# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Yellowfin BI | A visual analysis of gender pay inequality at Wimbledon

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Dive into a visual analysis of gender pay inequality at Wimbledon and uncover key insights into this pressing issue. Explore the data and learn more now!

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Women’s History Month: Wimbledon finally offers equal prize money | Tennis.com

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Thirty-four years after the US Open payed equally, the All England Club finally came around.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Maria Sánchez Becomes The Highest-Paid NWSL Player

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
At 27 years old, forward Maria Sanchez officially became the highest paid player in the National Women’s Soccer League with a deal worth $1.5 million.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.authors[].name
Madrid to Host Homeless World Cup Event and NEW Spanish Member country introduced

# data[].attributes.headline
Human rights violations by world cup host country

# data[].attributes.subject
Human rights violations by world cup host country

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Opinion: No room for politics in sport? With respect, that’s absolute garbage

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
If the tournament has to be in Qatar, then I’d rather see some pushback rather than meek silence in the face of the threat of a yellow card

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The 'One Love' Armband Is Causing a Stir at the World Cup

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Seven European teams scrapped their plans to wear the LGBT rights armband amid threats of sanction. Here's what to know.

# data[].attributes.headline
one love arm band, banned at women's world cup

# data[].attributes.subject
one love arm band, banned at women's world cup

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
FIFA confirms ‘One Love’ armband Women’s World Cup ban after controversy at men’s Qatar tournament

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
England Women will not be able to wear One Love armbands during Womens World Cup after FIFA confirmed the ban laid down during mens Qatar tournament last year remains; Lionesses had planned to wear armband but will be able to choose from one of eight FIFA-sanctioned alternatives

# data[].attributes.headline
The price of inappropriate gestures and not seeking consent

# data[].attributes.subject
The price of inappropriate gestures and not seeking consent

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Rubiales resigned from his job in football in September after weeks of defiance that increased pressure on him from the Spanish government and national team players.

ADVERTISEMENT

FIFA banned ousted former Spanish football federation president Luis Rubiales from the sport for three years on Monday for misconduct at the Women's World Cup final where he forcibly kissed a player on the lips at the trophy ceremony.

FIFA did not publish details of the verdict reached by its disciplinary committee judges, who had investigated charges relating to "basic rules of decent conduct" and "behaving in a way that brings the sport of football and/or FIFA into disrepute."

Rubiales kissed player Jenni Hermoso on the lips after Spain's 1-0 victory over England on 20 August in Sydney, Australia.

Minutes earlier, Rubiales grabbed his crotch as a victory gesture in the exclusive section of seats with Queen Letizia of Spain and 16-year-old Princess Sofía standing nearby.

Rubiales resigned from his jobs in football in September after weeks of defiance that increased pressure on him from the Spanish government and national team players.

Rubiales can request the verdict within 10 days and then file an appeal to FIFA, football's world body said.
Our journalists are working on this story and will update when more information becomes available.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
FIFA bans former Spanish football federation president Luis Rubiales

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Rubiales resigned from his job in football in September after weeks of defiance that increased pressure on him from the Spanish government and national team players.

# data[].attributes.headline
FIFA players "overworked" - which players and countries might not be able to afford this pace?

# data[].attributes.subject
FIFA players "overworked" - which players and countries might not be able to afford this pace?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Expanded FIFA Club World Cup in 2025 faces legal challenge by players

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The 32-team event, up from seven, is scheduled for June-July 2025 despite unions raising concerns about increasing physical and mental demands on players.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
1. 1

2. 2

3. 3

4. Page 1of 3

Anyone taking part in sport must take personal responsibility and behave in a certain way which is fully compliant with the rules and the expected behaviours of the sport. This is known as sportsmanship .

Rules

Participants have to follow the rules of the sport. In organised sport, these are developed by each sport's governing body and are upheld by officials during play. Rules make sure that play is safe and fair. Players are penalised if they do not respect the rules or the officials. During informal or adapted activities, participants often agree their own rules. Agreeing adaptations to the rules can make sport more inclusive, but still ensure fairness and safety.

Etiquette

Sport also has unwritten rules or customs - etiquette - to uphold respect and fairness. These help people to play in the 'spirit of the game'. They often require players to take an active approach to respect and fairness, not just avoid breaking the rules. For example, etiquette includes:

acknowledging that a ball was out in tennis

shaking hands with opponents before and after an important football match, regardless of the outcome

Sportsmanship

Sportsmanship means playing within the rules and understanding and using sports etiquette. It is playing fairly in the spirit of the game, showing respect and fair play to opponents and graciousness in both victory and defeat. Sportsmanship includes:

kicking the ball out when someone is injured in football and the other team giving possession back

helping a rival player up if they are down injured

a player calling the ball 'in' at a tennis match, even though the line judge called it 'out', thereby giving the point to their opponent

Gamemanship

Without breaking them, players may bend the rules and use questionable methods to gain an advantage. Examples include:

deliberately falling after being tackled in the penalty area to try to win a penalty in football

distracting an opponent, for example sledging in cricket where the bowler and fielders verbally abuse or intimidate a batsman to put him off

time-wasting to prevent the opposition from trying to score in hockey

Gamesmanship exists at all levels and in many sports. Due to media coverage, many examples are seen in elite sport. Some sport psychologists and philosophers believe this reflects players' motivation. Competitors who are strongly ego-oriented or extrinsically motivated are more likely to have a 'win at all costs' attitude, leading to unsporting behaviour. There is less incentive to cheat if someone is task-oriented and intrinsically motivated .

Question

A player kicks a ball out of play to stop the game when an opponent is injured. Is this sportsmanship or gamesmanship?

Reveal answer

Sportsmanship - this shows respect for the opposing team and upholds safety and fairness.

1. 1

2. 2

3. 3

4. Page 1of 3

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Sporting behaviour - sportsmanship - Ethical factors in sports - OCR - GCSE Physical Education Revision - OCR - BBC Bitesize

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
1 2 3 Page 1of 3 Anyone taking part in sport must take personal responsibility and behave in a certain way which is fully compliant with the rules and the expected behaviours of the sport. This is known as sportsmanship . Participants have to follow the rules of the sport.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Representatives from the English Cricket Board (ECB), the Professional Cricketers' Association, Marylebone Cricket Club, the National Counties Cricket Association and the First Class and Recreational County Cricket network met up at The Oval in London.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Azeem Rafiq: Cricket chiefs apologise for racism in the sport

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Cricket chiefs in England and Wales say racism is a disease in the sport.

# data[].attributes.headline
Premier League action plan to empower minority groups

# data[].attributes.subject
Premier League action plan to empower minority groups

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Premier League No Room For Racism Action Plan Commitments

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Find out more about the six commitments that underpin the No Room For Racism Action Plan

# data[].attributes.headline
Racism in sports - Australia aboriginal targets

# data[].attributes.subject
Racism in sports - Australia aboriginal targets

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Australia boasts a long and proud history in sports, showcasing its rich sporting culture on the world stage. Traditions and values in disciplines ranging from cricket and AFL to the Olympics unite our nation. This spirit inspires children to reach the highest levels and fuels community sports every weekend in backyards, on local grounds and in facilities.

Yet, beneath the camaraderie and competition, a persistent issue casts a shadow: racism, an ugly form of learned behaviour that has no place in sports or our communities. In 2024, several incidents have highlighted the ongoing struggle of First Nations Australians against racial discrimination in sports, underscoring the urgent need for systemic change and greater awareness.

In March 2024 former AFL star Eddie Betts, a leader and advocate for Indigenous rights and anti-racism, revealed that his children were racially abused while playing basketball in their own front yard by people driving past in a car. This attack on children underscores the broader societal issue of racism that affects even the youngest members of the First Nations community.

The Australian Football League and National Rugby League have struggled with incidents of racism from players, coaches, staff and spectators. In 2024, several high-profile cases once again brought this issue into the spotlight. Players reported on-field racial slurs and discriminatory behaviour from both opponents and spectators. The leagues are working to address these issues through education programs and stricter penalties, but the recurrence of such incidents indicates that more still needs to be done.

Recently Australian netball player Donnell Wallam recently received a deeply distressing racist letter, which caused a significant public outcry. The letter, filled with hateful and derogatory language, was a stark reminder of the racism that persists within Australian society, particularly towards First Nations people.

Netball Australia and fellow athletes rallied around Wallam, expressing their support and solidarity, highlighting the need for continued efforts to create a safe and inclusive environment for all players. Sports clubs and governing bodies have a crucial role in combating racism, and it will require a great deal of effort and energy from all levels to reinforce the need for change.

These incidents amplify calls for systemic change within Australian sports. Advocates stress the importance of incorporating Indigenous perspectives into decision-making processes and creating safe environments for First Nations athletes. This includes not only addressing incidents of racism as they occur but also fostering a culture of respect and understanding from the grassroots level up.

In the last month, a racial attack on Adelaide Crows player Izak Rankine came to light through a social media comment. The Brisbane Lions swiftly handled the complaint by identifying the offender and removing them as a member, sending a clear message.

And more incidents have happened since the writing of this statement.

Social media has become a double-edged sword for athletes. While it allows fans to connect with their sporting heroes, it also provides a platform for anonymous racial abuse. Throughout 2024, numerous First Nations athletes reported receiving racially charged messages and threats online. This trend is not new but has become more pervasive, with athletes like Betts calling for stricter regulations and accountability for social media platforms to curb online racism. Social media is not to blame, it is a tool that is used by individuals who reflect bad behaviour that does not align to our proud sporting culture.

We know this is happening at a grassroots level (see the article below), and it is completely unacceptable. Reconciliation SA receives notifications of incidents occurring regularly from many sporting codes on racist comments and is taking a stand with Sport SA by delivering Anti-Racism training. This training aims to support bystanders, victims, and leaders who want to see change and address the ugliness that threatens our sporting values and the continued growth of sport in our society.

The persistence of these issues calls for a more robust and proactive approach. It is imperative that sports organisations, governing bodies, and the wider community continue to stand against racism, support affected athletes, and work towards a future where all participants can compete free from discrimination.

Racism diminishes sport, codes, and clubs if it is allowed to persist. We all have a role to play in calling out ignorance, racism, and discrimination. Reconciliation SA welcomes leaders in our community willing to take a positive step to demonstrate their readiness to take action and participate in our program to equip themselves to be at the frontline of change and positively impact the lives and sporting legends of the future.

In the words of Eddie Betts, "Racism is a community issue, and it's everyone's responsibility to address it." As we move forward, let us ensure that the spirit of sportsmanship includes respect, equality, and the celebration of diversity every time we step out onto the arena.
Jason Downs Leah Cassidy Chief Executive Officer Chief Executive Officer Reconciliation SA Sport SA For Further Information email - Admin@ReconciliationSA.org.au

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Racism in Australian Sports in 2024...Taking a Stand

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
IPC - Paralympics News, Sports and Results

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Official website for the latest Paralympic news, videos, events and results. Follow the Paralympic Games and competitions for all Paralympic and IPC sports

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Paralympic Sports List - Summer & Winter Paralympic Sports

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
From Archery to Wheelchair Curling, the International Paralympic Committee currently sanctions 28 Paralympic sports. Find the full list here.

# data[].attributes.headline
Who I am mini documentary: king of basketball

# data[].attributes.subject
Who I am mini documentary: king of basketball

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Who I Am: Patrick Anderson | The King of Wheelchair Basketball | Paralympic Games

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Great Britain's Golden Boy | Who I Am: Jonnie Peacock | Paralympic Games

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Feb 19, 2020

Richard LapchickContributing Writer, ESPN.com

Close

American leader of the sports boycott of South Africa from 1975 until the end of apartheid

Chair of the DeVos Sport Business Management Graduate Program at the University of Central Florida

Author of 16 books and the annual Racial and Gender Report Card

Directs UCF's Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport

Director of the National Consortium for Academics and Sport

After an unprecedented increase in racist acts both in the United States and globally in 2018, there was some good news in 2019. According to research from the University of Central Florida's Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport (TIDES), documented acts of racism in sports in the U.S. sharply decreased from 52 acts in 2018 to just 25 in 2019. However, internationally, there were 131 occurrences in 2019 compared to 137 in 2018.

In 2019, according to TIDES, a large amount of the international documented racist acts occurred during professional soccer games. Of the 131 racist acts in sports in 2019, 81 of them (62%) were related to soccer, the most popular and most played sport in the world. Most (89%) of these 81 occurrences took place in Europe, especially in world soccer powerhouse countries including Italy and England, as well as Eastern European nations Bulgaria, Montenegro and Russia. Most of the discrimination was targeted toward African, Muslim and foreign-born players on opposing teams within these countries' top leagues such as the Serie A in Italy and the English Premier League in England.

Stars in the game such as Romelu Lukaku, Mario Balotelli and Paul Pogba publicly cited individual acts of racism committed against them in 2019. In November, Balotelli threatened to leave his club game against Hellas Verona after being the target of racial abuse from the crowd. In October, English players were verbally abused by fans during a Euro 2020 qualifier against Bulgaria in Sofia.

There have been efforts to combat and bring more awareness to the troubling realities of racism within the international soccer world. In October, the Italian soccer federation declared consideration of employing advanced listening devices used in anti-terrorism operations to identify offending fans. The launch was slated for March 2020. Not long after, the president of UEFA, Aleksander Ceferin, publicly criticized international soccer's lack of effort to tackle racism. FIFA leaders strengthened their disciplinary code on racism, doubling their minimum ban for racist incidents to 10 games per offense, fines for clubs starting at 20,000 Swiss francs (approximately $20,000), and inviting players to make victim statements at disciplinary hearings.

In December, Manchester United's Pogba, a consistent victim of racist verbal abuse in English Premier League games, brought some awareness to the issue by wearing black and white wristbands during the warm-up for a game. After winning the Ballon d'Or in December, USWNT midfielder Megan Rapinoe sent out a call for action to Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo and Zlatan Ibrahimovic to help use their voices to speak out on the blatant racism and sexism in the sport. "I want to shout: 'Cristiano, Lionel, Zlatan, help me!" Rapinoe said while speaking to organizers France Football after winning. "These big stars do not engage in anything when there are so many problems in men's football. Do they fear losing everything? They believe that, but it is not true. Who will erase Messi or Ronaldo from world football history for a statement against racism or sexism?"

While it's important for high-profile players to use their voices to speak out on these issues, it is not enough. We must challenge governing bodies and clubs to step in and put a stop to the hate. It is time for executives within these clubs to act and implement change.

Racism and its effects also hit home in 2019, especially in hockey and basketball, which endured multiple documented racist acts as well.

At TIDES, these documented racist acts, both in the U.S. and worldwide, were compiled via Google alerts for "racism in sports" throughout 2019. At the end of the year, the summaries based on the Google alerts were calculated to get the total number of racist incidents in sports. These incidents were then split up by sport and region (domestic or international). Social media incidents included in this research are based on those that have been reported by media outlets and appeared in a Google alert.

Monday through Friday, host Pablo Torre brings you an inside look at the most interesting stories at ESPN, as told by the top reporters and insiders on the planet. Listen

Headlines were made early last year at a Utah Jazz game when a fan allegedly directed "disrespectful" and "racial" comments toward former Oklahoma City Thunder point guard Russell Westbrook. Jazz executives, in addition to other Utah sports teams moved into action and came together for a "Lead Together" initiative against racism and hate speech. Initiatives like this one, turning a negative into a positive, are what other executives and owners across the NBA and other American professional leagues need to emulate and apply to their own organizations.

In August 2019, San Jose Sharks player Evander Kane was subject to a racist now-deleted comment on Instagram saying he should "stick to basketball." This raised larger concerns about the lack of diversity throughout hockey. Fewer than 5% of players in the NHL are players of color. Then, in November, notable hockey commentator Don Cherry spewed a hateful rant targeting the many immigrants in Canada in which he referred to them as "you people" and called on them to be more appreciative of veterans who afford them "the way of life [they] enjoy in Canada." Cherry was quickly fired from his position with Sportsnet. That same month, Calgary Flames head coach Bill Peters was accused of using racial slurs toward Nigerian-born player Akim Aliu when coaching him in the minor leagues a decade prior. The accusations were corroborated by two other players on that team and Peters was promptly removed from his position.

Thankfully, there have also been efforts in the sport to put an end to racist and hateful behavior. USA Hockey, the governing body for the sport in the United States, has made efforts to fight back against racism. They announced in late October that the penalties for racial or derogatory slurs by players would be met by harsher penalties, including a five-minute penalty, ejection from the game, and suspension from further participation until the matter is reviewed.

The racist acts of 2019 within the sports world should be an incentive for our top sports leaders and athletes to be sure that their leagues and teams can be role models for society and that there be a rigorously enforced no-tolerance policy of racism and hateful acts. In this new decade, we cannot let hate win. Sports can help lead the way.
David Morrin and Nicholas Mutebi made significant contributions to this column. Richard E. Lapchick is the chair of the DeVos Sport Business Management Graduate Program at the University of Central Florida. Lapchick also directs UCF's Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport, is the author of 17 books, the annual Racial and Gender Report Card, and is the president of the Institute for Sport and Social Justice. He has been a regular commentator for ESPN.com on issues of diversity in sport. Follow him on Twitter @richardlapchick.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Lapchick: Racism reported in sports decreasing but still prevalent

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Feb 19, 2020 Richard LapchickContributing Writer, ESPN.com Close American leader of the sports boycott of South Africa from 1975 until the end of apartheid Chair of the DeVos Sport Business Management Graduate Program at the University of Central Florida Author of 16 books and the annual Racial and Gender Report Card Directs UCF's Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sport Director of the National Consortium for Academics and Sport After an unprecedented increase in racist acts both in the United States and globally in 2018, there was some good news in 2019.

# data[].attributes.headline
understanding history: segregation in American sports

# data[].attributes.subject
understanding history: segregation in American sports

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Like much of society, professional American sports were segregated in the first part of the 20th Century, preventing black athletes from competing with white athletes. In baseball, there were established 'Negro' leagues for non-white players (while these leagues were predominantly African-American, there were also several Latin-Americans playing in the leagues, as well) through the early 1950s. The National Basketball League officially integrated in 1950. While professional football started with integration from 1900s-1930s (still, the percentage of African-American players was negligible), the National Football League was completely segregated from 1934-1945. The degree to which these degrading segregation policies hurt black communities - in and outside of sports - is immense, and not simply in the past. These official policies, explicit at the time, have affected communities in ways which have persisted through generations, and still exist as (generally) more implicit racially segregated policies. Whether it's due to 'old boy-esque' business models among the dominant rich, white men who run professional leagues, or from some other factor like lingering racist stereotypes, there are still today glaring discrepancies in the number of black coaches, officials, and administrators as compared with both players and society in general. Much more work is needed in the fight past these old, yet ever persistent, racist and segregating policies. The NFL's 'Rooney Rule,' established in 2003, requires teams to interview one minority candidate for head coaching and upper-level management positions. The simple fact that a rule like this was needed highlights the level to which sports leagues are still racially divided. With it being acknowledged that today's sporting world has major hurdles to overcome in terms of racial justice, the rest of this post will simply aim to honor, respect and highlight a few major people and groups in the road through and past the segregation policies in the early and mid 20th Century. While doing this, I think two things are important to keep in mind: these events were not too long ago - we are only a few generations removed from the late 19th Century; and, the fight for racial justice - both within and outside of sport - is not over. And, of course, many more people (of all ethnicities, races, colors, and places), helped break through the devastating color barriers which preoccupied professional sports for so long.

