Sexism, abuse and harassment: The experience of female fans at matches

Some names* have been changed in this article to protect privacy and prevent further harassment. Warning: This article contains stories readers might find upsetting.

Claire* stood at the entrance to the clubhouse with a male fan. As they chewed over the non-League match she'd just watched, she gave an opinion on something so nondescript that she can't even recall the thread of the conversation now. In response, the man grabbed her, pushed her against a fence and growled: “I could have you up against this right now and that will show you, won't it?”

He pinned his arms across Claire's chest, trapping her.

“It's just really shocking how casually he threw in a rape threat, just like that,” she says. “I felt mostly angry. I felt really indignant. Why can't we just talk about football without it turning into this? And I was a bit scared. I thought, I can't really say anything else now because what is he going to do? You don't want to push it.”

Eleanor Mulligan, a 24-year-old Crystal Palace supporter, was boarding a train at Liverpool Lime Street when a male fan grabbed one of her breasts as she walked past.

“Sadly, you've come to expect those things,” she says. “The worst experience I had at a match was at West Ham away last season. I went to the toilet, came back, looked up and they were all staring down at me.

“I was in the lower tier, with the home fans in the upper tier, and they started singing at me: 'Does she take it up the arse?'. Part of the problem is that, as a woman, you almost become desensitised to it and you have to brush it off, particularly at football. If you visibly kick off, it's going to make the situation much worse. It's going to egg them on.”

There was another unpleasant experience this past weekend for Mulligan. “During the Aston Villa vs Palace game on Saturday there were two men standing behind me in the away end who kept telling the (female) assistant referee (Natalie Aspinall) to 'go back to the kitchen'. When I challenged them, they told me I was 'overreacting' and that it was 'just banter'.

“Why should women be made to feel like they don't belong because of these bigoted views? But the response was, 'Well if you don't like it, don't come” and I was told to go to see a psychiatrist.”

Leah* was leaving a Premier League game to meet her father when she was “inappropriately touched”. A season ticket holder for 10 years, she says the incident has “shaken me up to the point where I am really not wanting to go back again. It was once my happy place”.

Izzy*, a football content creator, was wiring her laptop in the press box when a man in the seats below reached his hands through the barrier and grabbed her leg. She swivelled in alarm; he laughed at her.

“I felt too uncomfortable to challenge him any further, and had to spend the rest of the evening with him right in front of me at the match,” she says.

On another occasion, a gang of drunk men followed her to her car. They screamed at her when she drove off.

Several months ago, The Athletic began speaking to women about their experiences of harassment and abuse at football matches in the UK. It would be wrong to paint this as the game's dark underbelly or as the terraces finally giving up their secrets. How can that be when the abuse is so public, so commonplace, so blatant?

Perhaps Caragh Skipper, another Palace supporter, put it best: “To be able to go and support the team I love, I have to tolerate this stuff. If I challenge every bit of sexism from the moment I leave the door with a Palace scarf on, I'd miss the match because I'd be doing nothing else. That's what you learn and what the environment teaches girls: if you want to go to football, this is what you're going to have to put up with.”

My own violation arrived at 19. The memory comes to me easily. I remember why I didn't report it and I cannot say with any conviction that I would do the reverse were it to happen again. Not that I knew, then, who to report it to or the names of the men who, with that easy, loping entitlement, crowded me outside the coach toilet and asked me, because I was in their eyes so obviously flat-chested, if I was a man and if I had a penis and how I had aimed.

I remember the stinging heat of shame, and, chiefly, the sense that their words, their breath, had clung to me, and that I had to scrub myself clean. I remember that broiling sense of injustice that these men — from late teens to mid-fifties — could carry themselves in the world with this level of impunity while I folded in on myself, literally and metaphorically, loathe to take up any kind of space.

Of course they would face no consequences. Of course the other male passengers would laugh along. Of course I wouldn't report it and, in the end, I didn't because I felt as though I never had a right to be on that coach in the first place. I had never travelled to an away match via a coach. Maybe they were regulars and in the coach's social order, all this was expected, permitted. Imagine their anger if, abruptly, all that changed. Imagine if there were bans for those passengers, an investigation, rules; the mores of 'back of the bus' bent out of shape to accommodate someone who wouldn't travel with them again.

