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New disabled supporters’ associations speak on their journeys in Volunteers Week

Representatives from new disabled supporters’ associations (DSAs) featured in a special episode of The Level Playing Field Podcast, for Volunteers Week.

The charity’s fans liaison officer, Liam Bird, was joined by Brian and Niraj from Seagulls Disabled Supporters’ Association (Brighton Hove Albion), Diane from Chelsea Disabled Supporters’ Association, Simone from Coventry City Disabled Supporters’ Association and David from Hull City Disabled Supporters’ Association, Each shared their experiences and insights on starting and running disabled supporters’ associations and spoke on the importance of work done by DSAs across England and Wales,

The podcast episode can be found here, or via your chosen podcast platform and the full transcript is available below.

Liam: Hello, my name is Liam Bird and I am the fans liaison officer at Level Playing Field and you are listening to the Level Playing Field podcast. On today’s episode, we will be turning our attention to disabled supporters’ associations. For those who don’t know what a DSA is, they are typically a group or an organisation dedicated to representing and supporting the interest of disabled sports fans, particularly within the context of their club. These, associations are typically formed by disabled supporters themselves or their personal assistants or carers, often with the support of the club or relevant organisations such as Level Playing Field to bring about greater access and inclusion. DSA members dedicate countless hours, often sacrificing their own matchday experiences to work with their club. They’re tirelessly advocating for improvement in access and inclusion, ensuring everyone can enjoy the beautiful game. And that’s why for this volunteers week, we are going to be speaking to several supporters of new DSAs that launched last season.

So without further ado, let me introduce my guests from their respective DSAs. I have Diane from Chelsea.

Diane: Hello.

Liam: David from Hull City

David: Hello.

Liam: Brian and Niraj from Brighton and Hove Albion.

Brian and Niraj: Hello.

Liam: And Simone from Coventry City.

Simone: Hello. Sorry, I lost connection there.

Liam Bird: Simone, I’m going to start with you. Being part of a DSA can be very demanding and require a lot of. A lot of your time. With this in mind, what motivated you to start a DSA?

Simone: Well, it started off something that the club obviously initiated the ideas of and they were really keen to get something going. Our DLO link there, Jodie Jones, is really positive and really proactive in, you know, really kind of bringing change to the club and being inclusive. So for myself, I’ve got two young boys. One of them’s got cerebral palsy. My other little boy’s got autism and ADHD. So they’re both typical boys, love football, wanted to start going and watching their local team. So for me, the motivation was trying to make it a more inclusive thing for all. So, you know that football isn’t just about one particular group, it is for everybody. Old, young, disabled, able bodied, you know, for everybody. So it was just to kind of, drive things forward so that I could go and enjoy it with my children, regardless of their disabilities. Things could be adapted as needed. And, through the links, kind of with Jodie, I met quite a lot of other, disabled supporters. So it really kind of boosted me to want to drive change, really, and just make the club as inclusive as we can. Can make it.

Liam Bird: Same question to you, Niraj.

Niraj: I started at Brighton & Hove Albion when I was I guess an able bodied person. Unfortunately, I had an accident four years ago. The club was fantastic – the way that they helped myself and my family, basically. I decided to put myself forward for the fan advisory board and to my surprise I was voted on. It soon became apparent that Brighton & Hove Albion was actually one of the few clubs that didn’t have a DSA. Of course, having the experience being able bodied and then became a disabled person, I knew how important of course, accessibility and feeling the same as everyone else was. Other DSAs had great results, you know, the progress that they’ve made. But the club – I think our club wanted it to be sort of fan, fan led. So as a member of the FAB and I worked on their end and our work group, it became apparent to us that we needed a DSA. So myself and the chair of the FAB at the time volunteered to start looking and setting one up and that’s how it started basically.

Liam: And Brian, obviously you’re from the same football club. I mean, for you, why have you decided to give up your time to be part of this DSA?

Brian: There’s a large reference there. Gillian, my wife, she was chair of the FAB and we were looking at how we were going to resource the setting up of the DSA. I’m retired now, so I’ve got some skills and some enthusiasm to support the Niraj in setting up the DSA. And so far, we’ve been very successful in doing so.

Liam Bird: And for you, David?

David: Hull City started with a bit of a low bar really. They had the fans supporters committee meetings and there was no disability rep at them. Two meetings went past and there was nobody offering an opinion for disabled supporters. And we thought that can’t be right. There’s so many of us in different shapes and forms that, you know, we need to try and find out what disabled fans think. And so, I got together with some blank minded people, much like probably everybody else has done and put a survey together through social media and got a lot of feedback on the good things Hull City were doing. But equally areas that Hull City could improve. There’s been a huge change at my club with new owners with a big Turkish influence, as you may all be aware. All of a sudden there was a bit of an open door at Hull City and an opportunity to push in and get our voices heard. And the club has recently appointed a DLO, a new fans liaison officer. Liam, you’ve probably had contact with them. They’re very positive people, very responsive. And so, we’ve seen great strides being made in, literally a year from going from a very low bar with disabled fans to an area now where we have a really good rapport with our club.