Setting the Stage with Horse Racing

There was a time, in the late 19th Century, when black athletes dominated a sport - horse racing. When horse racing became an organized sport in the early 1900s, many black jockeys were at the top of the stage. When the Kentucky Derby began in 1875, 13 of 15 jockeys were African-American, and 15 of the first 28 Kentucky Derbies were won by black athletes. Their success was one of the first times in American sports that black athletes truly dominated the ranks of an entire sport. Isaac Murphy - the first millionaire black athlete - was the first jockey to win three Kentucky Derbies (1884, 1890, and 1891). Jimmy Winkfield, another black jockey, won the Kentucky Derby in 1901 and 1902. There hasn't been another black jockey to win the Kentucky Derby since. This is due to the Jim Crow laws of the 1880s which segregated blacks and whites, making it increasingly difficult for young black athletes to become engaged in horse racing (or, of course, any other sport). What was once a sport where black athletes could thrive, became a sport desolate of black participants. While this may not seem like a success story to fight against segregation, I believe it is. It serves as a stark example of how devastating the impacts of the entire set of policies of segregation were. These racist policies truly abolished black participation in a sport which was once dominated by that same group. These jockeys - including the likes of Isaac Murphy and Jimmy Winkfield - should be seen as great pioneers, if only for the reason that they show the beginnings, before segregation. Looking back at this remarkable group of athletes serves as a reminder that racial segregation whites was a purely racist institution, with no validity in the arguments of differences in quality, character, or worth between blacks and whites.

A Writer and Fighter

Wendell Smith, a journalist, is perhaps best known for his mentoring and accompanying role with Jackie Robinson as Robinson began his career with the Brooklyn Dodgers as the first black player in Major League Baseball. Smith's work goes far beyond his help with Robinson, though. Before and after traveling with Robinson, giving him advice and help with life, baseball, and navigating through the tremendous hardships of being the first black player in the MLB, Smith embarked on an incredible journalism career. As a baseball writer at the Pittsburgh Courier, Smith was a strong advocate for integration in professional baseball, attempting to bring black players across the color barrier into the then all white MLB. Through his journalism as well as networking, Smith fought for this vision for social justice in a myriad of ways. He argued for the sake of black communities as well as baseball fans everywhere - claiming that segregation deprived MLB fans of seeing some of the best baseball players in the world. This unique style of advocating crossed the black-white divide, because of its appeal to the game of baseball itself. Smith drew wide audiences, both in the public as well as within baseball. A first semi-successful alliance saw him team up with politician Isadore Muchnick in what ended up as fruitless tryouts for black baseball players for the Boston professional teams. After this is when Smith started working with Branch Rickey, general manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers, to bring in the first African-American baseball player (already well known to be the great Jackie Robinson) onto his team. Smith was a strong public voice for the integration of professional baseball, even when critics argued vehemently that his goals of ending Negro Leagues were harmful to black communities. He retaliated, "All they cared about was the perpetuation of the slave trade they had developed. They will shout to the high heavens that racial progress comes first and baseball next. But actually the preservation of their shaky, littered, infested, segregated baseball domicile comes first, last and always." Wendell Smith was much more than the mentor to Jackie Robinson. He was an advocate, a fighter, and an extraordinary journalist - he should be remembered for these wonderful characteristics, and many more which depict his great legacy.

Author: Mitchell Kiefer

References

Chamberlain, Gaius. "Wendell Smith." Great Black Heroes. N.p., 19 Dec. 2013. Web.

McKenzie, Sheena. "The Forgotten Godfathers of Black American Sport - CNN.com." CNN. Cable News Network, 22 Feb. 2013. Web.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Racial Segregation in American Sports - Sports Conflict Institute

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Like much of society, professional American sports were segregated in the first part of the 20th Century, preventing black athletes from competing with white athletes.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
On June 2, 2021, the National Football League (NFL) announced it would discontinue the use of race norming-the practice of assuming a lower baseline of cognitive abilities in Black players-in legal settlements for concussion-related injuries. For the past several years, Black former professional football players, led by former Pittsburgh Steelers Kevin Henry and Najeh Davenport, had been speaking out against the practice. Henry, Davenport and colleagues demonstrated that race norming was interfering with their ability to receive compensation and benefits from the settlement. Black retirees, who are overrepresented in the number of former players, staked legitimate claims about their impaired health after risking their minds and bodies for this American sport. Bottom line: the race norming practice limited Black players' access to the compensation they were rightfully owed.

In 2013, the NFL settled for $765 million after more than 4,500 retired players brought concussion-related lawsuits against the league. In theory, approximately 18,000 former players were eligible to receive the settlement, which is meant to cover compensation, medical exams, further research, and legal fees for concussion-related neurological diseases such as dementia, Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease and chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). While this settlement seemed like a victory to some, Black players quickly found out that it would be harder to access these funds because the NFL required that cognitive tests used be adjusted for race. With this in mind, Henry and Davenport quietly filed a lawsuit against the NFL in the fall of 2020.

"Black former players are automatically assumed (through a statistical manipulation called 'race-norming') to have started with worse cognitive functioning than White former players. As a result, if a Black former player and a White former player receive the exact same raw scores on a battery of tests designed to measure their current cognitive functioning, the Black player is presumed to have suffered less impairment, and he is therefore less likely to qualify for compensation," their lawsuit contended.

The June announcement was, rightly, met with shock that the practice had even been in use. But for those of us who are attuned to the actions and strategies of the most profitable and popular professional sport league in the United States, the news wasn't much of a surprise. It is just the latest example on the laundry list of the NFL's anti-Black, racist and discriminatory practices over the past decades. For the NFL, race norming depends on the belief that race is a binary, biological concept, and therefore that differences in Black bodies and minds are not only existent, but quantifiable. But they're wrong on all accounts: race norming is an inherently anti-Black form of scientific racism that is evidence of slavery's afterlife.

As Black feminist anthropologists-one who specializes in sport (Canada) and the other in medicine and public health (Carter)-interested in the social and lived experience of Blackness in the United States, we question how one's interactions with the social world are influenced by one's racialized experiences. The ways that Black football players navigate their time as current and former NFL athletes point to the continued social inequities that plague the league beyond claims of anti-Black racism. This is the same league whose cheerleaders accused it of gender discrimination. A league where only one player on an active roster has felt comfortable disclosing their sexuality as a gay man. A league where only three of 32 head coaches are Black and where some teams maintain racist caricatures as mascots. And a league where Black athletes account for more than 70 percent of the labor force on the gridiron.

When we reconsider the racial demographics of this situation alongside the plantation metaphors that riddle play in the NFL, then the injuries that athletes sustain, especially concussions and their side effects, can be classified, in the words of Saidiya Hartman, as the afterlife of slavery. And these injuries, vis-à-vis concussions and subsequent neurological disorders, are just one of the ways that anti-Blackness will continue to impact athletes long after they retire and are no longer affiliated with their professional teams. Often, these athletes' lives are fundamentally changed by their experience with the sport.

In his investigation of the spectacle and business of hockey, scholar Nathan Kalman-Lamb writes of the structural importance of injury, pain and violence to a team spectator sport. And as despicable a notion as this is, it's true. These are woven into the fabric of football. Largely for this reason, average NFL careers across all playing positions are only 2.66 years long. Thus, the tag "Not For Long," from sociologist Robert Turner's ethnography of NFL athletes, rings true as ever. Given the capitalist impulse of the league, these athletes are cared for just enough to protect the investment that has been made in their labor. NFL teams spent over $500 million on injuries in 2019, but the question becomes, whose bodies, injuries and health matter most to the league?

By requiring race norming to determine neurocognitive impairments in former players, the NFL acted as a racialized organization, as defined by sociologist Victor Ray, legitimizing the unequal distribution of resources to the majority of their players. Not only did this practice extend the NFL's participation in anti-Black practices, it also allowed the league to live up to its capitalist ideals. By 2015, the agreement in the settlement had been updated to nearly $1 billion available for settlement claims funded by the NFL. Even with the NFL's overwhelming financial prominence, race norming was one way the league could more closely moderate who was eligible (read: worthy) for a settlement. Yet, despite its contemporary uses, race norming can be traced back to plantation slavery, eugenics efforts globally and a long history of racial science used to justify the belief in inferior racial groups. These misguided scientific endeavors are rooted in an idea that Black people's bodies are inherently different from white people's bodies.

Scholars Lucia Trimbur, Lundy Braun and Dorothy Roberts have outlined that race norming (also called race correction and ethnic adjustment) and more broadly race-based medicine are not new phenomena. Such statistical practice has been used in medical specialties like pulmonology, neuropsychology, obstetrics, urology and nephrology. Braun 's work reveals Thomas Jefferson's "discovery" of differences in pulmonary function between Black enslaved people and white people-rooted in his beliefs that Black enslaved people had lower lung capacity than whites. This "fact" spread and then directly impacted the development of race correction in spirometers-an apparatus still used to measure respiratory disease today.

In nephrology, eGFR, another race-normed test, is the gold standard for measuring kidney function. This test measures levels of creatine and adjusts for gender, age and race. In 1999, a study developed a statistical prediction equation for eGFR based on race because scientists "determined" that Black people's muscle mass "on average" was higher than white people's-which they argued leads to higher kidney function. This deduction is not only flawed because race is not biological (nor is it genetically linked), but also because the muscle mass of living humans simply cannot be measured feasibly in clinics, according to nephrologist Nwamaka D. Eneanya.

Despite calls from the nation's leading experts to end its use, the test continues to persist. Race norming practices in lung and kidney function mirror the NFL's use of cognitive impairments. The impacts of these anti-Black practices within medicine are not just dire because of potential financial compensation but because there are real consequences on Black people's health and well-being in this country.

Outside of these examples and off the gridiron, these findings about race norming are reminiscent of studies that show bias in pain treatment based on assumptions of biological differences between white and Black patients, unequal COVID-19 treatment and outcomesfor Black patients, the ongoing Black maternal health crisis as Black women face higher rates of pregnancy-related deaths, the misdiagnosis of diseases like amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) in Black patients, and countless other ways that racialized and gendered biases influence the care of historically marginalized groups.

Recently, scientists announced an effort to study the connections between the NFL and ALS, the illness commonly referred to as Lou Gehrig's Disease, after the famous Yankee baseball Hall-of-Famer. As of the writing of this piece, 13 former NFL players have come forward with an ALS diagnosis. In a league where 70 percent of players are Black and nearly 73 percent nonwhite, only two Black men with ALS have come forward, while the other 11 persons with ALS are white. These lopsided ratios suggest the ways that the environment, bias, structural inequities and racial capitalism in slavery's multiple afterlives impact medical diagnosis and care-not simply who gets a settlement from the NFL.

Those who submitted claims for this concussion-related settlement are navigating the NFL's anti-Black afterlife. Concussions are a major component of this, given they are underreported during play and so little is known about their long-term effects in living former players. Through this system, as Hortense Spillers suggests, the bodies of these Black players are reduced from their full humanity to merely flesh. We must continue to examine anti-Blackness in its full extent in order to keep Black bodies from harm, injury and, most importantly, a premature death, as we continue to live in slavery's afterlife.

This is an opinion and analysis article; the views expressed by the author or authors are not necessarily those of Scientific American.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The NFL’s Racist ‘Race Norming’ Is an Afterlife of Slavery

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
On June 2, 2021, the National Football League (NFL) announced it would discontinue the use of race norming-the practice of assuming a lower baseline of cognitive abilities in Black players-in legal settlements for concussion-related injuries. For the past several years, Black former professional football players, led by former Pittsburgh Steelers Kevin Henry and Najeh Davenport, had been speaking out against the practice.

# data[].attributes.headline
Integration - negroes league baseball to Major league baseball

# data[].attributes.subject
Integration - negroes league baseball to Major league baseball

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
The Road to Baseball Integration | Philadelphia Phillies

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Official Site of Major League Baseball

# data[].attributes.headline
Should teams be forced a defeat because of racist fans? FIFA

# data[].attributes.subject
Should teams be forced a defeat because of racist fans? FIFA

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
English football has no plans to upgrade protocols dealing with racist abuse, despite the Fifa president, Gianni Infantino, calling for an automatic forfeit of games by teams whose fans cause an abandonment with racist behaviour.

Individual competitions have the right to decide what steps they want to take in the event of an abandonment. The internationally adopted process is to reschedule matches and it is thought unlikely the Premier League, English Football League or Football Association would change that without consensus in the English game.

A new focus on the processes for dealing with abuse comes after Infantino's remarks, which followed racist incidents last weekend in Serie A and the Championship. The rules dictate a three-step process whereby the referee is first informed of any abuse. If the abuse continues the referee withdraws teams from the field temporarily. If the players return and the abuse continues, players are withdrawn for a second time and the match is abandoned.

On Saturday Milan withdrew from the field at Udinese after sustained abuse of their goalkeeper Mike Maignan by home fans, but returned to the pitch and completed the fixture. In the EFL, play was temporarily stopped at Sheffield Wednesday after the Coventry midfielder Kasey Palmer reported monkey gestures directed at him by the crowd.

"We have to implement an automatic forfeit for the team whose fans have committed racism and caused the match to be abandoned, as well as worldwide stadium bans and criminal charges for racists," Infantino said. Udinese have said they intend to ban for life any spectators found guilty of racially abusing Maignan.

Infantino's words will be welcomed by many within the game. Ian Wright, posting on X, summarised the frustration widely felt over the slow progress on eradicating racism from football grounds. Commenting on the Maignan incident, Wright said: "Keep walking off!! We did 'playing through it' and nothing has changed. Points deductions needed, the fines are pointless."

Under Law 7.5 of the laws of the game as defined by the International Football Association Board, "an abandoned match is replayed unless the competition rules or organisers determine otherwise".

The FA, Premier League and EFL have, in recent years, increasingly taken a joined-up approach to matters of disorder. In 2022 they agreed common measures to tackle a growing trend for pitch invasions and objects being thrown on to the pitch. It is understood that any reform to the three-stage protocol and the approach to abandonments would need to be agreed in similar fashion.

skip past newsletter promotion

Sign up to Football Daily

Kick off your evenings with the Guardian's take on the world of football
Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
after newsletter promotion

Omar Beckles, chair of the Professional Footballers' Association, said: "Our members want to see real, consistent and significant consequences for racist abuse, both for the individuals who are responsible and for clubs who fail to get a grip of the issue within their stadiums. The reality is that players don't believe this is happening. The responsibility for what happens next lies with the authorities."

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
English football has no plans for forfeits over racist abuse despite Infantino plea

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
English football has no plans to upgrade protocols dealing with racist abuse, despite Fifa's president calling for an automatic forfeit of games by teams whose fans cause an abandonment with racist behaviour

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
As boxer Cindy Ngamba becomes first athlete from the Refugee Olympic Team to win a medal, find out more about the team and how it began.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Last night, England's football team took on Andorra in a World Cup qualifier at Wembley.

It was the first time they've played at Wembley Stadium since the Euro 2020 final - which was overshadowed by racist abuse directed at three of England's black players.

Among those who suffered abuse was Bakayo Saka who last night marked his 20th birthday by netting the fourth goal in a 4-0 win which was greeted by huge roars from the crowd.

But last week England's players were again racially abused by sections of the crowd during their match in Hungary last week.

This was the latest episode of racism in football - something which has long been a problem in the sport. So how do young fans feel about it? De-Graft went to speak to some.

Lots of England's young black players were the stars at Euro 2020 as the team made it to the final - the furthest they've got in a tournament for more than 50 years.
But when they lost the final to Italy on penalties, some of the players including Marcus Rashford, Bukayo Saka and Jadon Sancho were all targeted online and on social media after missing penalties in the decisive shootout.
De-Graft spoke to young people in Manchester - not far from where Marcus Rashford's mural was defaced.

They told us that they don't feel positive about racism around football and think that despite investigations into those doing the abusing, racism would show its face again.

"I would like to see it end," said one. "But I just don't think it will."

They also felt it was down to lots of different parts of the community to stop it happening. They suggested teachers and parents have a role to play, as do social media companies in how they treat the accounts of people who commit racist abuse.

All felt there needed to be consequences for those who racially abuse others in real life and online.

Although racist abuse in football is sadly not new, racism and the England men's team has become a major talking point.

Over many years, England's black players have suffered at the hand of supporters of other teams, but also from England fans themselves, with players targeted in the stadiums and online.

In 2020, the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement became known across the world after George Floyd was killed by a police officer in the US and many footballers in the UK and Europe began to take the knee before games.

The team have said, time after time that for them the act of kneeling is to show solidarity for campaigns against racism and to support calls for equality for black people in Britain and around the world.

But the association with the Black Lives Matter movement has caused some controversy and It has led to some fans in the stadiums booing the players as they take the knee. Lots of people - including players in the game - have accused these fans of being racist.

Some fans who are unhappy about players taking the knee say that the booing isn't racist, instead they say the act of kneeling is too political and is diverting attention away from sport and football.

Getty Images

Following England's penalty defeat to Italy in the Euro 2020 final in July, racism dominated the headlines again as Marcus Rashford, Bukayo Saka and Jadon Sancho were all targeted on social media.

After the three black players missed their penalties in the final shootout, they received thousands of racist messages online.

A mural of Rashford in his home town of Withington in Manchester was also vandalised.

England manager Gareth Southgate and Prime Minister Boris Johnson both spoke out and condemned the abuse but fellow England player Tyrone Mings accused government minister Priti Patel of failing to support the players enough when some fans booed their decision to take the knee before games.

Saka hit out at social media companies, including Twitter, Instagram and Facebook, for not doing more to protect people from racist abuse.

"I don't want any child or adult to have to receive the hateful and hurtful messages that me, Marcus and Jadon have received this week," he said.

"I knew instantly the kind of hate that I was about to receive and that is a sad reality that your powerful platforms are not doing enough to stop these messages."

Getty Images

Following the Euro 2020 final, there were calls for social media companies to ban anonymity on their platforms.

Social media company Twitter said "ID verification would have been unlikely to prevent the abuse from happening" because 99% of account owners were identifiable. Following an investigation, 11 people in the UK were arrested for online racism.

