Four out of five women coaches have experienced sexism and misogyny in their working environment, a new Kick It Out survey has found.

Eighty per cent of the 115 coaches surveyed by the charity, ranging from those working in the professional game down to grassroots, said they had encountered discrimination, with 70 per cent of respondents saying they experienced sexism while on a coaching course.

Of that 70 per cent, 71 per cent did not feel comfortable reporting what they had experienced to the course leader.

Although 60 per cent of all respondents thought coaching was an inclusive space, 54 per cent of those who said they had experienced sexism or misogyny admitted they had thought about quitting coaching as a result of their experiences.

Over half (57 per cent) of all respondents felt they had been spoken to differently based solely on their gender, 55 per cent recalled having their opinions or suggestions overlooked and 48 per cent said they were questioned over their knowledge of the rules.

Kick It Out’s chief operating officer Hollie Varney said: “At a time of huge growth for the women’s game, it’s alarming that over half of the coaches surveyed said they had thought about quitting because of the sexism they had experienced.

“Many of the women we spoke to shared their passion and love for coaching but also talked about the exhaustion that came from being regularly undermined, questioned, and overlooked in the coaching environment.”

Of the 80 per cent who had experienced sexism or misogyny, 56 per cent said this came from coaching staff, either at their own club or from coaches of an opposing club, while 40 per cent experienced sexism from the parents of children they coached.

Varney, who herself coaches an under-14 girls’ team in the Junior Premier League and is working towards a UEFA B qualification, told the PA news agency: “It’s those little micro-aggressions – ‘are you one of the parents?’ or ‘are you here to run the line?’.

“People might not think, ‘Oh, that’s sexist’, but when it’s just aimed at a woman and you wouldn’t do it to someone of the same sex, it makes you feel uncomfortable.

“Then there’s also some of the actual outright aggressive behaviour that you see and I’ve certainly experienced this – (people) swearing directly at you, I’ve heard examples of dads shouting at female coaches telling them they don’t know what they’re doing, to be quiet. Just dismissive of their experience because they’re women.

“I’m not surprised by the statistics and some of the feedback because it shows what a journey we have to go on in terms of that culture change, within football and within this coaching environment.”

Reports to Kick It Out of sexism and misogyny in the wider game were up 400 per cent in the 2022-23 season compared to the prior campaign.

Kick It Out has employed grassroots coach educators in an effort to give coaches the skills to tackle unconscious bias, while clubs and other organisations can access resources on how to tackle sexism and misogyny on Kick It Out’s ‘The Academy’ platform.

Anti-discrimination body Kick It Out received a 65.1 per cent rise in reports of discriminatory behaviour during the 2022-23 season – with reports of sexism and misogyny up 400 per cent.

Figures released by the organisation show 1,007 reports were made during the campaign from the grassroots and professional games and across social media, which Kick It Out puts down in part to an “increased awareness” of reporting procedures and fans becoming “less tolerant” of discriminatory behaviour.

Reports of online abuse rose by 279 per cent, with the organisation receiving 207 more reports related to online forums and social media than in the previous 12 months.

Racism was the most common form of discrimination, accounting for just under half (49.3 per cent) of all reports, while reports related to sexism and misogyny represented the largest rise in a specific discrimination type – up from 16 to 80.

Faith-based discrimination fell slightly due to a 29.5 per cent drop in the number of reports received of an antisemitic nature, but Islamophobia (300 per cent) and sectarian chanting in the professional game (15.8 per cent) were both up.

Discrimination reports in the professional game rose by 27.4 per cent to 484, which represents those received from the Premier League, English Football League and National League, domestic cups, European and international competition, Women’s Super League and Women’s Championship.

A statement from Kick It Out referred to the rise in reports as a “significant leap” that “highlights that discrimination is still a serious issue within the game”.

It added: “The record figures could also be attributed to an increased awareness of reporting procedures and fans becoming less tolerant of discriminatory behaviour.”

Racism continued to account for more than half of grassroots reports (50.8 per cent) and 43.4 per cent of overall grassroots incidents received were from under-18s or younger age-group games.

“Research conducted by Kick It Out suggests these numbers are the tip of the iceberg with many incidents still not reported,” the statement added.

