mostly) unfiltered thoughts on the situation from the time it happened, the original post is still up and you can read it here.
So, why am I posting about it again, almost 2 years later? Well, I returned to my blog a couple of weeks ago, and to be honest, totally forgot about the whole situation. In the end, nothing came of it – and my initial post doesn’t show up in search results anymore.
I feel like it’s appropriate to address this situation again. At the end of the day, there has been a systemic failure in the way that this issue has been handled. I want to not only add some more context, but emphasise once again how bad it really is.
Rob Parkin is still listed as club chairperson, press officer, and director on the club’s “Who’s who” page. You may be wondering why I didn’t reach out to Brenda Saunders, who is listed on their website as club welfare officer. That’s because there are only 5 people listed on their “Club Contacts” page. None of which are the club welfare officer (which is actually against FA regulations) and only one of which actually have contact information listed.
Julie Longhurst – who is the club’s fixture secretary, has a phone number listed. Rob Parkin is the only other person with a “contact” button, but he has no actual contact information on there – just a way to leave him a message via the website. In the modern world, where transparency is vital for safeguarding, having a “black hole” contact form as your only line of communication is simply not good enough.
Under team contacts on the Women’s team page, this man is still listed as a coach, too. After revisiting the coaches Instagram too, I can confirm that he is still affiliated with the club – as well as a men’s team at a different club now, too.
I just want to touch briefly on how fundamentally bad this is on all levels. To lay it out in black and white:
There is a 29-year-old man who coaches a women’s football team. He publicly comments on Instagram posts, objectifying women’s footballers – reducing their value to their relationship statuses or physical appearance.
The club he coaches for is aware of this, and they do not care. They, evidently, think that this behaviour is totally acceptable. Emphasised even more by the fact that he has the club tagged in his bio – they know that he is representing the club when he makes these comments.
I’m sure that, should you ask these people directly, objectifying women is not a part of the clubs ethos – particularly when they are trying to push their women’s team forwards. So why then, is a man who has publicly attached himself to the organisation, allowed to go around doing just that?.
Making all of this public information is a good thing – because with these people running things, the club deserves to have a stain on its reputation, and the players for Stotfold FC Women deserve better.
However, I’ve learnt that simply posting about it isn’t going to achieve anything. To see this, people are going to have to search for it. Evidently, nothing is going to change, and this behaviour will continue to be allowed.
As a coach, you are in a position of trust. You are a role model for your players, and a representative of your club. When that trust is used to objectify the very peers of the women you are supposed to be leading and developing, it creates a horrid, toxic culture, that the FA is working extremely hard to eliminate.
It is a huge violation – not just of the woman he objectified, and not just of the women he coaches – but to every single woman in his life.
With that in mind, I have submitted a formal report, including all of the evidence that I saved 2 years ago, as well as screenshots of the club’s website (just in case they change things) to the FA’s integrity team, Kick it Out, and the Bedfordshire FA’s safeguarding team.
I look forward to hearing back from them, and hopefully, some action being taken against both the club and the coach in question. I’ll be sure to make new posts as and when, if any, developments happen.
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