In July, the government announced plans to ban people who abuse footballers online from stadiums for up to 10 years. Boris Johnson also revealed plans to fine social media companies who fail to stop racist behaviour on their platforms.

In their first match since Euro 2020, England's black players were targeted with racist abuse by sections of the crowd during a match against Hungary.

England were playing Hungary in Budapest as part of the World Cup 2022 qualifiers.

Fifa has launched an investigation into the racial abuse aimed at the England players during the Hungary match.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has urged Fifa "to take strong action against those responsible to ensure that this kind of disgraceful behaviour is eradicated from the game for good."

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Racism in football: What do young people think after Euro 2020? - CBBC Newsround

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
As England start playing again after the racism suffered by Marcus Rashford, Bukayo Saka and Jadon Sancho at Euro 2020, Newsround hears from young people about what needs to happen to get racism out of the game - and who's job that is.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Racism in Football: We're not born racist | Newsround | CBBC

# data[].attributes.headline
UK government calls for more support of females in sport

# data[].attributes.subject
UK government calls for more support of females in sport

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Women and girls need more support in sport, say MPs

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Women and Equalities Committee have published a report that found “systemic gender inequality” in sport in the UK.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The ICEC asked the public for evidence of discrimination within the sport and in November 2021, they received 4,156 responses. In March 2022, a call for written evidence resulted in more than 150 responses.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Discrimination in cricket: Sport must change says new report

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
A news report into cricket says discrimination was found to be "widespread" across all levels of the game.

# data[].attributes.headline
surge in girls football - Lionness as role models and inspiration

# data[].attributes.subject
surge in girls football - Lionness as role models and inspiration

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The Department for Education, which is the part of the government that looks after schools and teaching, says it has a plan to improve girls' access to sport.

Over the next two years, over £600m of funding is going to be put into teaching sport in school.

The hope is that if girls have more options to play sport, or get to do it more in school, they will start to enjoy it more.

Also, after the success of the Lionesses in the World Cup earlier this year, there's been more funding put into girls football, and finding coaches for teams.

Three young footballers sat down and chatted to Sue Campbell, the women's chair of the FA, about the FA's plan to get more girls playing football if they want to.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Sport England survey: Surge in girls playing football since Lionesses Euro 2022 win

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
A report looking at exercise levels in young people has found that 68,000 more girls started playing football in England since the Lionesses were crowned champions of Europe.

# data[].attributes.headline
inequality in prize money - 2015 to now how has it changed?

# data[].attributes.subject
inequality in prize money - 2015 to now how has it changed?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Men earn more prize money than their female counterparts in 30% of sports, according to a BBC Sport study.

The biggest differences in prize money were found in football, cricket and golf.

"There is a gap, it needs to be closed but it's not going to happen overnight. We do know that women's sport is very exciting, we know it can draw really big audiences but we need more media coverage and more commercial investment," says Minister for Sport Helen Grant.

A total of 56 global sports were looked at in the study.

Out of 35 sports that pay prize money, 25 pay equally and 10 do not. Fourteen sports, including rugby union and hockey, do not pay any prize money at all.

Before 2004, the study found only athletics, bowls, skating, marathons, shooting, tennis and volleyball paid equal prize money.

In the last ten years, nine more sports have starting doing so with five - diving, sailing, taekwondo, windsurfing and some cycling events - achieving equality in the past couple of years.

Female footballers are rewarded significantly less than male players.

For winning this year's World Cup in Brazil, Germany received over £21m more than their female Brazilian team did after they were crowned World Champions in 2011.

This season's men's FA Cup winners, a competition watched in more than 120 countries, will secure £1.8m in prize money while the team that lifts the Women's Cup will only win £5,000.

The Football Association has said men's and women's football were incomparable, describing them as "polar opposites" in the size of audiences they attract around the world.

In squash, Laura Massaro - the first English woman to hold both world and British Open titles at the same time - has been key to bringing equal prize money to the British Nationals, and increasing women's prize money for the British Open.

But for winning her world title, she received £16,300 less than the reigning men's world champion Nick Matthew, who secured £28,600 when he won his third world crown in November.

Andrew Shelley, chief executive of World Squash, said the sport's World Championships would bring in equal prize money "soon".

Tennis was the first sport to pay equal prize money when the US Open started doing so in 1973.

WTA Chief Executive Stacey Allaster, who runs the main organisation representing women's professional tennis, says "it does not make any sense" that top female athletes in other sports are missing out on a greater share of sponsorship money and media exposure.

The study, which looked at prize money only and does not include wages, bonuses or sponsorship, was commissioned ahead of a conference on Thursday aimed at transforming sport for the benefit of every woman and girl in the United Kingdom.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Men get more prize money than women in 30% of sports

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Men earn more prize money than their female counterparts in 30% of sports, according to a BBC Sport study. The biggest differences in prize money were found in football, cricket and golf. "There is a gap, it needs to be closed but it's not going to happen overnight.

# data[].attributes.headline
BBC school report: gender inequality in sport

# data[].attributes.subject
BBC school report: gender inequality in sport

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Across professional sports there is a major gender inequality, especially in those considered more 'masculine' such as football. Although there is a major wage gap between male and female athletes in a range of different sports, it is especially highlighted with football players.

Premier league male footballers earn approximately £2 million a year, whereas females earn £25,000 and would be extremely fortunate to earn over £50,000.

Male footballs are far better known and are much better paid than female footballers, despite the fact that recently the English female football team came second in the world cup whereas the men didn't even make it past the group stages.

Some may argue that whilst football is a male dominated sport, there are sports just like netball that are predominantly female dominated. However, netball is severely under-supported and generally considered not a dynamic sport despite having millions of players in the UK alone, netball is still not even an Olympic sport.

Moreover the pay difference between male footballers and female netballers is still a staggering size of over £1.9 million; there is no doubt that this disparity is hugely unfair.

On the other hand, we are as a society making progress as hockey players receive more or less the same play regardless of gender and is an Olympic sport open to all.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Gender inequality in Sport - The King's School Chester

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Across professional sports there is a major gender inequality, especially in those considered more 'masculine' such as football. Although there is a major wage gap between male and female athletes in a range of different sports, it is especially highlighted with football players. Premier league male footballers earn approximately £2 million a year, whereas females...

# data[].attributes.headline
Why are girls dropping out of sport and what can be done?

# data[].attributes.subject
Why are girls dropping out of sport and what can be done?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Why are Girls Dropping out of Sport and What Can be Done About it? 🏀 | Newsround

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Pride in sport: Recognising the achievements of LGBTQ+ Olympians during pride month

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
From Megan Rapinoe to trail-blazing figure skaters, the last decade has seen landmark moments for queer Olympians.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Professional Footballer Jake Daniels on how he felt coming out | Newsround

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Data and research has shown that the LGBTQ+ community have different rates of engagement with sport and physical activity and many do not reap the benefits of being sufficiently active. However, there are significant barriers faced by the LGBTQ+ community when it comes to engagement with sport and physical activity.

Homophobia: Research by Scotland's Equality Network highlights the wider problem of homophobia across sport. The report on their findings 'Out for Sport' shows that of more than 1,700 respondents, 79% thought that there was a problem of homophobia in sport, whilst 62% had witnessed or experienced homophobia or transphobia in sport. Amongst Trans respondents the numbers of those having experienced or witnessed homophobia or transphobia in sport rose to 80%.

Gendering in sport: Sport has traditionally been very rigid in the way it sees men and women, and how it views what are appropriate 'male' and 'female' sports - which can be problematic for LGBTQ+ people. Not only does this very segregated view of sport enforce certain kinds of behaviours and sports as being appropriate for one gender, it also stereotypes sportspeople who step outside of these ideas. For transgender and non-binary people, the binary gendered division of sport can be problematic, as it forces them to participate in one category or another, when these categories might not fit how they feel about themselves. This may be especially true of young people who are exploring their gender identity. Not fitting into girls'/women's or boys'/men's sport can mean exclusion from sport altogether.

Environment: Toilets and changing rooms at sports facilities can present as a major barrier with shared changing rooms as the third highest barrier to participation amongst trans adults in one study. Much of this links into the gendering in sport and can prevent engagement due to the possibility of a negative experience or being unsure of where they can change.

Lack of awareness: Whilst there is a basic awareness among stakeholders that there are issues relating to LGBT people that have to do with participation, discrimination and homophobia in sport, there is a lack of expertise (and in some cases desire) to do what is required to address them.

Previous Experience: LGBTQ+ adults feel that they have missed out on sports participation earlier in life and early negative experiences of sport and physical activity may discourage them from engaging as adults.

Research Gaps

Whilst these five key barriers have been highlighted from across the literature there is still a lack of research and data relating to LGBTQ+ engagement with sport and physical activity. There are specific gaps around bisexual and transgender identities and experiences, the management of LGBTQ+ identities and experiences, including coaching and the intersections of LGBTQ+ issues with race, age and class.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Barriers faced by LGBTQ+ people in sport and physical activity

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Data and research has shown that the LGBTQ+ community have different rates of engagement with sport and physical activity and many do not reap the benefits of being sufficiently active. However, there are significant barriers faced by the LGBTQ+ community when it comes to engagement with sport and physical activity.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Transgender runner Nikki Hiltz is headed to the Paris Olympics

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The nonbinary athlete punched their ticket to Paris after winning the 1500-meter race at Sunday’s U.S. Track and Field Olympic Trials.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
At least 186 out LGBTQ athletes at the Tokyo Summer Olympics, by far a record - Outsports

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
There were more out LGBTQ athletes in Tokyo than all the previous Summer Olympics combined. Here’s the list.

# data[].attributes.headline
The other side of 'coming out' as a professional athlete

# data[].attributes.subject
The other side of 'coming out' as a professional athlete

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Jake Daniels’ mom discusses ‘other side’ of gay footballer’s story - Outsports

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Pro soccer player Jake Daniels came out as gay in 2022. Michael Gunning speaks to the teenager and his mom, Jayne, in a new documentary.

# data[].attributes.headline
transgender athletes banned at the olympics

# data[].attributes.subject
transgender athletes banned at the olympics

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Track governing body bans transgender female athletes

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The World Athletics Council also adopted new rules for athletes with differences in sex development, such as Olympic champion Caster Semenya.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Olympic boxer at center of gender dispute calls for end to ‘bullying’ of athletes

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Imane Khelif of Algeria has faced a wave of attacks following allegations about her gender identity and eligibility to compete with women.

# data[].attributes.headline
Tom Dailey - world's most succesful diving Olympian

# data[].attributes.subject
Tom Dailey - world's most succesful diving Olympian

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
👏  RECORD-BREAKER! | Sensational Tom Daley Wins FOUR Olympic Diving Medals!

# data[].attributes.headline
Tom Dailey on pride of being gay and an athelete

# data[].attributes.subject
Tom Dailey on pride of being gay and an athelete

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Tom Daley says he is ‘proud to be a gay man and an Olympic champion’ at Tokyo 2020 Olympics

# data[].attributes.headline
NFL training camp for LBGTQ+ sports community

# data[].attributes.subject
NFL training camp for LBGTQ+ sports community

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
New York Giants host gay football league clinic with NFL players - Outsports

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The New York Giants have worked with the NY Gay Football League for over five years, building a partnership with the LGBT community.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
MLS Player Says His Suspension For Gay Slur Was Justified - Outsports

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Seattle Sounders player Marc Burch says Don Garber made the right decision, is ready to start his new season

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
West Indies’ Devon Thomas banned five years for match-fixing

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
West Indies international Devon Thomas is banned from cricket for five years after admitting seven anti-corruption breaches.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Afghanistan cricketer Ihsanullah Jannat banned for 5 years for match-fixing

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Afghanistan Cricket Board says Ihsanullah Jannat has been banned from all forms of cricket for five years for match-fixing.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Angered by Paris ban, Russia’s media scorns ‘the Olympics of Hell’

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Most Russian athletes are not allowed to compete in Paris due to their country’s war in Ukraine.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Just days before the start of the FIFA 2006 World Cup tournament, Italian National team captain Fabio Cannavaro and his team-mate at Juventus, Frenchman David Trezeguet, travelled to Rome to bear witness to the allegations of 'illegal competition with use of threats and violence' at GEA.

Goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon, the Juventus goalkeeper and one of Azzurri's best players in the tournament, was more seriously threatened, with charges of ' involvement in illegal betting on domestic games ' being levied against him.

Trezeguet missed a crucial penalty as France lost the final and a jubilant Cannavaro held the World Cup aloft for the world to behold. However, a very different fate awaited the players back in their nation.

It was the first time in history that a side recently crowned as the World Champions were flying back home to appear before investigators who, effectively, were accusing them of being corrupt.

Back in 2004, two very different yet startling rumours started doing the rounds. One alleged that the Juventus players were susceptible to doping while the other talked of illegal betting and corrupt referees. Naturally, a taskforce was set up and the Italian police began investigating these claims.

Though both rumours proved to be ungrounded, the investigating magistrates' wiretaps turned up something much bigger: The Calciopoli.

In the spring of 2006, the Turin magistrates approached Italy's football authorities but swiftly realised that the governing bodies were themselves implicated. Then Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, president and owner of AC Milan, was not in favour of a public investigation as his club was one of the big four in the line of fire.

Hence, the magistrates turned to the press and the Calciopoli became front page news.

Voluminous but inconclusive evidence from the wiretaps showed the then Juventus sporting director Luciano Moggi communicating in an "exclusive" manner with the referee designators of Serie A, attempting to influence results by picking certain referees he considered more favourable to Juventus or more likely to rule in favour of the Old Lady on a dubious call.

The scandal painted a shady picture of a vast and shadowy network of untraceable phone cards, secret payoffs and Godfatheresque proposals no match official could refuse. It was further alleged that throughout the season, top players of rival clubs were shown a calculated number of yellow cards in a bid to ensure their suspension when their teams faced the record Italian champions.

But the question remains, how was all this done? Who orchestrated the whole operation? Who was to gain from all this? The answer to all these questions is Luciano Moggi and his system termed as 'Moggiopoli'.

Moggiopoli: The approach and system behind Calciopoli

To understand the system, one must have a little insight about Luciano Moggi. Born in Tuscany, Luciano quickly rose to the rank of a railway station ticket office manager and it was during this time that he befriended a baker who worked as a scout on the sides and took him to watch football matches.

Moggi was a brilliant salesman with an eye for young talent and began his career in football as a youth scout for Juventus in the early 1970s. He befriended the players and was like an elder brother to them.

In a move characteristic of the Tuscan native, Moggi hired the baker who he befriended as an assistant. This was the basic principle of the Moggi system - what goes round comes round, once a friend, always a friend.

The late 70s were a key time for Moggi as he worked tirelessly, networking assiduously with politicians, magistrates, diplomats, military officers, celebrities and especially journalists. The 80s presented turbulent times for the Italian as he found himself embroiled in a huge corruption scandal at Lazio, the famous match-fixing affair involving Paolo Rossi, who returned from a two-year ban to inspire Italy to World Cup victory in Spain in 1982.

'Lucky Luciano' escaped the spotlight and subsequently worked in administration for Roma, Torino and Napoli before returning to Juventus as general manager or 'chief managing director' in 1994. At Juventus, Moggi's power continued to grow and his system was firmly in place.

No one doubts that Moggi was able to have a huge and nefarious influence on Italian football which was profound in helping Juventus (and possibly several others) win.

However, there is no proof which suggests definitively, that the matches were rigged. No players or referees have been shown to accept brown envelopes.

Yet, Moggi was somehow able to select referees for games, influence the selection of other teams, have games postponed or cancelled and also influence the media coverage of football in a country in which the sport is regarded as a religion.

One of the first to be heard by the tribunal was Italy coach Marcello Lippi.

On 19th May 2006, three weeks before the FIFA World Cup in Germany, Lippi appeared in front of magistrates to answer charges that his selection of players for Azzurri had been influenced by Moggi. It was alleged that Moggi had put pressure on Lippi to select fewer Juventus players for the national team so that the club can minimise injuries and fatigue ahead of the new season.

Lippi did name five Juventus players for the World Cup (13 players out of the 23 man squad played for clubs that were found guilty in the scandal) but they were all cleared of any wrongdoing.

Conversations between Moggi and Italy's most famous sports commentator Fabio Baldas (on 18 October 2005) showed how Baldas pre-decided to make a referee (Rodomonti) look bad with his comments during the match between AC Milan and Cagliari.

Moggi had great knowledge on the workings of the media and had worked out that the best way to conceal any bias that referees showed towards Juventus. Luciano argued that on an average 50,000 might see the game in the stadium, but millions who watched the match on television had their opinions formed by men such as Baldas.

According to investigators, Baldas and Moggi spoke before every programme to discuss what was going to be said and shown, who was going to be given the thumbs up and who got the thumbs down.

However, one might wonder. What was Baldas to gain out of all this?

In return for his biased views, Baldas received access to Juventus and had a good source in Moggi, who was always resourceful in finding out stuff. Also, of course, Moggi had friends everywhere, in the senior ranks of the football federation, in clubs, among players and could always call in favours with them.

Moggi's sports agency, GEA, looked after 200 players and also employed the children of a dozen of the most powerful financiers and sports investors in Italy, which also included the sons of Lazio president Sergio Cragnotti and of Italy coach Marcello Lippi. If Baldas or anyone else wanted GEA players on their programme or wanted a pass to Juventus's ground, they required Moggi's assent.

But sports journalists are hardly the key to throwing games. For that, one needs referees.

Conversations Moggi had with the head of national referees' association, Pierluigi 'Gigi' Pairetto, clearly showed the two preferring some particular referees for Juventus games. This evidence was found courtesy a wiretap on the conversations between the two, and some of the details are pretty shocking.

A conversation between the two on 11th August 2004, a day after the Old Lady's Champions League third qualifying round game, showed Moggi expressing his disapproval of the match official after he had ruled out a goal that was scored by Fabrizio Miccoli.

On 23rd August 2004, right before the second leg of the Djurgaarden game, Moggi and Pairetto discussed the crucial European match. Pairetto assured Moggi that Juventus will win 4-1 and they do just that.

The next conversation between the two was about the possible candidates to officiate the upcoming Juventus and AC Milan fixture, where Moggi very clearly instructed Pairetto to make Tiziano Pieri the match official. The referee at the game between the two Italian giants on 28th August 2004 was indeed Pieri and Juve won the match 1-0.

Pairetto called Moggi again just one week later and once more talked about the Champions League. Juventus were due to play their opening group game against Ajax in Amsterdam and much to Moggi's jubilation, Pairetto informed him that he would send Urs Meier to officiate the match. On 15th September 2004, Juventus played Ajax in Amsterdam and won 1-0. The referee was indeed Urs Meier (Not investigated nor suspected of wrongdoing).

There were many conversations like the above ones that took place between the two, but Moggi wasn't the only one calling in favours. Officials at Milan, Lazio & Fiorentina were all guilty of influencing the choice of referees too.