I have, as have most people who have taken a train on a Saturday afternoon, sat in a train carriage that stayed silent as a group of men implored two young women to “get their tits out for the lads”. Don't embarrass those women. Don't aggravate the aggressor. Head down, walk a little quicker, call someone who is likely to pick up on the first ring and pretend that they are just around the corner.

The Athletic's special report into the sexism and abuse directed at female football fans has found that:

Her Game Too's June 2021 survey revealed that 216 of its 370 respondents had experienced sexist abuse at a football ground or in a pub. Her Game Too is a voluntary organisation of women — many of whom are in their early twenties — supporting others through harassment and abuse, as well as working with schools, ex-offenders, venues and transport providers.

“Some of (the stories) are really hard to read,” says founder Caz May. The survey responses, she says, comprised “pages and pages and pages. It got to the point where I had to stop reading because some of it was really tough. People have said they don't want to go back because of the fear of it happening again. People say they go into a different area of the ground, travel to games a different way — things they shouldn't have to do”.

In August, Everton issued a stadium ban to a fan who sexually harassed a woman during a home match 11 days earlier. “While I was on my way onto the concourse at the match, making my way along the aisle, a male supporter grabbed my arse,” the woman, who wishes to remain anonymous, told The Athletic. “Despite me noticing this and making it clear I'd noticed, he just found it amusing.”

After posting about the incident on social media — “the thought that, without me reporting, those sorts of people could continue assaulting and harassing fellow supporters at the match just felt wrong to me” — she was contacted by Everton's security team. “For the first few matches after it happened, I was actually really anxious even going the game, but now I just feel reassured knowing that the majority of people in and around the ground are completely opposed to harassment in any form,” she said. “It just feels like an ordinary match again now.”

A person was banned after assaulting a female fan during this match between Everton and Chelsea (Photo: Catherine Ivill via Getty Images)

Shannon* recalls watching Sian Massey-Ellis run the line at Wembley. Following a tight offside call, a man nearby called: “You've got that wrong, you slag.” Shannon challenged him, “only to be met with a group of men teaming up together to call me a leftie and a lesbian. I reported them to the stewards, who didn't do anything but gave me a form to fill out”.

She continues: “I was made to feel a bit silly, like a little girl reporting it to a headteacher. I filled out the form but the security man seemed pretty uninterested and at no point did they say they'd remove the men from their seats. I moved to find another place to stand with my brother. I never heard anything back from filling out the form. I do still get tickets to Wembley when I can, but it definitely is a thought in the back of my mind that I may be exposed to sexist abuse. I'm also aware of how difficult it is to stand up against it when it begins.”

Shannon then adds, casually, that two men once banged on the door of the women's toilet at an away game and threatened to sexually assault her. This happened in a bar after a game. Shannon's brother reported the men to the bar staff, and security removed them.

Their stories highlight the gamut of responses when women choose to report harassment and abuse. Many women do not know how to — part of Her Game Too's campaign is putting posters and QR codes in stadia to raise awareness — but not all clubs had reporting lines in place when Her Game Too first began to meet with them.

Indeed, it was not part of the EFL's code of practice until this season for clubs to have a reporting mechanism within the club structures. An EFL spokesperson said that the “vast majority” of clubs “do already have this in place”, but it will be a minimum licensing requirement when clubs are assessed next season. The EFL does have agreements in place with Kick It Out and Her Game Too, although the latter has partnerships with only 61 of the 92 Premier League and EFL clubs.

“People are scared to report,” says May. “I've seen people speak out on Twitter, and then they've got backlash and had to delete the tweet. There is that fear of: am I safe in reporting? One of our ambassadors is tackling someone who's openly misogynistic and sexist and starts these chants at grounds. He's got a ban, and he's obviously very angry about it. He's got a couple of mates that are very angry about it. She's worried about going to the next game because of it. We need to make sure the club is fully supporting her with that.”

Increasing trust and faith in clubs and other bodies is vital. Jade* and her friend were attending a Premier League game in a VIP suite bar when a man recognised Jade from social media, where she regularly posted updates about the club's women's team. “'You're that girl — you watch women's football',” he said to her. “'They're all lesbian cunts. You're a lesbian cunt. You make me sick. You're disgusting. You're just like them'.”

Jade fled in tears and reported the incident to the club, who rang her the following day, apologised and promised to investigate, later banning the fan. The police, however, did not respond as swiftly.

