Is it just me, or is anybody else getting disillusioned with the culture in football at the moment?

The back pages are once again full of stories of racism, diving and abuse of referees. The behaviour and attitudes of current players seems to be spiralling out of control. Is there no code of honour any more? There has been a problem in football for quite some time but it has been allowed to continue unchecked and has got gradually worse over the years. In the good old days, penalties were conceded by defenders, not won by confidence tricksters who cheat, fall and dive around like they’ve been shot. The all too familiar ugly scenes of players surrounding the referee and openly shouting obscenities seem to have become normal. In what society is it acceptable to speak to somebody with such vulgarity and aggression?

I go to watch my nine year-old Nephew’s football team play most weekends and every time I am thoroughly entertained by the elaborate goal celebrations on display that are perfect imitations of those of their Premiership heroes. On the flipside however, many of them also perfectly imitate the backchat and disrespect shown to the referee, thinking that it is normal and acceptable behaviour because week-in and week-out they watch their heroes doing exactly the same thing. Thankfully, my Nephew’s coach is determined to instil different values in his players: respect, honesty, gamesmanship and stamps any behaviour or attitudes that are not in line with these values very quickly.

How does the culture in rugby differ so much to that in football? From my years playing rugby, I remember that we could only speak to the referee via our captain and he had to be addressed as ‘Sir’. The difference is that rugby has stayed true to its values.

Charles O’Reilly, wrote about corporate culture in ‘Corporations, Culture and Commitment – Motivation and Social Control in Organisations’: “There is nothing magical or illusive about corporate culture. One has only to be clear about the specific attitudes and behaviours that are desired, and then to identify the norms and expectations that promote or impede them.”

And the same can be applied to sport.

The rugby community has always been clear about the behaviours and attitudes that it desires and everybody involved in the sport – from commentators to players to spectators – collectively discourage any norms that impede them. How many times have we heard Brian Moore state during his commentary of a match, “This isn’t football.” when the crowd boo whilst a player is taking a kick, for example?

We learn our values from those that we respect and they are reinforced by our experiences, so are either strengthened or weakened by what we see. From this, individual attitudes and opinions are then formed. An organisations most respected and highly regarded people are the senior managers. They are the people that lead the organisation and should set the standard. They must demonstrate that safety is a value in order for others to embrace it.

The same is true of people in such positions within sport. They have a moral duty to lead by example. There has to be more focus on the players and other people within the sport to set expectations for what is acceptable and say “hang on a minute – what you’re doing is not in the spirit of the game.”

What culture do you want in your organisation?

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