So why did the referees, who in Italy are well-paid professionals, do what they did?

The answer is simple - They had no real choice, they were weak, they were ambitious and also because they were caught up in a corrupt system.

If they didn't favour Juventus they wouldn't get picked to referee big games. If they displeased Moggi, they might lose their jobs.

As a punishment, Juventus were relegated to the Italy's second division Serie B and were docked enough points to ensure that they would remain there for at least two seasons. They were also stripped of the Serie A titles they had won in the previous two years.

Fiorentina were relegated with a 12-point deduction and missed out on their Champions League spot just like Juventus. Lazio joined them in Serie B with a seven-point penalty and were stripped of their UEFA Cup place.

The fourth club to be implicated, AC Milan, escaped relegation but started their next League campaign with a 15-point handicap and were barred from playing in the Champions League.

Italy, even with its history of sporting and political scandals, had never seen anything like this.

Final Verdict

The Naples tribunal ruled that the 2004-05 season was unaltered by any illicit means and that the results (and therefore, the championship title won by Juventus) were valid and regular.

Moggi was charged with attempted sporting fraud - but the attempts were found to be completely unsuccessful in altering the results.

It is also important to note, as the proceedings in the High Court have found, that Moggi was far from alone in his possible attempts at illicit behaviour. New evidence indicated similar dubious actions from the directors of Milan and Inter among others.

Calciopoli in short was both more widespread and less influential than originally thought and the original verdict from the FIGC that pointed the finger at Juventus clearly deserves the revision it has undergone over the years. Cannavaro, Trezeguet and Buffon were all cleared of any wrongdoing by the Naples Tribunal.

Nine years after the case came into the spotlight, the Italian Supreme Court ( Corte di Cassazione) gave the final verdict on the case.

Moggi was acquitted of "some individual charges for sporting fraud, but not from being the 'promoter' of the 'criminal conspiracy' that culminated in Calciopoli." The remaining charges on him were cancelled without a new trial due to the statute of limitations.

Appeals by Fiorentina owners Andrea and Diego Della Valle and Lazio President Claudio Lotito against their sentences were also rejected on the ground that their cases passed the statute of limitations.

The court accepted the prosecutor's request to clear the charges of former referees, Paolo Bertini, Antonio Dattilo, and Gennaro Mazzei but rejected the appeals for Massimo De Santis and Salvatore Racabulto.

On 9 September 2015, the Supreme Court released a 150-page document explaining its final ruling on the case. The court made it clear that Moggi's unwarranted activities incurred significant damage to Italian football not only in a sporting sense but also in economic terms.

The scandal will forever leave a black mark in Juve's otherwise illustrious history, but they have turned over a new leaf since then.

The Bianconeri have been dominating the Serie A in the past few years, winning the league four times since the 2011-12 season. The reigning Italian Champions had also reached the Champion's League final at the back end of the 2014-15 campaign, although they succumbed to 3-1 defeat to eventual winners FC Barcelona.

Considering their impressive form in Italy and Europe in recent years, Juventus look destined to forget the fateful affair and achieve even more sporting greatness in the years to come.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Calciopoli 2006: The match-fixing scandal that got Juventus relegated

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Just days before the start of the FIFA 2006 World Cup tournament, Italian National team captain Fabio Cannavaro and his team-mate at Juventus, Frenchman David Trezeguet, travelled to Rome to bear witness to the allegations of 'illegal competition with use of threats and violence' at GEA.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Which countries have been banned from participating in the Olympics? | Paris Olympics 2024 News | Al Jazeera

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
We use cookies and other tracking technologies to deliver and personalize content and ads, enable features, measure site performance, and enable social media sharing. You can choose to customize your preferences.Learn more about our Cookie Policy.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Systematic doping in Russian sports has resulted in 47 Olympic and tens of world championships medals being stripped from Russian competitors-the most of any country, more than four times the number of the runner-up, and more than 30% of the global total. Russia also has the most competitors that have been caught doping at the Olympic Games, with more than 200.

Russian doping is distinct from doping in other countries because in Russia steroids and other drugs were supplied to sportspeople by the state. Due to widespread doping violations, including an attempt to sabotage ongoing investigations by the manipulation of computer data, in 2019 the World Anti-Doping Agency banned Russia from all major sporting events for four years. That ban was later reduced to two years in 2020 by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) following an appeal by Russia. Competitors from Russia are allowed to compete in international competitions under a neutral flag and designation.

According to British journalist Andrew Jennings, a KGB colonel stated that the agency's officers had posed as anti-doping authorities from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to undermine doping tests and that Soviet competitors were "rescued with [these] tremendous efforts". On the topic of the 1980 Summer Olympics, a 1989 Australian study said "There is hardly a medal winner at the Moscow Games, certainly not a gold medal winner, who is not on one sort of drug or another: usually several kinds. The Moscow Games might as well have been called the Chemists' Games."

Documents obtained in 2016 revealed the Soviet Union's plans for a statewide doping system in track and field in preparation for the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. Dated prior to the country's decision to participate in the 1984 Summer Olympics boycott, the document detailed the existing steroids operations of the program, along with suggestions for further enhancements. The communication, directed to the Soviet Union's head of track and field, was prepared by Dr. Sergei Portugalov of the Institute for Physical Culture. Portugalov was also one of the main figures involved in the implementation of the Russian doping program prior to the 2016 Summer Olympics.

Multiple Russian biathletes were involved in doping offences in run-up to the 2010 Olympics. The president of the International Biathlon Union, Anders Besseberg, said, "We are facing systematic doping on a large scale in one of the strongest teams of the world."

Reviewing 7289 blood samples from 2737 competitors from 2001 to 2009, a report found that the number of suspicious samples from "Country A" notably exceeded other countries. One of the authors said that Country A was Russia.

2010-2014: allegations of state-sponsored doping and 2014 ARD documentary

In 2010, an employee at the Russian Anti-Doping Agency ( RUSADA), Vitaly Stepanov, began sending information to the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) alleging that RUSADA was enabling systemic doping in athletics. He said that he sent two hundred emails and fifty letters over the course of three years. In December 2012, Darya Pishchalnikova sent an email to WADA containing details of an alleged state-run doping program in Russia. According to The New York Times, the email reached three top WADA officials but the agency decided not to open an inquiry but instead forwarded her email to Russian sports officials. In April 2013, having failed a doping test for the second time (after a previous two-year doping ban in 2008-2010), Pishchalnikova was banned by the Russian Athletics Federation (RusAF) for ten years, in a move that was likely in retaliation. Her results from May 2012 were annulled, thus setting her on track to lose her Olympic medal. British journalist Nick Harris said that he contacted the IOC with allegations about Grigory Rodchenkov's laboratory in Moscow in early July 2013.

According to Stepanov, "Even at WADA there were people who didn't want this story out," but he said that a person at the organization put him in contact with the German broadcaster ARD. WADA's chief investigator Jack Robertson believed that the organization was reluctant to take action and that media attention was necessary, so he obtained the permission of WADA's director-general, David Howman, to approach an investigative reporter called Hajo Seppelt, who had previously reported on doping in East Germany and other countries. In December 2014, ARD aired Seppelt's documentary, "Geheimsache Doping: 'Wie Russland seine Sieger macht'" ("The Doping Secret: 'How Russia Creates its Champions'"), which uncovered alleged Russian state involvement in systematic doping, describing it as " East German-style". In the documentary, Stepanov and his wife Yuliya Stepanova ( née Rusanova), claimed that Russian athletics officials had supplied banned substances in exchange for 5% of an athlete's earnings and had also falsified tests in cooperation with doping control officers. It included conversations that had been secretly recorded by Stepanova, e.g. Russian athlete Mariya Savinova saying that contacts at a Moscow drug-testing laboratory had covered up her doping. Russian long-distance runner Liliya Shobukhova allegedly paid 450,000 euros to cover up her positive doping result. According to the allegations, Dr. Sergei Portugalov of the Institute for Physical Culture, who stands accused of organising state-sponsored doping in the Soviet Union, dating back to the early 1980s, was also involved in the recent Russian doping programme.

In January 2015, then- All-Russia Athletic Federation President Valentin Balakhnichev resigned as treasurer of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF).

In response to the ARD documentary, WADA commissioned an investigation headed by former anti-doping agency President Dick Pound, the report of which was published on 9 November 2015. The 335-page document, described as "damning" by The Guardian, reported widespread doping and large-scale cover-ups by the Russian authorities. It stated that the Federal Security Service (FSB) had regularly visited and questioned laboratory staff and instructed some of them not to cooperate with the WADA investigation. Two staff members said that they suspected that the offices and telephones were bugged. The report recommended that ARAF be declared non-compliant with respect to the World Anti-Doping Code and that the IOC should not accept any 2016 Summer Olympics entries from ARAF until compliance was reached.

A day later, WADA suspended the Moscow Anti-doping Center, prohibiting the laboratory "from carrying out any WADA-related anti-doping activities including all analyses of urine and blood samples". On 13 November, the IAAF council voted 22-1 in favour of prohibiting Russia from world track and field events with immediate effect. Under other penalties against the ARAF, Russia has been also prohibited from hosting the 2016 World Race Walking Team Championships ( Cheboksary) and 2016 World Junior Championships ( Kazan), and ARAF must entrust doping cases to Court of Arbitration for Sport. ARAF accepted the indefinite IAAF suspension and did not request a hearing. ARAF's efforts towards regaining full IAAF membership will be monitored by a five-person IAAF team. On 18 November 2015 WADA suspended RUSADA, meaning that Russia does not have a functioning NADO for any sport.

In January 2016, the IAAF gave lifetime bans to the former head of the Russian athletics federation, Valentin Balakhnichev, and a top Russian coach, Aleksey Melnikov.

In mid-January, WADA released the second report by its independent commission. The following month, the United Kingdom Anti-Doping (UKAD) agency was tasked to oversee testing in Russia.

Two former directors of RUSADA, Vyacheslav Sinev and Nikita Kamaev, both died unexpectedly in February 2016. The Sunday Times reported that Kamaev had approached the newspaper shortly before his death planning to publish a book on "the true story of sport pharmacology and doping in Russia since 1987". Grigory Rodchenkov, the director of a prominent laboratory who has been described by WADA as "the heart of Russian doping", was fired by Russian authorities and fled in fear of his safety to the United States, where he shared information with the help of filmmaker Bryan Fogel, which was documented in the film .

In March 2016, German broadcaster ARD aired a documentary called "Russia's Red Herrings", alleging that competitors were alerted about testing plans and offered banned substances by individuals at RUSADA and ARAF. According to a May 2016 report in The New York Times, whistleblower Grigory Rodchenkov said that doping experts collaborated with Russia's intelligence service on a state-sponsored doping programme in which urine samples were switched through a hole in the laboratory's wall. He said that at least fifteen medalists at the 2014 Winter Olympics were involved. On 19 May, WADA appointed Richard McLaren to lead an investigation into the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi.

Away from the Olympics, Russian heavyweight boxer Alexander Povetkin and tennis player Maria Sharapova would both fail drug tests in March and May respectively, both testing positive for Meldonium. Russian-Finnish footballer Roman Eremenko would also fail a drugs test later on in the year.

An ARD documentary in June 2016 implicated Russian sports minister Vitaly Mutko in covering up doping by a football player at FK Krasnodar. In the same month, IAAF deputy general secretary Nick Davies was provisionally suspended over allegations that he took money to delay naming Russian athletes. According to the BBC, emails from July 2013 showed that Davies had discussed how to delay or soften an announcement on Russians who had tested positive.

In June 2016, WADA released a report stating that the work of its Doping Control Officers (DCO) had been limited by a "significant amount of unavailable competitor reports and missed tests", insufficient or incorrect competitor location information, and little information about the location or date of competitions. Some competitors named military cities requiring special permission to enter as their location and some national championships, including Olympic qualifiers, were held in cities with restricted access due to civil conflicts, preventing testing of the competitors. WADA also reported intimidation of DCOs by armed Federal Security Service (FSB) agents; "significant delays" before being allowed to enter venues; consistent monitoring by security staff; delays in receiving competitor lists; and opening of sample packages by Russian customs. 90% of Russian competitors did not respond or "emphatically" refused when WADA requested to interview them as part of its investigation. Director general David Howman stated, "It was the very right time for those who considered themselves clean [to approach WADA]. They had nine months, plenty of time, and none came forward."

On 17 June, the IAAF Council held an extraordinary meeting "principally to give the Russian Athletics Federation (RusAF) a further opportunity to satisfy the Reinstatement Conditions for IAAF Membership". A task force chaired by Rune Andersen recommended against reinstating Russia after reporting that criteria had not been met and that there were "detailed allegations, which are already partly substantiated, that the Russian authorities, far from supporting the anti-doping effort, have in fact orchestrated systematic doping and the covering up of adverse analytical findings". The IAAF voted unanimously to uphold its ban.

A week later, the International Weightlifting Federation (IWF) decided to give a one-year ban to Russia, along with two other countries; on 3 August 2016 the IOC ratified the decision, and Russia's weightlifting team missed the 2016 Summer Olympics.

On 18 July 2016, Richard McLaren, a Canadian attorney retained by WADA to investigate Rodchenkov's allegations, published a 97-page report covering significant state-sponsored doping in Russia. Although limited by a 57-day time frame, the investigation found corroborating evidence after conducting witness interviews, reviewing thousands of documents, analysis of hard drives, forensic analysis of urine sample collection bottles, and laboratory analysis of individual competitor samples, with "more evidence becoming available by the day". The report concluded that it was shown "beyond a reasonable doubt" that Russia's Ministry of Sport, the Centre of Sports Preparation of the National Teams of Russia, the Federal Security Service (FSB), and the WADA-accredited laboratory in Moscow had "operated for the protection of doped Russian competitors" within a "state-directed failsafe system" using "the disappearing positive [test] methodology" (DPM) after the country's poor medal count during the 2010 Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver. McLaren stated that urine samples were opened in Sochi in order to swap them "without any evidence to the untrained eye". The official producer of BEREG-KIT security bottles used for anti-doping tests, Berlinger Group, stated, "We have no knowledge of the specifications, the methods or the procedures involved in the tests and experiments conducted by the McLaren Commission."

According to the McLaren report, the DPM operated from "at least late 2011 to August 2015". It was used on 643 positive samples, a number that the authors consider "only a minimum" due to limited access to Russian records. The system covered up positive results in a wide range of sports:

Athletics (139)

Weightlifting (117)

Non-Olympic sports (37)

Paralympic sport (35)

Wrestling (28)

Canoe (27)

Cycling (26)

Skating (24)

Swimming (18)

Ice hockey (14)

Skiing (13)

Football (11)

Rowing (11)

Biathlon (10)

Bobsleigh (8)

Judo (8)

Volleyball (8)

Boxing (7)

Handball (7)

Taekwondo (6)

Fencing (4)

Triathlon (4)

Modern pentathlon (3)

Shooting (3)

Beach volleyball (2)

Curling (2)

Basketball (1)

Sailing (1)

Snowboard (1)

Table tennis (1)

Water polo (1)

In response to these findings, WADA announced that RUSADA should be regarded as non-compliant with respect to the World Anti-Doping Code and recommended that Russian participants be banned from competing at the 2016 Summer Olympics. The IOC decided to decline 2016 Summer Olympics accreditation requests by Russian sports ministry officials and any individuals implicated in the report, to begin re-analysis and a full inquiry into Russian competitors at the Sochi Olympics, and to ask sports federations to seek alternative hosts for major events that had been assigned to Russia.

On 21 July 2016, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) turned down an appeal by the Russian Olympic Committee and 68 Russian competitors. The following day, the International Paralympic Committee began suspension proceedings against the National Paralympic Committee of Russia. On 24 July, the IOC rejected WADA's recommendation to ban Russia from the Summer Olympics and announced that a decision would be made by each sport federation. With each positive decision having to be approved by a CAS arbitrator. WADA's president Craig Reedie said, "WADA is disappointed that the IOC did not heed WADA's Executive Committee recommendations that were based on the outcomes of the McLaren Investigation and would have ensured a straight-forward, strong and harmonized approach." On the IOC's decision to exclude Stepanova, WADA director general Olivier Niggli stated that his agency was "very concerned by the message that this sends whistleblowers for the future".

Originally Russia submitted a list of 389 participants for the Rio Olympics competition. On 7 August 2016, the IOC cleared 278 competitors, while 111 were removed because of the scandal (including 67 athletes removed by IAAF before the IOC's decision).

Critics noted that Kuwaitis were banned from competing under their own flag (for a non-doping related matter) while Russians were permitted to do so. Due to governmental interference, Kuwaiti competitors were permitted to enter only as independent athletes. Dick Pound stated, "It is not a consistent standard which is being applied now. Not all Kuwait competitors banned from competing in Rio under their own flag were supporters of the regime, and not all South African participants were supporters of apartheid, but the greater good called for South Africa to be expelled." Germany's Deutsche Welle wrote of "troublesome questions, like why Kuwait's Olympic federation faced a ban from Rio, while Russia's did not. Kuwait's tiny team [...] was suspended because of improper political conduct by the government; Russia's was not, after systematically organizing a doping program for many of its competitors."

Having sent samples for forensic analysis, the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) found evidence that the Disappearing Positive Methodology (DPM) was in operation at the 2014 Winter Paralympics in Sochi. On 7 August 2016, the IPC's Governing Board voted unanimously to ban the entire Russian team from the 2016 Summer Paralympics, citing the Russian Paralympic Committee's (RPC) inability to enforce the IPC's Anti-Doping Code and the World Anti-Doping Code, which is "a fundamental constitutional requirement". IPC President Sir Philip Craven described the Russian anti-doping system as "entirely compromised" and 18 July 2016 as "one of the darkest days in the history of all sport", and stated that the Russian government had "catastrophically failed its Para athletes". IPC Athletes' Council Chairperson Todd Nicholson said that Russia had used competitors as "pawns" in order to "show global prowess". On 23 August 2016, the Court of Arbitration for Sport dismissed Russia's appeal, stating that the IPC's decision was "made in accordance with the IPC Rules and was proportionate in the circumstances" and that Russia "did not file any evidence contradicting the facts on which the IPC decision was based". The Federal Supreme Court of Switzerland rejected another appeal by Russia, saying that the RPC "needed to demonstrate it had fulfilled its obligations in upholding... anti-doping protocols, and that its interests in an immediate lifting of its suspension outweigh the International Paralympics Committee's interests in fighting doping and in the integrity of athletics. It did not succeed in this in any way." Rejecting an appeal by ten competitors, a German court stated that the IPC had no obligation to allow them to compete and that the committee had "comprehensibly justified" its decision.