“I ended up telling my story two or three times,” Jade says. “No one ever came out to see me. It was always done over the phone. They ended up putting it as a racially aggravated public order (offence). When I saw it written down, I said: 'It's not racially aggravated. He didn't call me anything racist. It's a homophobic attack'. They said: 'Don't worry, it will be fine. If we don't get him on that, we'll get him on something else'. They assumed it was racially aggravated because I am mixed race.

“I just didn't hear anything for months and months. I was having to ring them: 'What's going on?'. It made me feel sick. It made me feel like they were not interested. I had to get support mentally at work because it was always on my mind, hanging over me. And I hadn't done anything. I was the victim.”

She contacted her MP, who, upon speaking to the Crown Prosecution Service, learned that evidence had not been submitted correctly. The police force, Jade says, then sent her a WhatsApp message to say that her case had been dropped. An inspector eventually called with an apology.

“If I was white, it would have been different,” Jade says. “They would have heard me straight away.”

She has returned to the ground since but saw a handful of the man's friends. His ban will soon expire. “I don't think I will go back when I know he's back,” she says. “You can't control who goes to a game. What are they thinking when they look at me?”

Criminal law does not treat all protected characteristics equally. Someone assaulted on the basis of disability does not receive the same protections as someone assaulted because of their race. Aggravated offences only apply to incidents of racial and religious hostility. Stirring up offences do not encompass those linked to a disability or transgender identity.

Sex and gender are not among the protected characteristics for hate crimes. The Law Commission, an independent body set up by the UK government to review laws and suggest reforms, has recommended that they should not be added to the protected characteristics for aggravated offences “as it would be ineffective at protecting women and girls and in some cases, (be) counterproductive”, particularly in cases of rape and domestic abuse.

They acknowledged, however, that failing to do so “would make sex or gender very much the poor relation of hate crime characteristics, applicable only in certain, limited contexts”. They recommended instead a government review of the need for a specific offence covering public sexual harassment, as well as “extending the offence of stirring up hatred to cover stirring up hatred on the grounds of sex or gender”. The Law Commission expects a response from the government later this year.

The latter would be a timely intervention given the landscape. The 2021 murder of Sarah Everard and the related charges for the police officers who had exchanged racist, homophobic, misogynistic and ableist messages, are symptomatic of a range of wider cultural concerns. A 2023 Hope not Hate survey found that eight in 10 British boys aged 16-17 had consumed misogynistic content from social media influencer Andrew Tate and that 45 per cent of British men aged 16–24 had a positive view of him, compared to only one per cent of British women in the same age range.

At some point, football's threads braid with this, both in the interactions between female fans and law enforcement — a February 2023 YouGov poll found that women are “notably less likely than men to trust individual police officers” — and the broader treatment of women that the sport too often permits. Consider, for instance, the responses of male fans to the news that charges against Mason Greenwood of attempted rape, assault occasioning actual bodily harm, and controlling and coercive behaviour were dropped in February 2023.

“You have chants that are making light of footballers and sexual abuse accusations,” says Emily, a Palace fan. “They are not something I enjoy or want to hear.”

“We are extremely disappointed to hear of the negative experiences that some female fans have had at matches across England,” said a Football Association spokesperson. “We strongly condemn prejudice of any kind, including sexism and misogyny, and we encourage anyone who has been the subject of, or witness to, this behaviour inside a stadium to report it to the relevant authorities and the club concerned.

“Wembley Stadium has a zero-tolerance policy for anti-social and discriminatory conduct, and has introduced an anonymous text message service (text HELP to 66566) to ensure fans can report incidents directly to the stadium's control room to be investigated. Anyone found guilty of this behaviour will be immediately ejected.”

Chris Paouros, a Kick It Out Trustee, says: “Sexist abuse in stadiums reflects a culture of misogyny in our country that continues to pervade many facets of the game. Wholesale cultural change is needed to ensure women feel safe and welcome when attending matches. For too long, misogyny has been accepted as an unavoidable aspect of the game. That needs to end now.

“People often say football is a mirror of society, but changing football crowds can lead to change more widely. We live in structures that are inherently patriarchal and steeped in a culture that supports them; there continue to be many cases of violence against women. But by calling out sexism or reporting sexist chanting, people can not only tackle a culture in football but also perhaps influence behaviours away from the stadiums.”

Additional reporting: Matt Woosnam

If you have been affected by the issues raised in this article, support is available. You can contact the Samaritans for confidential advice and help.

(Top photos: Getty Images; design Eamonn Dalton)