Social media abuse comprised a much larger proportion of overall reports compared to previous years, making up 28 per cent of all reports received, up from 12.1 per cent last year.

Kick It Out chief executive Tony Burnett said: “The significant increase in reports across the game is alarming and strengthens our resolve to tackle discrimination in all areas of football.

“Behind each of these statistics is somebody who has sadly experienced discrimination, and supporting the victims of abuse remains Kick It Out’s utmost priority.

“While we continue to work tirelessly to Kick It Out, we call upon fans, clubs, leagues and governing bodies to help us with this cause, and we are encouraged that the number of reports per incident continues to increase, suggesting that people are becoming less tolerant of discriminatory behaviour and more likely to report abuse when they see it.

“Our figures provide a snapshot of what is happening across the game, but we still don’t know the full picture because clubs, leagues and governing bodies aren’t currently mandated to share their reporting data.

“This underscores why football urgently needs a centralised reporting mechanism to collate and monitor reports. Only once that happens can we understand the full extent of the problem within football and tackle it with the full force of the sport.”

Clubs must stop operating an “old boys’ network” and use objective processes to recruit managers and coaches, Kick It Out chief executive Tony Burnett has said.

A report from the Black Footballers Partnership in March found the number of management-related positions held by black employees rose by eight in 2022 compared with the previous year, from 49 among 1,338 individuals (3.7 per cent) to 57 individuals out of 1,304 in 2023 (4.4 per cent).

There are currently no black or minority ethnic managers in the Premier League following the sacking of Patrick Vieira at Crystal Palace.

Kick It Out wants football’s new independent regulator to oversee equality standards as part of a code of football governance and to compel clubs to share representation and recruitment data, with Burnett insisting far too much in football is going on in the shadows.

“Football is one of the last bastions of the old boys’ network, to be absolutely frank,” he told the PA news agency at the Include Summit in Manchester.

“It’s a tap on the shoulder quite often, who you know rather than what you know.

“When you look at the representation across football, what’s really clear is there is a myth of meritocracy.

“The best people aren’t getting jobs, whichever way you look at this, the best people, the most qualified people, are very frequently not getting the jobs. And so we want fair representation.”

Kick It Out wants to work with the football authorities to put an objective assessment process in place which guides recruiters, as happens in other industries like the financial sector.

“When clubs are recruiting a manager they would have a definitive list to pick from – people who’ve been through an objective process – rather than going off the recommendations of a mate of a mate, or an agent, and that’s what we’ve got to stop,” Burnett added.

“Football is one of the last industries around where a tap on the shoulder and who you know seems to drive your career path.

“It’s far too informal and it’s against modern recruitment standards. You’re not going to get the best people if it’s done in a way that isn’t objective.”

The Government’s White Paper on football governance published in February proposed that equality, diversity and inclusion would fall outside the new regulator’s immediate scope.

The paper said: “The industry has taken on greater accountability and the Government will continue to support reform in this space.”

However, Kick It Out and Burnett are insistent EDI matters must form part of the regulator’s final remit and is “expectant and determined” that they will.

“Football has been marking its own homework in this space for a long time,” he said.

“When football says ‘actually, leave us alone, we’re gonna get this right’ – well you haven’t got it right in the last 30 years so we’ve got no confidence you’re going to get it right now.

“This is a huge opportunity for us to put some compliance mechanisms around football to get it right.”

Burnett insists there remain big gaps in data related to EDI, both in terms of representation and the reporting of discrimination.

“We’ve got lots of different mechanisms in reporting when it comes to fan behaviour, 92 clubs all with separate reporting mechanisms, (Kick It Out) have a reporting mechanism, lots of other organisations do, but we never have a full picture of the data because the clubs aren’t mandated to share that,” he said.

“More importantly for us, we have no idea what the culture is like within the football environment.

“Because there is no compulsion for clubs to share internal discrimination reports, employee to employee for example, or employee against line manager, we have no idea what the extent of the problem is within football, and so we’ve no idea what sort of cultural problem we’ve got to tackle.

“It’s all right tackling diversity, but if we don’t try and make football a more inclusive culture, then there’s no point bringing more (diverse) people in, because they will leave.”