In an interview with NRK, WADA's director general Olivier Niggli said that "Russia is threatening us and our informers", mentioning daily hacking attempts and bugging of houses. He said that the agency had "a pretty good suspicion" that the hackers were Russian and that Western governments were already familiar with them. He stated, "I think this will cease if they stop looking at us as an enemy, and instead accept that there is a problem that we must work together to solve. But for the moment they are sending out completely the wrong signals."

On 3 November 2016, Russia approved an anti-doping law targeting coaches.

On 15 November 2016, Berlinger introduced a new design for doping sample bottles. A spokesman later said, "We work with forensic specialists from different nations. We want to always stay a little bit ahead of those cheating but you cannot avoid a system like the Russians built up."

On 9 December 2016, McLaren published the second part of his report. The report claimed that from 2011 to 2015, more than 1,000 Russian competitors in various sports (including summer, winter, and Paralympic sports) benefited from the cover-up. However, McLaren later walked back from that assertion when the cases went to court, rephrasing it as not a fact but only a possibility, as recorded on page 68 of the CAS verdict for Alexander Legkov: "Prof. McLaren went on to explain that, in this respect, if his investigation obtained evidence that a particular competitor may have benefited from the scheme, then 'It didn't mean that they did benefit. It didn't mean that they committed [an] anti-doping rule violation.'" Emails indicate that those who might have benefited from a cover-up included five blind powerlifters, who may have been given drugs without their knowledge, and a fifteen-year-old. An IAAF taskforce announced that Russia could not be reinstated because the country still had no functional drug-testing agency and had not accepted the findings of investigations.

In February 2017, All-Russia Athletic Federation vice-president Andrey Silnov held a press conference in Moscow alongside a former Soviet competitor who said that East German successes due to state-sponsored doping are legitimate results of "good pharmacology" and should not be condemned. Later that month, WADA stated that evidence against many individuals named in the McLaren report might be insufficient because the Moscow laboratory had disposed of doping samples and Russian authorities were not answering requests for additional evidence.

An IAAF taskforce chaired by Rune Andersen published an interim report in April 2017. President Sebastian Coe stated, "There is testing but it is still far too limited. The Russian investigative committee is still refusing to hand over competitor biological passport samples for independent testing from labs, we still have got competitors in closed cities that are difficult or impossible to get to, the ongoing employment of coaches from a tainted system, and we have got the head coach of RUSAF effectively refusing to sign their own pledge to clean athletics." The report also noted the case of whistleblower Andrei Dmitriev, who had fled Russia after being threatened with imprisonment. Coe said, "Anyone with information about a system which has failed to protect the goals and aspirations of clean competitors must feel it is safe to speak out." Andersen questioned the selection of Yelena Isinbayeva, who had called for whistleblower Yuliya Stepanova to be "banned for life", as the chair of RUSADA's supervisory board. Andersen stated, "It is difficult to see how this helps to achieve the desired change in culture in track and field, or how it helps to promote an open environment for Russian whistleblowers", noting that Isinbayeva had called a WADA report "groundless" without reading it, publicly criticised whistleblowers (Dmitriev and the Stepanovs), and had not signed a pledge for clean sport or endorsed a Russian anti-doping group.

In September 2017, WADA rejected Russia's claims that WADA should be held responsible for Rodchenkov, noting that Russia had chosen to appoint him as head of the Moscow laboratory. The organisation also stated, "WADA would expect the Russian authorities to take responsibility for this deliberate system of cheating that was uncovered by the McLaren Investigation - as is stipulated within RUSADA's Roadmap to Compliance - rather than continually shifting the blame onto others." Seventeen national anti-doping organisations criticised the IOC for a "continuing refusal to hold Russia accountable for one of the biggest doping scandals in sports history" and "dereliction of duty [sending] a cynical message that those of favored, insider nations within the Olympic Movement will never be punished or held accountable". They stated that cases had been "shut prematurely before the IOC or IFs have obtained complete evidence from the Moscow laboratory or interviewed the relevant witnesses". An additional 20 NADOs have signed on.

In November 2017, the IOC disciplinary commission headed by Denis Oswald imposed its first sanctions after a year-long Sochi investigation. As of 22 December 2017, 43 Russian competitors had been sanctioned and 13 medals had been stripped.

On 10 November 2017, the day after Vladimir Putin accused the U.S. of stirring up problems for Russian competitors, WADA said in a news release that it had obtained an electronic file that contained "all testing data" from January 2012 to August 2015 - thousands of drug screenings run on Russian competitors. The database, which the Russian authorities were unwilling to share with antidoping investigators, arrived through a whistleblower. The head of the Russian Ski Association, Yelena Välbe, told the press that "whistleblowers are traitors to their country" shortly thereafter. Russia's ski team coach went even further and accused Ilia Chernousov (a skier who won a bronze medal in the 50 km freestyle event) of "leaking information" to WADA.

On 11 November 2017, it was revealed that Grigory Rodchenkov had provided new evidence of Russian state-sponsored doping to the IOC, noting that he would consider going public if the Schmid Commission did not give due weight to his evidence in any public findings.[citation needed ]

On 16 November 2017, WADA announced that Russia remained non-compliant with its Code. On 26 November 2017, IAAF decided to maintain Russia's ban from international track and field competitions, saying the country had not done enough to tackle doping.

In an interview with the New York Times, Rodchenkov reported that Yuri Nagornykh, the deputy minister of sport, had asked him to incriminate a Ukrainian competitor, Vita Semerenko, during a competition in Moscow leading up to the Olympics. Rodchenkov did not comply, convincing the minister that a retest of the drug sample would show the drugs had been spiked into the sample rather than passed through a human body. "I could not have done this to an innocent athlete," he said. "During my career, I reported many Dirty Samples as clean, but never the other way around."

On 5 December 2017, the IOC announced that the Russian Olympic Committee had been suspended with immediate effect from the 2018 Winter Olympics, but their concession was to allow those Russians with no previous drug violations and a consistent history of drug testing to compete under the Olympic Flag as an "Olympic Athlete from Russia" (OAR). Under the terms of the IOC's edict, no Russian government officials were permitted to attend the Games, and neither the Russian flag nor the Russian national anthem would be featured; the Olympic Flag and Olympic Anthem were to be used instead. On 20 December 2017, the IOC proposed an alternative logo for the OAR competitors' uniforms (shown on right). IOC President Thomas Bach said that "after following due process [the IOC] has issued proportional sanctions for this systematic manipulation while protecting the clean competitors."

As of January 2018, the IOC had identified 43 Russian competitors from the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi that it intended to ban from competing in the 2018 Winter Olympics and all other future Olympic Games as part of the Oswald Commission. All but one of those competitors appealed against their bans to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS). The court overturned the sanctions on 28 of the appellants, resulting in their Sochi medals and results being reinstated, but the court ruled that there was sufficient evidence against eleven of the competitors to uphold their Sochi sanctions. The IOC issued a statement saying "the result of the CAS decision does not mean that athletes from the group of 28 will be invited to the Games. Not being sanctioned does not automatically confer the privilege of an invitation" and that "this [case] may have a serious impact on the future fight against doping". The IOC found it imperative to point out that the CAS Secretary General "insisted that the CAS decision does not mean that these 28 competitors are innocent" and that they would consider an appeal against the court's decision. The court also downgraded the punishment by deciding that the 39 competitors should only be banned from the 2018 Games, not all future Olympic Games. The remaining three Russian competitors did not appeal their decisions until March 2020 and in September 2020, two of them were cleared of doping whilst the remaining one was found guilty, however all three had their life bans overturned. After the partially successful appeal, 47 Russian competitors and coaches launched a further appeal to the CAS, in a final attempt to secure an invitation to the Games. This appeal was dismissed on 9 February 2018, the day of the opening ceremony, a decision that was welcomed by the IOC.

An original pool of 500 Russians was put forward for consideration for the 2018 Games and 111 of them were immediately eliminated from the pool; this included the 43 competitors who had been sanctioned by the Oswald Commission. The remaining 389 were required to meet a number of pre-games conditions, such as a further round of tests and re-analysis of stored samples, and they would only be considered for invitation to the Games providing these requirements were met. The final number of neutral Russian competitors that were invited to compete was 169. However, speed skater Olga Graf chose not to compete, stating that "the sport has become a bargaining chip in dirty political games", bringing the eventual total to 168.

In the past, the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin, and other government officials had stated that it would be a humiliation for Russia if its competitors were not allowed to compete at the Olympics under the Russian flag. However, despite rumours to the contrary, his spokesman Dmitry Peskov later revealed that no boycott had been discussed leading up to the IOC's announcement. After the IOC decision was made public, Ramzan Kadyrov, the Head of Chechnya, announced that no Chechen competitors would be allowed to compete under a neutral flag. On 6 December 2017, Putin confirmed that the Russian government would not prevent any of its competitors from participating at the 2018 Games as individuals, despite there being calls from other leading Russian politicians for a boycott. Gennady Zyuganov, leader of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, put forward a proposal to send fans to the Games with a Soviet Victory Banner. Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Sergey Lavrov, commented that the United States "fears honest competition", affirming Vladimir Putin's position that the United States used its influence within the IOC to "orchestrate the doping scandal". According to Komsomolskaya Pravda, a popular Russian tabloid newspaper, 86% of the Russian population opposed participation in the Winter Olympics under a neutral flag. Many Russians believed that the IOC was retaliating against Russia for their discriminatory anti-gay law which provoked considerable controversy with the IOC during the 2014 Winter Olympics when it was hosted in Sochi, Russia.

During the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics in February 2018, two Russian competitors from the Olympic Athletes from Russia (OAR) delegation failed doping tests and were disqualified: curler Aleksandr Krushelnitckii who won a bronze medal in the mixed doubles event; and bobsleigh pilot Nadezhda Sergeeva who finished twelfth in the two-woman event. The IOC expressed their disappointment at the positive doping tests and stated that the OAR team would consequently not be allowed to parade under the Russian flag at the closing ceremony.

Despite the two disqualifications, the IOC announced on 28 February that it had chosen to reinstate Russia's Olympic membership, just days after the end of the Winter Games, as no more cases of doping had been found in the delegation. The surprise decision to lift the suspension provoked anger among the international sporting community. The IOC had planned all along to reinstate Russia after the Games provided there were no more failed tests. Their statement read "The suspension of the Russian Olympic Committee is automatically lifted with immediate effect."

In the buildup to the 2018 FIFA World Cup hosted by Russia, lab director and whistleblower Grigory Rodchenkov said that he recognised one of Russia's players as a doper in one of his own doping programmes. FIFA had opened an inquiry into Russian doping in football after the McLaren report was published with 33 Russian footballers named in it, but said in May that they had found 'insufficient evidence' of doping but said that some cases with players unrelated to the World Cup were ongoing. The tournament eventually concluded with no players failing a drugs test. A few months after the tournament had concluded in September, the father of Russian player Denis Cheryshev said that his son had been taking growth hormone during the tournament. He was later cleared of doping by anti-doping authorities.

On 20 July, the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) released details of 120 doping cases with some 85 of the cases involving Olympic and World Championships medallists and almost half (47.5%) involving Russians. On 27 July, 10 days before the start of the 2018 European Athletics Championships, the IAAF announced that despite making improvements in key areas, Russia would still remain suspended from international athletics competitions. 29 Russian athletes still competed in the championships as Authorised Neutral Athletes, and Russia eventually topped the medal table of the inaugural European Championships.

The World-Anti Doping Agency voted on 20 September whether or not to re-instate the Russian Anti-Doping Agency after they were suspended in 2015. A WADA compliance review committee had recommended that RUSADA be re-instated, which sparked anger from international competitors and officials. One of the members of the six-person review committee, Beckie Scott, the chair of WADA'S athletes commission, left her role on the committee in protest over the recommendation to reinstate RUSADA and the vice president of the agency, Linda Helleland, said that she would vote against their re-admission. A group of competitors from UK-Anti-Doping had earlier called for Russia to remain banned until it had overhauled its Anti-Doping System, saying that Russia's re-admission would be "a catastrophe for clean sport" and a member of US Anti-Doping Agency was quoted as saying 'frankly, it stinks to high heaven'. The former head of the Moscow laboratory turned whistle-blower Grigory Rodchenkov said that lifting Russia's ban would be a 'catastrophe'.

WADA had insisted that Russia meet two criteria before RUSADA could be re-admitted; accept the findings of the McLaren Report and grant access to Moscow's anti-doping laboratory. The compliance review committee had reviewed a letter from the Russian Sports Ministry that said it had 'sufficiently acknowledged the issues identified in Russia' and that they agree to accept the two remaining conditions'.

WADA voted unanimously to re-instate the Russian Anti-Doping Agency at their congress in the Seychelles, going against the wishes of numerous national Anti-Doping agencies around the world. The lawyer for whistle-blower Grigory Rodchenkov called it "the greatest treachery against clean athletes in Olympic history" whilst US Anti-Doping Agency head Travis Tygart said the decision is "bewildering and inexplicable" and a "devastating blow to the world's clean competitors". The decision received so much criticism that the head of WADA, Craig Reedie, had to publicly defend the decision as he came under mounting criticism.

With RUSADA now re-instated, the Russian Athletics Federation launched a legal challenge to the IAAF to overturn their ban from athletics competitions from which they were still suspended. The IAAF, however, refused the request, which was later withdrawn by the Russian athletics federation. By 26 September 2018, 77 Russians were serving doping bans in the sport of athletics including 72 athletes and five coaches and athlete support personnel.

On 14 December 2018, Hugo Lowell at newspaper reported from Moscow that officials at the Russian Ministry of Sport were still reluctant to cooperate fully with WADA over turning over the testing data from its anti-doping laboratory. WADA subsequently released a statement that said their Expert Team had flown to extract the data. Later, it emerged that WADA was unsuccessful in retrieving the data because their equipment had allegedly not been properly certified.

The reinstatement of RUSADA prompted allegations of bullying and a call for reform within the World Anti-Doping Agency, however the IAAF decided to uphold Russia's suspension from athletics into 2019 with 63 Russians cleared to compete as neutral athletes for the year. A team of five WADA experts traveled to Moscow on 17 December expected to be given full access to the laboratory, but on arrival they were refused full access which put RUSADA on the brink of being suspended once more with their president Yuri Ganus appealing to Vladimir Putin personally for a resolution.

WADA had set Russia a strict deadline to hand over data from their Moscow laboratory by 31 December, a deadline which they evidently missed. There were calls for the WADA compliance review committee to meet immediately to consider their next steps, however they decided to meet much later on 14 January which caused anger among the international community with 16 national anti-doping bodies calling for Russia's suspension once more. WADA president Dick Pound described the reaction to their decision as like a 'lynch mob'.

WADA eventually gained full access to the Moscow laboratory on 10 January, 10 days after the initial deadline. The WADA president described it as a 'major breakthrough for clean sport' and said that they were now starting their second phase of authentication and review of the data that had been collected to make sure that it had not been compromised and to build strong cases against Russian competitors that might have doped. WADA eventually managed to retrieve 2262 samples from the Moscow lab. Despite missing the deadline, RUSADA was still deemed compliant and was not punished. The Institute of National Anti-Doping Organisations (iNADO) said that 'Russia has been granted more chances and, ultimately, leniency than any individual competitor or small country could expect to receive. This is very troubling'.

It was announced on 8 February that the International Paralympic Committee would now re-instate Russia by 15 March after they were suspended in July 2016. They stated that 69 of the 70 reinstatement criteria had been met with the last criterion being to accept the findings of the McLaren report. Meanwhile, Russia's ban in athletics was upheld by the IAAF 'until further notice' stating that there were two outstanding issues that needed to be resolved.

Russia's 2008 Olympic high jump champion Andrey Silnov stepped down from his position as the vice-president of the Russian Athletics Federation in June after it was reported that he was under investigation for a possible doping violation following a re-analysis of his sample from 2013. It was also reported that seven Russian track and field athletes, including athletes from the national team, were caught training in Kyrgyzstan with Vladimir Kazarin, a coach who was banned from the sport for life in 2017 for doping offences. With all of that in mind, Russia was in danger of remaining suspended for the 2019 World Athletics Championships in September after the IAAF voted to uphold their ban, the 11th time they had done so. In July 2019 Reuters reported that two Olympic Russian boxers competed in 2018 while serving doping bans applied by RUSADA. Reuters said this indicated an inconsistency in Russia's reform of its anti-doping practices. After Reuters notified it of the two cases RUSADA said it would investigate.

The first cases of possible Anti-Doping violations against Russian competitors' samples taken from the Moscow Laboratory were handed over to the individual sporting federations in July. WADA said that the data of 43 competitors had been handed over out of a target pool of 298. The first sporting federation to suspend competitors from the data received was the International Weightlifting Federation who suspended 12 Russian weightlifters including Olympic, World and European medalists.

On 21 September, it was widely reported that some of the data retrieved from the Moscow laboratory may have been manipulated and tampered with before it was retrieved by the World Anti-Doping Agency. This meant that Russia would remain suspended from the then-upcoming 2019 World Athletics Championships, and faced a possible ban from hosting and competing in all major sporting events including the upcoming 2020 Olympics and possibly the 2022 Olympics, 2022 FIFA World Cup, 2023 FIFA Women's World Cup and the 2024 Olympics.

WADA then recommended that Russia be declared non-compliant once more and banned from hosting sporting events for four years. On 9 December, WADA banned Russia from major international sporting events for four years, on charges of tampering with doping-related reports. Russia will be barred from hosting, participating in, or establishing bids for international sporting events during this period. As before, WADA will allow cleared Russian competitors to compete neutrally, but not under the Russian flag. This will not affect Russia's co-hosting of UEFA Euro 2020, as WADA does not recognize UEFA as a "major event organization" covered by the ban. In regard to this sanction, WADA president Craig Reedie said that "For too long, Russian doping has detracted from clean sport". He also added that "Russia was afforded every opportunity to get its house in order and rejoin the global anti-doping community for the good of its competitors and of the integrity of sport, but it chose instead to continue in its stance of deception and denial". Russia appealed the decision to the Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS).

In January 2020, WADA suspended the Moscow laboratory from carrying out its only remaining accreditation, analysis of blood samples. The Moscow laboratory had been allowed to carry out analysis of blood samples since May 2016 as "practically impossible for laboratories to interfere with the blood variables of samples due to the nature of the analytical equipment and the athlete biological passport principles in place".

On 30 April, WADA announced that they had completed their 'painstaking' investigation of the 298 Russian competitors whose data they had received from the Moscow laboratory in January 2019. The first data was handed over in July and a total of 27 international sporting federations and one major event organisation received the data in order to decide on possible anti-doping violations being brought forward.

The Russian athletics federation failed to pay half of its $10 million World Athletics fine by 1 July. RusAF's chief, Yevgeny Yurchenko, stated that the federation did not have the sufficient funds to pay the fine. RusAF avoided expulsion from World Athletics after the Russian Sports Minister Oleg Matytsin made an 'unconditional' guarantee to pay the fine by a new deadline of August 15. Russia paid the fine of $5 million and $1.31 million in costs three days before the set deadline and avoided expulsion by doing so.

