FA to increase Asian representation in football

The Football Association has today (14th May 2015) released a strategy to increase Asian representation in grassroots football, the aim of which to improve in areas such as participation, talent development, role models and how to develop talent ID officers are chronicled within the plan, with progress measures set against them.

Only 7 out of 3000 professional footballers in England are Asian

Statistics for participation and representation from within the British Asian community across English football are a cause for concern. There are 3,000 professional footballers in the Football League and Premier League and around 5 million Asians living in England.

Yet despite these figures, there are just seven Asian footballers plying their trade in the English league system. Of those seven professional Asian footballers, West Bromwich Albion have two on their books, brothers Adil and Samir Nabi with a third Nabi brother - Rahis - playing for Albion’s under-16 side.

Asian under-representation neglected for a very long time

Baljit Rihal, Founder of The Asian Football Awards said “it’s good to see that the FA has made an effort with this plan. They have been engaging with the Asian community over the past year and I’m glad that some quality time has been spent in devising this much needed initiative. However, the question now is – what are they going to do to ensure that this isn’t just a tick box exercise to appease a community that has been neglected for such a very long time?”

However, he added that the plans also do not go far enough “for the vast majority of British Asians, football is their sport of choice. Grassroots clubs and recreational soccer centres have large percentages of Asians participating. These figures, although slowly improving, are not reflected at professional level.”

‘Asians Can’t Play Football’

The issue of the under-representation of Asian communities in football has been well recognised and documented over the last few decades. In 1996, author and activist Jas Bains, on behalf of the National Asians in Football Forum, published a seminal report entitled ‘Asians Can’t Play Football’. This report gave an in-depth narrative on the issue from key community football clubs at the time, such as Albion Sports and Punjabi Wolves.

‘Asians Can Play Football’

In 2005, he penned a follow-up report entitled ‘Asians Can Play Football’ which stated that after a decade of activity to address the situation there was still very little representation in terms of the number of professional players, individuals within the hierarchy and structure of the game and active match-goers from Asian communities.

Baljit and other representatives are calling for greater financial commitment from the FA to the Asian community over a sustained period of time.

Click to download a copy of the FA 'Bringing Opportunities to Communities' plan.