However, the ruling also clarified that the sanctions do extend to any official World Championship and, subsequently, racing drivers from Russia are unable to officially represent Russia in FIA-sanctioned World Championships for 2021 and 2022.

Although the IOC stated in July 2016 that it would ask sports federations to seek alternative hosts, Russia has retained hosting rights for some major international sports events, including the 2017 FIFA Confederations Cup, 2018 FIFA World Cup, and 2019 Winter Universiade. In September 2016, Russia was awarded hosting rights for the 2021 World Biathlon Championships because the IOC's recommendation did not apply to events that had already been awarded or planned bids from the country.

Olympic medalists Steven Holcomb, Matthew Antoine, Martins Dukurs, and Lizzy Yarnold questioned the decision to hold the FIBT World Championships 2017 in Sochi, with boycotts considered by Austria, Latvia, and South Korea. Latvia's skeleton team confirmed that it would boycott if Sochi remained the host, saying that the "Olympic spirit was stolen in 2014." On 13 December 2016, the International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation announced that it would relocate the event. Some competitors were concerned that they might unwittingly ingest a banned substance if the host tampered with food or drinks, while others "were worried about the evidence that Russian laboratories had been opening tamper-proof bottles. If they have opened these bottles to help their competitors, what is to stop them also opening them to tamper with samples from any athlete in the competition?"

Biathlon teams from the Czech Republic and Great Britain decided to boycott a 2016-17 Biathlon World Cup stage in Tyumen. On 22 December 2016, Russia announced it would not host the World Cup event or the 2017 Biathlon Junior World Championships in Ostrov. The same day, the International Skating Union decided to relocate a speed skating event, the 2016-17 ISU Speed Skating World Cup stage in Chelyabinsk, due to "a substantial amount of critical evidence and the uncertainty relating to the attendance of the competitors". Russia was later removed as host of the 2016-17 FIS Cross-Country World Cup final stage and 2021 World Biathlon Championships in Tyumen.

19 national anti-doping organisations recommended suspending Russia from participation in all sports. Russia was suspended from athletics, motorsports, weightlifting, Paralympic sport competitions, but has continued its participation in other sports.[citation needed ]

The IAAF permitted Russians who have undergone testing by non-Russian agencies to compete as neutral athletes. The Russian flag, national colours, and anthem were banned.

There were calls to ban Russia from participating in the 2018 Winter Olympics and 2018 Winter Paralympics or to allow Russians to compete only as neutrals. They were indeed allowed to do so as Olympic Athletes from Russia at the former and Neutral Paralympic Athletes at the latter.

This section needs expansion. You can help by adding to it.

Russian doping has been featured in several documentaries broadcast in Germany, France, and the United States:

Geheimsache Doping: Wie Russland seine Sieger macht (The Doping Secret: How Russia Creates Champions), ARD / Das Erste, aired 3 December 2014

Geheimsache Doping. Im Schattenreich der Leichtathletik (The Doping Secret: The Shadowy World of Athletics), ARD / Das Erste, aired 1 August 2015

Geheimsache Doping: Russlands Täuschungsmanöver (The Doping Secret: Russia's Red Herrings), ARD / Westdeutscher Rundfunk, aired 6 March 2016

Plus vite, plus haut, plus dopés (Faster, higher, more doped), Arte in partnership with , aired 7 June 2016

Inside edge on Amazon prime

Some sportspeople from other countries have criticised WADA, alleging that the agency has been reluctant to investigate Russia despite multiple tips over several years. WADA officials stated that the agency lacked the authority to carry out its own investigations until 2015. Arne Ljungqvist, WADA's former vice chairman, commented that "WADA always had an excuse as to why they wouldn't move forward. They expected Russia to clean up themselves." In June 2016, The Guardian reported that a letter approved by over twenty competitors' groups from multiple sports and countries as well as the chairs of the IOC's and WADA's athletes committees, Claudia Bokel and Beckie Scott, had been sent to IOC president Thomas Bach and WADA head Craig Reedie; the letter criticised the organisations for inaction and silence until the media became involved and said that competitors' confidence in the anti-doping system had been "shattered".

On 18 July 2016, WADA's Athlete Committee stated, "Although we have known of the allegations, to read the report today, to see the weight of the evidence, and to see the scale of doping and deception is astounding." The athlete committee, the Institute of National Anti-Doping Organizations, and the leaders of anti-doping agencies in Austria, Canada, Denmark, Egypt, Finland, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United States called for Russia to be banned from the 2016 Olympics in Rio. After Bach delayed a decision on whether to ban the entire Russian team, IOC member Dick Pound said, "the IOC is for some reason very reluctant to think about a total exclusion of the Russian team. But we've got institutionalized, government-organised cheating on a wide scale across a whole range of sports in a country. You've got to keep from turning [zero tolerance] into: 'We have zero tolerance except for Russia.'" Bruce Arthur of the Toronto Star said, "If the threshold Russia established is not high enough to merit a total ban from an Olympic Games, it's a remarkable precedent to set." Former IOC vice president, Kevan Gosper of Australia, said, "we have to be very careful [about making] the wrong move with an important country like Russia", to which Richard Hind of The Daily Telegraph (Sydney) responded, "And there is the IOC in a nutshell. There are nations, and there are 'important nations'. Not everyone pees in the same specimen jar."

The IOC's decision on 24 July 2016 was criticised by competitors and writers. It received support from the European Olympic Committees, which said that Russia is "a valued member". Cam Cole of Canada's National Post said that the IOC had "caved, as it always does, defaulting to whatever compromise it could safely adopt without offending a superpower". Expressing disappointment, a member of the IOC Athletes' Commission, Hayley Wickenheiser, wrote, "I ask myself if we were not dealing with Russia would this decision to ban a nation [have] been an easier one? I fear the answer is yes." Writing for Deutsche Welle in Germany, Olivia Gerstenberger said that Bach had "flunked" his first serious test, adding, "With this decision, the credibility of the organization is shattered once more, while that of state-sponsored doping actually receives a minor boost." (Germany) described Bach as "Putin's poodle". Paul Hayward, chief sports writer of The Daily Telegraph (UK), remarked, "The white flag of capitulation flies over the International Olympic Committee. Russia's deep political reach should have told us this would happen."

Leaders of thirteen national anti-doping organisations wrote that the IOC had "violated the competitors' fundamental rights to participate in Games that meet the stringent requirements of the World Anti-Doping Code" and "[demonstrated that] it lacks the independence required to keep commercial and political interests from influencing the tough decisions necessary to protect clean sport". WADA's former chief investigator, Jack Robertson, said "The anti-doping code is now just suggestions to follow or not" and that "WADA handed the IOC that excuse [not enough time before the Olympics] by sitting on the allegations for close to a year." McLaren was dissatisfied with the IOC's handling of his report, saying "It was about state-sponsored doping and the misrecording of doping results and they turned the focus into individual competitors and whether they should compete. [...] it was a complete turning upside down of what was in the report and passing over responsibility to all the different international federations."

Some Russians described the allegations as an anti-Russian plot while others stated that Russia was "just doing what the rest of the world does". Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Russia had "never supported any violations in sport, we have never supported it at the state level, and we will never support this" and that the allegations were part of an "anti-Russia policy" by the West. Aleksei Pushkov, chairman of Russia's parliamentary foreign affairs committee, said that the IAAF's decision to uphold its ban was "an act of political revenge against Russia for its independent foreign policy". A member of Russia's parliament, Vadim Dengin, stated, "The entire doping scandal is a pure falsification, invented to discredit and humiliate Russia." After the Court of Arbitration for Sport turned down an appeal by Russian athletes, pole vaulter Yelena Isinbayeva wrote, "Let all those pseudo-clean foreign athletes breathe a sigh of relief and win their pseudo gold medals in our absence. They always did fear strength." The Ministry of Foreign Affairs called the ruling a "crime against sport". A poll by the Levada Center found that 14% of Russians believed that the country's competitors had doped in Sochi, 71% did not believe WADA's reports, and 15% decided not to answer.

A spokesman for Putin called Stepanova a " Judas". The Russian media have also criticised the Stepanovs. Yuliya Stepanova said, "All the news stories call me a traitor and not just traitor but a traitor to the Motherland." Vitaly Stepanov said, "I wasn't trying to expose Russia, I was trying to expose corrupt sports officials that are completely messing up competitions not just inside the country but globally." Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reported that the Russian media portrayed the German documentaries as "part of a Western conspiracy with the aim of weakening the great nation that Vladimir Putin lifted from its knees". Hajo Seppelt had the "impression that he and the Stepanovs were being styled as enemies of the state".

Dick Pound described Russia's response as "a bit like when you get stopped for speeding on the freeway by the police and you say 'Why me? Everyone else was doing it'." He stated that if Russia's authorities had "responded to their issues they could easily have enough time to sort everything out in time for Rio. But instead, they played the role of victims, claiming there was a plot against them for too long." Leonid Bershidsky, a Russian writer for Bloomberg View, wrote that Russia's "officials need to understand that " whataboutism" doesn't avert investigations". The Moscow correspondent of Deutsche Welle, Juri Rescheto, wrote that the response he saw in Russia "shows that the country is living in a parallel universe" and seeks to blame others. Writing for The New York Times, Andrew E. Kramer said that Russia responded to the IAAF's decision against reinstatement with "victimhood" reflecting a "culture of grievances that revolves around perceived slights and anti-Russian conspiracies taking place in the outside world, particularly in Western countries". The newspaper's editorial board also saw a "narrative of victimization" in Russia, and wrote that it resembled how the Soviet Union would respond to a punishment - by saying that it was "politically motivated, always a provocation, never justified. [Even] though the Cold War is long over, President Vladimir Putin remains stuck in the same, snarling defensive crouch in his responses to any accusations of Russian foul play". Andrew Osborn of Reuters wrote that the Russian government had "deftly deflected the blame by passing it off as a Western Cold War-style plot to sabotage Russia's international comeback". In response to Russia's opinion that the allegations were "politically motivated", WADA's former chief investigator, Jack Robertson, said that he saw politics "when Craig Reedie tried to intervene by writing emails to the Russian ministry to console them".

Match TV said that Americans had orchestrated the doping scandal, and modern pentathlon champion Aleksander Lesun called it an unfair "attack", because "Doping is in all countries and there are violators everywhere." Following the IOC's announcement on 24 July 2016, Russian sports minister Vitaly Mutko said it was "a just and fair decision and we hope every federation will take the same kind of decision. Doping is a worldwide evil, not only of Russia." The Russian media's reaction was "nearly euphoric at points".

A reporter from Russian state-owned television told IOC President Thomas Bach that "It looked like you personally were helping us," and asked whether the doping investigation was a "political attack" on Russian competitors. After Russian competitors said that McLaren was about "politics" rather than sport, the British biathlon association stated that their comments were "brain-washed, deluded and dishonest" and decided to boycott an event in Russia. Russia's Deputy Prime Minister Vitaly Mutko said that competitors should be "punished" for calls to boycott.

In Russia, the December 2019 sanction was received with outrage. President Vladimir Putin slammed the decision as a "politically motivated" ruling that "contradicted" the Olympic Charter. "There is nothing to reproach the Russian Olympic Committee for and if there is no reproach towards this committee, the country should take part in competitions under its own flag," Putin said. Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev also said the ban was politically motivated. "This is the continuation of this anti-Russian hysteria that has already become chronic," Medvedev told domestic press.

The fallout from the IOC bans of Russian competitors caught doping at the Sochi Olympics, which left previous Russian whistleblowers in fear of their own personal safety, has been likened to a "witch-hunt" within the Russian winter sports community. On 9 November 2017, Vladimir Putin called the decisions to ban Russian competiors for doping violations an attempt by the U.S. to undermine his nation and affect the Russian presidential election in March.

The IOC's decision was criticized by Jack Robertson, primary investigator of the Russian doping programme on behalf of WADA, who said that the IOC had issued "a non-punitive punishment meant to save face while protecting the [IOC's] and Russia's commercial and political interests". He also emphasized that Russian whistleblowers provided empirical evidence that "99 per cent of [their] national-level teammates were doping." According to Robertson, "[WADA] has discovered that when a Russian competitor [reaches] the national level, he or she [has] no choice in the matter: [it is] either dope, or you're done"; he added "There is currently no intelligence I have seen or heard about that indicates the state-sponsored doping program has ceased." It was also reported that Russian officials intensively lobbied U.S. politicians in an apparent attempt to achieve the extradition to Russia of the main whistleblower, Grigory Rodchenkov.

On 6 December 2017 Vladimir Putin announced his decision "not to prevent individual Russian competitors" from participating at the 2018 Winter Games. He also stated that he is pleased the IOC Inquiry Commission chaired by Samuel Schmid "didn't find any proof that the Russian government was involved in a doping conspiracy". However, the Inquiry Commission only said that there's not enough evidence to claim that highest Russian state authorities were involved. The fact that Russian Ministry of Sport and Federal Security Service were part of the scheme was never in doubt.

Justin Peters of Slate magazine wrote during the Games that the IOC "ended up with a situation that seemed to negate the entire point of the sanctions against Russia. The IOC did not want there to be a Russian Olympic team at the Pyeongchang Games... [yet] arenas are full of teams of Russian Olympians... [this is] a half-hearted wrist slap issued by an entity that appears more interested in saving face than in protecting competitors".

The CAS decision to overturn the life bans of 28 Russian competitors and restore their medals met fierce criticism among Olympic officials, including IOC president Thomas Bach who described the decision as "extremely disappointing and surprising". Grigory Rodchenkov's lawyer has stated that "the CAS decision would allow doped competitors to escape without punishment" and also that "[the CAS decision] provides yet another ill-gotten gain for the corrupt Russian doping system generally, and Putin specifically".

WADA publishes annual summaries of anti-doping rule violations (ADRV). Russia ranked first in the world for ADRVs during 2013, 2014, and 2015.

Due to doping violations, Russia has been stripped of 43 Olympic medals - the most of any country, four times the number of the runner-up, and more than a third of the global total. It was the leading country in terms of the number of medals removed due to doping at the 2002 Winter Olympics (5 medals), the 2006 Winter Olympics (1 medal), the 2008 Summer Olympics (14 medals), the 2012 Summer Olympics (13 medals), 2014 Winter Olympics (4 medals) and the joint most at the 2004 Summer Olympics (3 medals) and the 2016 Summer Olympics (1 medal). The 43 revoked medals include 11 Golds, 21 Silvers, and 11 Bronzes.

According to Reuters, Russian trolls were involved in spreading Twitter hashtag #NoRussiaNoGames following the announcement from IOC that Russia was suspended from the 2018 Winter Olympics. One of the accounts identified by Reuters as driving activity around #NoRussiaNoGames was @ungestum, which lists its location as the Russian city of Orenburg. The account has sent 238 tweets consisting of just the hashtag to other users since the ban was announced, indicating that these were computer-generated. The campaign was also highly promoted by a group of at least five accounts which tweeted the hashtag numerous times along with the links that were not related to Russian-language news articles, and repeatedly reposted tweets from each other. One of those accounts, @03_ppm, has sent at least 275 such tweets.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Systematic doping in Russian sports has resulted in 47 Olympic and tens of world championships medals being stripped from Russian competitors-the most of any country, more than four times the number of the runner-up, and more than 30% of the global total.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
FA reveals plan to expand disability football for kids

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The FA says Comets will be the most inclusive format of the sport.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.provider_name
GLAAD | GLAAD rewrites the script for LGBTQ acceptance.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
LGBTQ People and Sports *This section was created as a collaboration between GLAAD, Athlete Ally, the National Center for Lesbian Rights, and the Inclusion Playbook In recent years, we’ve seen increased media coverage at the intersection of athletics and LGBTQ equality. The coming out of prominent athletes including U.S. Olympic and professional soccer star Megan

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
This page shares the results from Out on the Fields (2015) and OutSport (2019), the first and second international research on homophobia and transphobia in sport. You will find statistics on gay athletes and trans athletes.

Many of the results for gay athletes and bisexual athletes were identical or similar;

The data comes from 12,000+ lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender participants from all EU countries and the United State, Canada, Australia, and NZ;

This page also links to other high-quality studies to support researchers, LGBTQ leaders, media, and sports organizations understand and write about homophobia and transphobia.

Y ou will find links to data from the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, New Zealand, and Australia.

We only link to studies which are free to read (no paywalls/open access). to have your study listed.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
This page shares the results from Out on the Fields (2015) and OutSport (2019), the first and second international research on homophobia and transphobia in sport. You will find statistics on gay athletes and trans athletes.

# data[].attributes.headline
Marathon runner forced to compete for Japan 

# data[].attributes.subject
Marathon runner forced to compete for Japan 

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Sohn Kee-Chung: The Defiant One | Olympic Marathoner, Korean Patriot, Japanese Occupation | Britannica

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Officially known at the 1936 Berlin Games as Son Kitei, marathon runner Sohn Kee-Chung symbolized the fierce nationalistic tensions of the era. A native Korean, Sohn lived under the rule of Japan, which had annexed Korea in 1910. From an early age Sohn had chafed under Japanese domination. Though

# data[].attributes.headline
Discrimination for all groups - gender, racism, religious

# data[].attributes.subject
Discrimination for all groups - gender, racism, religious

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Gender Discrimination in Sports

Gender discrimination in professional sports is a tale as old as time, with women fighting for sports equity in countless ways. When it comes to gender discrimination in sports examples, you likely think of Billie Jean King fighting to receive equal pay, or women ski jumpers demanding they be allowed to participate in the Olympics.

Discrimination of gender in sports is prevalent as their games are scheduled for less desirable times and are barely discussed in the media. Women's professional sports teams also earn much less than their male counterparts, as their wages are revenue-based.

However, hot on the heels of the 2019 FIFA Women's World Cup, the U.S. women's soccer team launched a campaign to make their pay more equitable to their male counterparts. The team was successful in its endeavor, with the United States Soccer Federation, the United States Women's National Team Players Association, and United States National Soccer Team Players Association agreeing to a deal for equal pay in May of 2022.

Female athletes also have to deal with how they are perceived by the public. Men who play professional sports are seen as heroes who live and breathe their game. However, women are often viewed as mothers or wives first and athletes second. Toxic gender stereotypes also lead female athletes to be objectified and sexualized, their looks garnering more press than their skills.

The 2016 USA Gymnastics scandal shined a spotlight on sexual harassment in sports after a number of former gymnasts alleged they were abused by coaches and doctors. In 2021, survivors were awarded a $380 million dollar settlement from USA Gymnastics and the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee.

Some additional strides have been made for women facing gender discrimination in sports in the past few years, with record viewing numbers for UK women's sports in the first three months of 2022. Another barrier was broken in the arena of women's sports in 2022, with Madison Square Garden playing host to a boxing match with two women for the first time ever .

While gender discrimination in sports most negatively affects women, gender stereotypes in sports also affect men. Male athletes who participate in "feminine" sports like figure skating and dance at a young age are often bullied. Men are often expected to be tall, big, and muscular to play any sport and may be discriminated against if they don't fit that body type.

Solutions

Make sports culture safe for everyone.

Download this free sexual harassment policy template to help protect athletes and your organization.

Racial Discrimination in Sports

Dalilah Mohammed, 400-meter hurdles world record holder, Olympic champion, and world championship gold medalist, shared a story from 2019, where she was told the night before her big race that she "had" to win. Said Dalilah, "He just wanted to make sure I knew that coming in second place would be completely unmarketable for me. Sometimes in America, that's how it feels. You either have to be the best or we're not spoken about. Being in second place is not a luxury that we have."

Sports organizations should have a zero-tolerance policy for racial discrimination and harassment. Supporting minority athletes by developing a good reporting tool and taking every case seriously will make athletes of all races feel safer and more welcome.

Solutions

Religious Discrimination in Sports

Religious discrimination in sports can take many forms. Opponents and teammates may harass athletes if they are even chosen for the team at all. Less direct forms of discrimination, such as not accommodating each player's religious needs, can be just as harmful.

The traditional ways of doing things in the world of sports may not fit with some athletes' religions. For instance, Jewish athletes can't play a game on a Saturday and Muslim athletes may be prohibited from mixing with the opposite gender, including staff or spectators.

Sports uniforms often pose problems for religious athletes. Players may feel uncomfortable wearing uniforms with sponsor logos that don't mesh with their beliefs (e.g. tobacco, alcohol, gambling). Uniforms may also be too revealing. Sports dress regulations should allow athletes to wear religious head coverings.

Despite some progress, overcoming religious discrimination in sports continues to be a hurdle at a global level. In early 2022, lawmakers in France proposed a ban on women wearing hijabs, along with any other "ostensible religious symbols", in sporting competitions .

Religious athletes may also have unique needs during practice and games. People may assume that fasting players will be too weak to participate. However, asking the player how to accommodate them is always better than making assumptions. Not offering players breaks from play and a quiet space for religious observation is another form of indirect discrimination in sports.

Solutions

Disability Discrimination in Sports

Disability discrimination in sports is perhaps the least talked-about form. Even if they are not being malicious, people may leave out athletes with disabilities because they don't want to do the extra work to accommodate them.

In terms of participation, some of the barriers facing people with disabilities include:

Accessibility

Finding equipment and trainers

Psychological barriers

Media coverage and language

Institutionalized inequality and present an ongoing challenge. However, strides are being made as athletes with disabilities such as the U.S. National Soccer Team's Carson Pickett who has a limb difference bring the issue to the forefront.

Organizations like are advocating for differently abled individuals to have equal access to sport and recreation in their community. Sports organizations need to provide a range of options when it comes to including athletes with disabilities.

Consider the inclusion spectrum, which includes everything from making no modifications to creating teams exclusively for those with disabilities. Asking athletes how you can meet their needs (rather than assuming) is the best way to combat disability discrimination in sports.

Solutions

RELATED: Doping in Sports: What it Is and How to Stop it with Whistleblowing

LGBTQ Discrimination in Sports

LGBTQ athletes often face physical abuse, verbal threats, cyberbullying, and exclusion from team social activities. Teammates, opponents, staff, and spectators may also make homophobic jokes or use slurs.

According to Out On the Fields and OutSport, it's estimated that 80 per cent of participants around the world have experienced or witnessed homophobia in sport, with homophobic language being the most common. The studies also note that when it comes to homophobia, men and women are targeted almost equally when it comes to hearing slurs, at 84 per cent and 82 per cent respectfully.

Additionally, the two studies found that the most likely place for homophobia at sporting events to occur is in the spectator stands.

faced enormous backlash and found herself at the center on the debate about the participation of trans women in sports, after becoming the first transgender athlete to win an NCAA Division 1 title .

Solutions

Require regular inclusion training. Players and staff should participate in an annual program that teaches how to avoid discrimination in sports.

Include LGBTQ in your harassment policy. Make sure everyone in your organization knows that discrimination and harassment for sexuality or gender identity is just as unacceptable as it is for religion, race or ability.

Run an anti-homophobia campaign. Participate in programs like the project or to show your organization supports LGBTQ athletes.

Promote positive spaces. Display signs and stickers around fields, arenas, locker rooms and offices to show your support for gay and transgender athletes.

Offer LGBTQ information on your website. Prominently display equity statements and include links to LGBTQ resources (e.g. gay teams or groups).

Addressing Inequalities in Sports

As a sports organization, it's essential to support diverse athletes and staff. In addition to the solutions listed above, use the resources written by the U.S. Center for Safe Sport a non-profit dedicated to eradicating all forms of abuse in sports. Keep in mind that it's not just about discrimination in professional sports, it extends to sport at all levels.

How are you handling reports of discrimination?

Use our EEO investigation checklist to ensure you take all the necessary steps the next time you receive a complaint from an athlete.

How i-Sight (now Case IQ) Can Help

If you're still simply reacting to discrimination, you're putting your organization, your athletes and staff, and your reputation at risk.

With i-Sight (now Case IQ)'s powerful case management software, you can analyze historic case data so you can take preventive measures, reducing future incidents.

i-Sight (now Case IQ) is a flexible and configurable solution that can be integrated with your existing reporting systems and third-party hotlines, ensuring no reports slip through the cracks.
Learn more about how i-Sight (now Case IQ) can reduce resolution time and improve your organization's investigations here.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Discrimination in Sports: 5 Types, 25 Solutions | Case IQ

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Gender discrimination in professional sports is a tale as old as time, with women fighting for sports equity in countless ways. When it comes to gender discrimination in sports examples, you likely think of Billie Jean King fighting to receive equal pay, or women ski jumpers demanding they be allowed to participate in the Olympics.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The best practices for ethical behavior in sports are often debated, and codes of ethics can vary greatly from sport to sport.

When we talk about ethics, we're talking about a system of values that we use to make daily decisions: what we value and how we use those values in our dealings with the world. Ethics don't just guide individuals; they also inform the missions and actions of larger organizations. Ethics in sport permeate competitive environments. Young children are taught to play fairly and adhere to the rules. In adulthood, the violation of ethical guidelines can have legal implications, as seen by cases such as the "Deflategate" controversy involving the New England Patriots in the NFL. ¹

Here's a look at how ethics in sport management affect the world of sports, and how ethics in sports may evolve going forward.

Ethics in Sports: An Overview

Because ethics have been debated by philosophers since antiquity, defining them in the context of modern sport can sometimes be difficult. Because the goal of sports is winning, how morality fits into that objective can get hazy. Many organizations today, including the International Association for the Philosophy of Sport, strive to develop codes of ethics in sports. ²

One thing is clear: Ethics in sports are essential to good sportsmanship. The National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics states that key elements of sportsmanship include cooperation, gratitude, honor, humility and fairness-all principles that relate to ethical actions in sports. ³ We can see ethical behavior in sports in a multitude of spheres, including:

Following rules within a game, and accepting penalties when given

Calling games fairly as a referee

Compensating players fairly

Employing rules that keep players, fans and officials safe

Regulating performance-enhancing substances

As this brief list illustrates, ethical decisions and ethical actions in sports affect stakeholders at every level: athletes, coaches, managers, referees, executives and fans.

Ethics in Sport Management

If you enter the field of sport management, a range of ethical dilemmas related to players and game play will present themselves. Some of the most pressing ethical issues facing sport managers and others in the industry include:

From drafting athletes to hiring coaches and front and back office personnel, it's increasingly important to be aware of unequal treatment in employment in the field, particularly regarding race, ethnicity and gender.

From college to the professional level, the sports industry has been called out for not paying certain athletes (particularly female athletes) equitable salaries and not paying college athletes salaries in addition to college scholarships
Athlete Behavior
The sport management industry has had to develop policies for ethical behavior on the part of the athletes, addressing such issues as how to handle drug use or athlete altercations during and outside of game play.

The Code of Ethics promoted by the North American Society for Sport Management is a set of guidelines that many managers throughout varying levels of athletics management follow. ⁴ Some standards include: promoting the safety and health of all athletes, issuing public statements in an objective and truthful manner, respecting privacy of athletes and clients, and treating colleagues with respect and courtesy.

Examples of Ethical Dilemmas in Today's Sports World

As new challenges arise as the field of sports develops and becomes more complex, those working in sport industries will need to be equipped to address new ethical questions. Some of the most pressing ethical dilemmas in sports include these:

Should sports with high brain injury risk exist?

Some have argued that Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) fighting and boxing, both sports where strikes to the head are common, should be illegal. ⁵ In addition, the NFL has been questioned thoroughly in recent years about football's relationship to brain injury. ⁶ Chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, has been linked not only with major concussions but with the repetitive smaller hits to the head that NFL players experience every game, as well. ⁷

As new research has emerged on links between CTE and football, leaders in sport management have had to address ethical decisions regarding football players' safety.

During play on December 8, 2011, Cleveland Browns quarterback Colt McCoy took a helmet-to-helmet hit and was sent back into the game without being tested for a concussion. After the game, he was diagnosed with a concussion. According to the Browns, their trainers didn't see the hit because they were tending to other players ... and no one told them about it.

Within two weeks, the NFL placed independent certified athletic trainers (ATC spotters) in stadium booths at every game. They serve as additional sets of eyes, watching for potential injuries. ATC spotters may use a medical timeout to stop a game to remove a player for medical examination; teams aren't charged for those timeouts.

Taking this ethical decision a step further, the league added a video component to the new surveillance system before the playoff games on January 7 and 8, 2012.

During the playoffs, a player was hit in the head (helmet) by another player's knee. Though he was back on his feet quickly and got to the sideline, his teammates urged trainers to evaluate him for a concussion. He was almost cleared to keep playing when the head athletic trainer checked the video, which confirmed that the player had collapsed from wooziness before standing up.

Recognizing the benefit to player safety, the NFL permanently implemented a more sophisticated observation system before the 2012 season began. ⁸

While these additions are designed to identify head injuries quickly, the NFL has taken more recent action to help prevent them and reduce their severity. As of 2022, the league requires all offensive and defensive linemen, tight ends and linebackers to wear pillowy, padded caps, called Guardian Caps, on top of their helmets during training. According to the league, Guardian Caps reduce impact severity by at least 10% if a player involved in an on-field collision is wearing one; by at least 20% if both players involved wear them. Speaking to the Washington Post, NFL chief medical officer Allen Sills said, "The training camps, that period up to that first preseason game, that's the highest period for the density of contact, meaning there's more contact practices during that time than there are any other times during the year. So it makes sense to start with the most vulnerable players in terms of numbers of impacts and also the most vulnerable time of the year." ⁹

Should college athletes be paid?

Scandals in the NCAA, the rise of million-dollar salaries for college coaches, and the massive entertainment industry that college sports produces have resulted in intense debate about paying college athletes. ¹⁰ While college athletes do typically receive tuition scholarships, they often also have had to miss classes to play, or they ended up dropping out of school to pursue professional opportunities. Student athletes, particularly football and basketball players, are the engine of a college sports industry that nets universities millions of dollars in profits; some have said that's reason enough to provide them with a salary. In addition to calling for a pay-for-play model for college athletes, some professional coaches have called for a measure that allows college athletes who leave school but do not get drafted to return to school. ¹¹

In 2021, the NCAA adopted guidelines that allow college athletes to profit off of their names, images and likenesses. According to NBC News, this decision affected nearly a half million college athletes, who became enfranchised to pursue sponsorship deals, online endorsements and personal appearances. ¹²

The new guidelines, however, open the door to further ethical dilemmas in sport, including these:

What impact will the guidelines have on the future of amateur competition?

In what way(s) do they create a less equitable environment, especially for female athletes?

Colleges are still not paying their athletes, despite profiting from their names, images and likenesses for many years

Should professional leagues promote gambling?

In 1992, citing the potential of money laundering schemes and other activities of questionable ethics, Congress enacted the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act (PASPA), which prevented the expansion of sports wagering beyond Nevada. According to Forbes, this effectively gave Nevada a national monopoly on single-game wagering. The prohibition stood for roughly 30 years, despite the proliferation of illicit sports gambling. ¹³

In January 2018, the National Basketball Association (NBA) surprised many sports fans by proposing a new set of laws for national legalized betting on basketball games. ¹⁴ By becoming a partner in the gambling venture, the NBA stood to make one percent on every bet made on games. This raised ethical dilemmas about how widespread gambling might affect player effort, or players' ability to sway games. Further, the social problem of gambling addiction brought up other ethical issues extending beyond the world of sport.

In its May 2018 ruling of Murphy v. National Collegiate Athletic Association, the United States Supreme Court declared PASPA unconstitutional, paving the way for sports gambling expansion. Since then, roughly 30 states have legalized sports betting, including 21 that allow online betting. Five more states appear poised to legalize it within the year. ¹³ As of early October 2022, total wagers nationwide exceed $152 billion. ¹⁵

Writing for The Atlantic, Matthew Walther examined ethical issues brought to the fore by the 2018 ruling:

"Before the legalization of online gambling, the great majority of Americans would go their entire [lives] without being tempted to seek out a bookie or fly to the handful of jurisdictions in which in-person sports betting was permitted. What millions now face are endless deceptive advertisements aired during the most-watched television broadcasts in America, inviting them to risk their money on platforms funded by venture capitalists rather than by organized crime. Many of the commercials I see while watching football promote what are called "risk free" bets, a phrase that should probably fall afoul of various truth-in-advertising statutes. What they mean is that if you bet $300 and win, you will be able to withdraw your winnings (in five to seven days via bank wire or instantaneously if you opt for the platform's branded prepaid card); if you lose, your forfeited wagers become credits that can be used for future bets. Risk-free bets serve one purpose: ensuring that you continue to make use of the platform ... To shield a tiny portion of the population who engaged in behavior that might once have been considered immoral (or 'harmful' as many prefer to put it now) from the worst consequences of their actions, we have exposed many millions of others to an apparently mitigated version of the same hazards, and enriched powerful corporate interests in the bargain." ¹⁶

Influence the Future of Ethics in Sport

Numerous ethical dilemmas confront the sports industry today. Issues in recent years have included trainer abuse of athletes, the unintentional use of performance-enhancing drugs that resulted in punishment, how athletes who commit crimes outside of sports should be treated and viewed in the sports world, the rights of transgender athletes and athletes with variations in sex characteristics, and institutional racism and exclusionary practices in sport teams and clubs.

Make your mark on the next generation of sport and sport leadership. With the KU online master's degree in sport management,* you'll be ready when the right opportunities arise. Study online and maintain your career momentum as you look to build the expertise you need to lead sports organizations. Explore thecurriculum, including our internship opportunity, andschedule a call with an admissions advisor today.
*This program is a Master of Science in Education (M.S.E.) degree in health, sport management, and exercise science with an emphasis in sport management.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Learn how ethics play a role within the sport management profession - read more from KU here!

# data[].attributes.headline
How to deal with (and have ethics) in sports

# data[].attributes.subject
How to deal with (and have ethics) in sports

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Ethical issues in sports are a major factor in determining the success or failure of an athletic program. For athletic directors and other members of sports leadership, it's essential to understand the ethics involved with sports and know how to react when an issue arises.

Why Are Ethics Important in the Sports World?

The sports industry is a major player in the American economy. Statista reports that in 2022, the five major professional sports leagues in the U.S. received more than $6.1 billion in sponsorship revenue. ¹ And that isn't even including the profits generated by college leagues - the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) raked in approximately $1.14 billion in 2022 from March Madness alone. ²

With this enormous flow of revenue comes high stakes for everyone involved with sports, from players to coaches, trainers, athletic directors and team owners. Those high stakes can lead to increased temptation to make questionable decisions and take unethical actions in order to secure a win.

In Major League Baseball (MLB), for example, sign stealing is an unethical action sometimes taken by teams to gain an upper hand. Baseball teams use hand signals, or signs, to communicate with members of their team. While it's understandable that players could learn another team's signs by paying close attention, using any type of technology to steal a team's signs is illegal in baseball.

In 2017, the MLB discovered that the Houston Astros had participated in unethical sign stealing throughout the season. The Astros were fined $5 million and lost their first and second year draft picks for two years. Some of the individuals involved also faced consequences - Astros general manager Jeff Luhnow and another manager, A.J. Hinch, were both suspended. ³

This is just one example of why ethics are so important in the sports world. After all, athletic events aren't just a major moneymaker - they're also a main source of entertainment for people around the world. Sports bring people together, whether they're facing off on the field, cheering from the stands or watching from home. At the heart of a love for sports is the belief in one central ethical principle: Every team or individual should play by the same rules.

What Are Common Ethics Issues in Sports?

While ethical issues in sports can be diverse and vary between sports programs and leagues, some challenges are common across the spectrum. These include:

Corruption and bribery: Money can be a major motivator for anyone, and it's no different for professionals in the sports industry. However, accepting bribes, fixing games and other forms of corruption are unethical and negatively impact the sports world and all those involved in it

Harassment: Physical, verbal, sexual, emotional and mental harassment cannot be tolerated at any level of the sports industry. Harassment between athletes, between players and coaches and from fans may not happen often, but sport managers need to be prepared for these situations when they arise. Allowing harassment to go unchecked is an ethical issue that stands in the way of a healthy environment for all those involved.

Examining Ethical Issues in College Sports

Some ethical issues are more common in college athletics than in other levels of the sports industry. The high-pressure environment of college sports can lead players, coaches and others to make poor ethical decisions when it comes to:

Expand your career with a Master's in Sports Administration
View the OMSA
Ethical Issues in Youth Sports

Adolescent athletes require thoughtful guidance and support when they participate in sports. Ethical adults who model positive attitudes toward competition and fair play are essential to these developing athletes. Sports have great potential to teach important life lessons, but these ethical issues can get in the way:

Ethical Issues in Hiring for Sports Positions

While ethical issues in the sports world often center on athletes, it's just as important to scrutinize hiring practices for coaches, sports managers, athletic directors and other positions. Unethical hiring practices can result in legal ramifications as well as damage to a team's reputation. Legal and ethical issues involved with hiring for sports positions can include:

Dealing With Ethical Dilemmas in Sports

Conscientious coaches, athletic directors and other administrators can promote ethically driven sports programs by being prepared to handle ethical issues when they occur. Instead of shying away from the challenges, it's essential for those involved in sports leadership to set the example by facing ethical issues head-on.

While each situation is different, the step-by-step process below can help you navigate an ethical dilemma in your athletic program. ⁷

1. Take every complaint or report seriously. Never attempt to silence whistleblowers who are reporting on unethical actions taking place in your program.

2. Learn everything you can about the ethical issue. Talk with everyone involved to ensure you know all of the facts before proceeding.

3. Refer to local, state and federal regulations regarding the issue. If there are laws pertaining to the ethics issue at hand, consult your organization's attorney about the proper next steps.

4. Discuss the issue with other stakeholders. Notify any other professionals necessary, including the athletic director and other members of your organization's leadership team.

5. Develop a plan to remedy the issue. With other stakeholders and, if needed, a legal representative, determining what steps should be taken to address the ethical issue at hand.

6. Implement your plan, including any necessary disciplinary actions. This step may involve implementing an improvement plan or even dismissing the athletes or personnel who took unethical action.

7. Follow-up with everyone involved. Ensure that all stakeholders, including the person who reported the incident, is aware that action has been taken. This is also the time to reflect on the process you followed and make any necessary improvements on your process for the next time your program faces ethical issues.

How to Be an Ethical Sports Leader

The field of athletic leadership delivers many challenges, but it also offers great opportunities to those who are passionate about sports and committed to ethical practices and fair play. To gain the necessary skills and expertise, aspiring sports leaders can benefit from degree programs that specialize in athletic administration.

Ohio University's Online Master of Sports Administration is the top online sports management graduate program in the U.S. as of 2023. ⁸ Request more information today to discover how Ohio University's online program supports graduates in becoming ethical sports leaders who run healthy, thriving athletic departments.

Sources

1. Statista. "Sponsorship revenue of the major sports leagues in the United States in 2022." Feb. 2023. Retrieved Oct. 25, 2023 from https://www.statista.com/statistics/1380768/sponsorship-revenue-sports-leagues-usa/

2. Investopedia. "How Much Does the NCAA Make Off March Madness?" June 8, 2023. Retrieved Oct. 25, 2023 from https://www.investopedia.com/articles/investing/031516/how-much-does-ncaa-make-march-madness.asp

3. PBS. "Sign Stealing in Baseball Dates Back to the 19th Century. Here's Why the Houston Astros Sign Stealing Was Different." Oct. 3, 2023. Retrieved Oct. 25, 2023 from https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/sign-stealing-baseball-history/

4. ThoughtCo. "Sports Ethics and Our Society." Feb. 5, 2019. Retrieved Oct. 25, 2023 from https://www.thoughtco.com/sport-ethics-2670391

5. Case IQ. "Why Ethics in Sports Should Be Your Organization's Top Priority." Retrieved Oct. 25, 2023 from https://www.caseiq.com/resources/why-ethics-in-sports-should-be-your-organizations-top-priority/

6. Society for Human Resource Management. "What Are Some Common Ethical Dilemmas that HR Professionals Face During the Recruiting Process?" Retrieved Oct. 25, 2023 from https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/tools-and-samples/hr-qa/pages/ethicaldilemmashrprofessionalsface.aspx

7. Play By the Rules. "The Big Picture - Ethical Decision Making in Sport." Retrieved Oct. 25, 2023 from https://www.playbytherules.net.au/got-an-issue/integrity-in-sport/what-can-you-do/ethical-decision-making

8. College Rank. "Top 20 Online Best Sports Management Graduate Programs." Retrieved Oct. 25, 2023 from https://www.collegerank.net/best-online-sports-management-masters-degree-programs/

Your Future Starts Here
Online Programs
Call Us

740.924.5725

to speak with a knowledgeable Enrollment Counselor.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Explore different issues, implications, and steps to protect the team when ethical issues in sports arise with tips for the athletic director.

# data[].attributes.headline
values for why corruption (or unethical behavior) happens

# data[].attributes.subject
values for why corruption (or unethical behavior) happens

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
To understand the role ethics plays in sport and competition, it is important to make a distinction between gamesmanship and sportsmanship.

Gamesmanship is built on the principle that winning is everything. Athletes and coaches are encouraged to bend the rules wherever possible in order to gain a competitive advantage over an opponent, and to pay less attention to the safety and welfare of the competition. Some of the key tenants of gamesmanship are:

Winning is everything

It's only cheating if you get caught

It is the referee's job to catch wrongdoing, and the athletes and coaches have no inherent responsibility to follow the rules

The ends always justify the means

Some examples of gamesmanship are:

Faking a foul or injury

Attempting to get a head start in a race

Tampering with equipment, such as corking a baseball bat in order to hit the ball farther

Covert personal fouls, such as grabbing a player underwater during a water polo match

Inflicting pain on an opponent with the intention of knocking him or her out of the game, like the Saint's bounty scandal

The use of performance-enhancing drugs

Taunting or intimidating an opponent

A coach lying about an athlete's grades in order to keep him or her eligible to play

All of these examples place greater emphasis on the outcome of the game than on the manner in which it is played.

A more ethical approach to athletics is sportsmanship. Under a sportsmanship model, healthy competition is seen as a means of cultivating personal honor, virtue, and character. It contributes to a community of respect and trust between competitors and in society. The goal in sportsmanship is not simply to win, but to pursue victory with honor by giving one's best effort.

Ethics in sport requires four key virtues: fairness, integrity, responsibility, and respect.

All athletes and coaches must follow established rules and guidelines of their respective sport.

Teams that seek an unfair competitive advantage over their opponent create an uneven playing field which violates the integrity of the sport.

Athletes and coaches are not discriminated against or excluded from participating in a sport based on their race, gender, or sexual orientation.

Referees must apply the rules equally to both teams and cannot show bias or personal interest in the outcome.

Similar to fairness, in that any athlete who seeks to gain an advantage over his or her opponent by means of a skill that the game itself was not designed to test demonstrates a lack of personal integrity and violates the integrity of the game. For example, when a player fakes being injured or fouled in soccer, he or she is not acting in a sportsmanlike manner because the game of soccer is not designed to measure an athlete's ability to flop. Faking is a way of intentionally deceiving an official into making a bad call, which only hurts the credibility of the officiating and ultimately undermines the integrity of the game.

Responsibility

To be sportsmanlike requires players and coaches to take responsibility for their performance, as well as their actions on the field. This includes their emotions.

Many times athletes and coaches will make excuses as to why they lost the game. The most popular excuse is to blame the officiating. The honorable thing to do instead is to focus only on the aspects of the game that you can control, i.e. your performance, and to question yourself about where you could have done better.

Responsibility requires that players and coaches be up to date on the rules and regulations governing their sport.

Responsibility demands that players and coaches conduct themselves in an honorable way off the field, as well as on it.

All athletes should show respect for teammates, opponents, coaches, and officials.

All coaches should show respect for their players, opponents, and officials.

All fans, especially parents, should show respect for other fans, as well as both teams and officials.

The sportsmanship model is built on the idea that sport both demonstrates and encourages character development, which then influences the moral character of the broader community. How we each compete in sports can have an effect on our personal moral and ethical behavior outside of the competition.

Some argue for a "bracketed morality" within sports. This approach holds that sport and competition are set apart from real life, and occupy a realm where ethics and moral codes do not apply. Instead, some argue, sports serves as an outlet for our primal aggression and a selfish need for recognition and respect gained through the conquering of an opponent. In this view, aggression and victory are the only virtues. For example, a football player may be described as mean and nasty on the field, but kind and gentle in everyday life. His violent disposition on the field is not wrong because when he is playing the game he is part of an amoral reality that is dictated only by the principle of winning.

An ethical approach to sport rejects this bracketed morality and honors the game and one's opponent through tough but fair play. This means understanding the rules and their importance in encouraging respect for your opponent, which pushes you to be your best.
Kirk O. Hanson is the executive director of the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics. Matt Savage was a Hackworth Fellow at the Center. These materials were prepared for the Institute for Sports Law and Ethics, of which the Markkula Center is a partner organization. Return to Sports Ethics: Mapping the Issues
August 2012

# data[].attributes.headline
racism in sports - over and under representation

# data[].attributes.subject
racism in sports - over and under representation

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The 21 st March marks the International Day for the Elimination of Racism. Organised by the United Nations, the day, often shortened to the International Day Against Racism, annually recognises discrimination that continues to undermine and persist in our society, at work, in sport or in our everyday lives.

This annual awareness date was initially formed in commemoration of the 1960 police massacre in South Africa, which killed 69 people demonstrating against the apartheid "pass laws".

The day is a time to reflect on the event and identify how racial inequality, discrimination and racism are still prevalent in modern day society.

In order to continually tackle inherited structures, archaic systems and challenge institutions on racism, the day is a reminder that we still need collective action. It is not enough for us to say we are not racist anymore - we all must actively work to ensure we are individually and organisationally anti-racist if we are truly going to eliminate racism in all its forms.

Tackling racism should be considered to be everyone's responsibility. Racism and the Equality Act

What does racism in sport look like?

When we think of racism in sport, we often hear about the overt forms of it. We recently heard of racism in Professional Football where former Crawley FC manager, John Yems, was banned from football for 15 months after an investigation into 16 alleged racist comments he made to his players. There have also been incidents in Women's Basketball where Sarah Chan a Black woman, reported incidences where she has been spat in the face for the colour of her skin. The truth of the matter is, is that the sport and physical activity sector is far from immune to bias, racism and discrimination.

Racism and racialised inequalities significantly influence ethnically diverse communities accessing and participating in sport and physical activity. Research has suggested that experiences of ethnically diverse communities significantly differ from their white counterparts.

The TRARIIS report gives an insight into the depth and deep-rooted nature of racism in sport. It has now been 18 months since UK sport and the Home Country Sport Councils published the initial findings and recommendations and on the 31 st January, there was a third release on the update on progress to date.

Sport England report that in the six months since their last update, there continues to be incidents of racism in sport highlighting the importance of the work that is being done in this space.

It has been reported that after former England rugby union player Luther Burrell spoke out about racism in Rugby, there was an influx of messages from parents confirming that their children were also the victims of racism at age-group level. We also saw the detailed accounts of Azeem Rafiq's experiences in front of the Department for Culture Media and Sport Committee in December. Lord Patel has since announced his resignation as Chair of Yorkshire County cricket club.

We know that incidents like this can go unreported and when we look at the sports ecosystem, they only scratch the surface. These incidents not only highlight the scale of abuse and discrimination faced by individuals within sport, but they also serve as a constant reminder of the work that is still to be done.

How else does racism and racial inequality present itself?

Intersections between gender, sexual orientation, class, age and disability also influence experiences in sport.

Dress codes and uniforms make room to turn a lot of "isms" into policies since typical standards of professional dress and sports uniforms are, at the core built around, racist, sexist, classist views.

We saw FINA banning swimming caps designed for afro hair to be worn at international competitions - such as the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.

Soul caps are swimming hats designed for the Black community. Afro hair is naturally drier than other hair because it has fewer cell layers. The chemicals found in swimming pools can dry it out more, leading to damage. Current swimming hats are often problematic due to elasticity. Having uniform and mandatory dress that is designed in a specific way, can be a huge barrier but the reality is that the historical and ongoing lack of diversity across the sector means that barriers such as these will continue to emerge if we cannot find a way to bring in the experience and insight required as we design products, programmes, policies and strategies.

Professionalism as a Racial Construct can manifest itself in different ways including areas such as pay and promotion.

A  study  conducted by Northwestern University concluded that white applicants received 36% more callbacks for jobs than equally qualified applicants with Black-sounding names. People with classically South Asian and East Asian names were 28% less likely to get called for an interview than their white counterparts. In the United Kingdom, a person named Adam was offered three times as many interviews as someone named Mohammed. Before Black and Brown communities can even think about applying for a role, there is the risk that unconscious bias may put individuals at a significant disadvantage. It is not uncommon for applicants to fake a name on job applications to almost cancel out biases or racial stereotyping.

Over representation and underrepresentation

Black athletes are usually given credit for their "natural athleticism," while white athletes are credited for their "hard work," "discipline" and "knowledge of a game".

These sport stereotypes can also have an impact on people gaining sports roles. Most employers are not concerned with an employee's natural athletic abilities, however, stereotypes of being 'athletically superior' for the most part could begin to explain why Black and Brown communities are overrepresented in sport security roles.

When stereotypes begin to insinuate that certain races have certain characteristics, whether they be positive or negative, they fall into the same racist generalisations that are at the root of racism and race-based discrimination.

Associate professor Cynthia Frisby published a study  examining the media depictions of Black male athletes, where she found, after analysing a decade's worth of news clippings, that black male athletes receive "significantly more negative coverage" in the form of hard news stories about domestic and sexual violence; whereas their white counterparts are the hero protagonists of feature stories that lay bare the shades of their humanity. Clearly, words matter. Words hurt. And yet there are few, if any, consequences for bigoted language.

Stopping the ripple effects

Most human attitudes and behaviours  have both a genetic and an environmental component.

This is also true for fear of others who are different to us. When people and organisations we trust talk in such a way, it has a profound effect on us.

It can shape our beliefs about what we might think are rational issues as we tend to adopt a common position on a topic to signal that we are part of a group, just like football fans wear certain colours to show club loyalty.

Even strong individuals who stand up to oppressive regimes typically  have shared ideals and norms  with other members of a resistance movement. This tribalism can all feel very visceral and natural because, well, in a way, it is. It fires up the primal parts of our brain that evolved for such responses. So when we begin to embark on a journey of anti-racism it has to be as a team.

So how do we start addressing racism in sport?

Adopt anti-racist and inclusive language.

Actively and consistently challenge racism as active bystanders, allies, and accomplices.

Develop an organisational anti-racism strategy and communicate this widely.

Undertake an ethnicity pay gap report regardless of the size of your organisation.

Deal with detractors in your direct team or department.

Proactively and robustly deal with race related issues.

Review and where necessary redesign policies and processes - consider recruitment, professional development, procurement and pensions is a great starting point.

Embed the use equality impact assessments and continuously review the impact of these assessments

Take an anti-racist approach to recruitment and consider how you can diversify your talent pool.

Suggested further reading

Home Page | Kick It Out

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
A focus on racism & racial inequality in sport - Inclusive Employers

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The 21 st March marks the International Day for the Elimination of Racism. Organised by the United Nations, the day, often shortened to the International Day Against Racism, annually recognises discrimination that continues to undermine and persist in our society, at work, in sport or in our everyday lives.

# data[].attributes.headline
why does racism come to the surface when teams lose?

# data[].attributes.subject
why does racism come to the surface when teams lose?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
In the penalty shoot-out that saw Italy defeat England in the UEFA Euro 2020 final, the skill of the goalkeepers was overshadowed by the perceived failure of the English players who missed their shots. Three young players - Marcus Rashford, Jadon Sancho and Bukayo Saka - were subjected to torrents of anti-black racist abuse.

One of the worst things about this racism was how predictable it was. Racism has long been found in European sports, and is intensified when players of colour are put in the spotlight during major international competitions. A tweet in response to the harassment captures this phenomenon: "When you score, you're English. When you miss, you're an immigrant."

It wasn't only English players who experienced such treatment during the tournament. French player Kylian Mbappé faced online abuse when Swiss goalie Yann Somer successfully defended his penalty in the second-round clash that sent les bleus home. Racist abuse resurfaces constantly.

The massive increase in the visibility and popularity of sports over the past century, thanks to television, radio and the internet, has intensified the way that fans relate to players as local and national representatives. Athletes become the face of a nation, and many of us pin patriotic hopes, fears and frustrations on them. See this oft-cited quote from historian Eric Hobsbawm about the power of football to capture national feelings: "The ... imagined community of millions seems more real as a team of 11 named people."

When visibly diverse teams win world cups, it is seen as an anti-racist triumph. It is one reason South Africa's win in the 1995 rugby world cup was so symbolic, coming so soon after the collapse of apartheid. The French men's football team inspired waves of pride in French multiculturalism after their 1998 and 2018 wins. This was symbolised in the slogan Black-Blanc-Beur (Black-White-North African) - a riff on bleu-blanc-rouge (blue, white and red) the colours of the French flag.

But the idea of achieving racial harmony through diverse sports teams has sparked controversy. Historian Laurent Dubois detailed how the national joy of winning a tournament glosses over difficult histories of racism and exclusion in his book on France's "soccer empire".

Also, the celebrations last only as long as the win. Research has shown that when visibly diverse teams lose, existing exclusionary and racist nationalist undercurrents rise to the surface, manifesting as denial that players of colour belong to the nation. If the team is not "us", then "we" didn't lose. It wasn't the nation, or "my" people that failed, it was this interloper.

This can take different forms in nations where white people aren't the majority, but the underlying vitriol is the same. For example, Muslim Indian sports stars have been subjected to such abuse in their own countries, as have Japanese players with black heritage.

Racism and reality

Such abuse is a particularly ugly mix of grief, fandom, patriotism, rage and scapegoating. In the case of the English players, it denies the reality of their birth, citizenship and cultural upbringing in England - and the history that has made the country, and Europe more widely, a profoundly mixed and ethnically diverse space.

When fans engage in racist abuse, they are targeting players because they are seen as "not belonging". Perhaps rejecting them feels safer than rejecting people who share an imaginary "genuine" white national identity, and strengthens a sense of superiority. Doing this requires both forgetting and reinvention, and suggests deep insecurity about one's own identity.

Lilian Thuram's assessment of the racism he received from so-called "fans" was more generous. As Dubois wrote,

He has repeatedly said and written that the problem is simply that they are caught up in a way of thinking, and that they haven't had the opportunity to escape that.

Sociologists, historians, art critics, anti-racist activists and media scholars would agree with Thuram about the scale of the problem. There is a long, deep and pervasive tradition of designating players of colour in Europe as "other" than the norm and as being more "physical" or less "strategic".

It is no coincidence that only 3.9% of coaches in Europe's 14 biggest leagues have an ethnic minority background. Researcher Irene Blum and anti-racism activist John Oliveira noted that this replicates age-old historic patterns of black labourers and white owners supported by scientific racism, slavery and colonialism.

Could we, then, move beyond the abusive denial of history into a more mature and joyous fandom and national pride? A mural of Marcus Rashford - defaced by racists then transformed by fans and supporters into a moving site of honour and respect - bears witness to this potential.

It remains to be seen whether - and how - government will take action. UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has suggested that fans spreading racism online could be banned from matches. His critics have accused him of hypocrisy, saying Johnson helped stoke such responses by refusing to condemn booing over players taking the knee.

Perhaps this latest ugliness will achieve a transformation from scientific reports and policy documents to action and structural change. That would take commitment from (social) media, funders, coaches, players, training academies, and also from fans. It might take penalties to achieve, but it is a noble goal.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Racism in sport: why it comes to the surface when teams lose

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In the penalty shoot-out that saw Italy defeat England in the UEFA Euro 2020 final, the skill of the goalkeepers was overshadowed by the perceived failure of the English players who missed their shots. Three young players - Marcus Rashford, Jadon Sancho and Bukayo Saka - were subjected to torrents of anti-black racist abuse.