Liam: And, Diane, finally, I mean, why have you decided to give up all your time to create, a DSA at Chelsea?

Diane: I wasn’t afraid to speak to the club about issues that were being raised and that meant that lots of other people came to me. So, I did a lot on behalf of others, too. I was first asked by the club to join the access forum, but I didn’t think that was proactive enough and I wanted to do a lot more. So, when the idea of reinstating our DSA, which hadn’t been around for quite a number of years, I thought this was a better opportunity to help everyone, to kind of like, improve all of our experience at the club and ensure that we had this constant inclusion in quality. So, I just thought it was a no brainer, really.

Liam: And Niraj, I’m interested to know, did you have any experience about setting up an association before you even started trying to create a DSA?

Niraj: Well, that’s very, very important point. It almost put me off. The answer is no. I had absolutely no experience. I’m an engineer, basically, that’s what I do. So, trying, to organise, understanding how the setup is, let alone how you go about setting the steering group, etc, etc. So, you may recall, I actually contacted yourself, and Level Playing Field and with your help and support, as well as contacting other clubs. And we got in touch with some other clubs which had established DSAs, others that were just starting off just to kind of, see how their DSAs were running. But the support we received from Level Playing Field was instrumental. Without their help, I don’t think we would be where we are now, to be fair.

Liam: Has anyone else actually got any other background in like a, supporters’ association or anything of that kind of ilk before creating your DSA? Diane, I know you kind of have.

Diane: I’m on the Trust, the, Chelsea Supporters’ Trust, but I haven’t been extremely long. I think that’s kind of been a really good thing for me. But my prime thing on there was, again, for about disability, and accessible supporting. That’s kind of like why I got on the board.

David: Yeah, I’ve been with, Hull City Supporters’ Trust in the past as part of their board of directors. So, I knew how a fans group worked. That was at a time when the club was having difficulties with the owners and that kind of thing. There was a more attritional situation in place at that time. But it did give me an eye-opening experience into how supporter groups work. I’ve also done some work with the official supporters’ club who were very different in their approach to things. But yeah, the door, to Level Playing Field became apparent really through the work at Swansea. I use Swansea, I lean on Swansea quite a bit because they seem to be very well organised and then they sort of pointed us to the Level Playing Field routes and that’s, as you know, we’ve been undertaking that now for a year or so.

Liam: Come to you, Brian, what advice would you give someone who is thinking about setting up a DSA, but is worried? We’ve got people here who haven’t really led an association before. It is a daunting task, right?

Brian: Yeah, I think it is, Liam. But I think there are a number of channels I think you can go to. Number one is talk to your club, talk to the ED&I people at the club. Because in the main the club want these to succeed. There may be some outliers, but, from talking to many DSAs over the last year, most clubs really want this to work. I think talking to yourselves, you’ve got a blueprint that, that gives us really good guidelines on the different phases, different steps we should be, should be taking from inception through to maturity. And then lastly talk to the other DSAs. Don’t reinvent the wheel. You know, we’ve spoken, as Niraj rightly says to lots of DSAs and we’ve learned some very good things, very positive things. But equally they’ve told us where things have not worked out and we hopefully can avoid some of those pitfalls. And I’m sure all of us, around the call tonight, we’d be delighted to speak to anyone who is now looking at, setting up a DSA for their club.

Liam: So overall, this is a question for anyone who wants to jump in. I mean, how has your first year been? I mean, what have been your successes and what have been your challenges? Go for it, Niraj.

Niraj: We’re called the Seagulls DSA, basically. And we actually launched on the 24th of February, that was during the ‘Unite For Access’ campaign. You kindly volunteered to help us launch that, Liam, which went down a treat, basically. But we’re in the process of setting up a steering group at the moment. So, we’re really at right the start of our journey, on the DSA. But we’ve gone as far as actually getting hold – well, we’ve managed to get, an ambassador, an ex-football player in Guy Butters, who’s going to be our, first ambassador. And the club have been very, very supportive as well, giving a space in the programme to publish articles on the proposed DSA and of course yourself visiting us. And that had a big, a big impact, I think, on the club and, the fans as well, once they knew. There’s a lot of people that know Level Playing Field, not just from football, from other sports as well. So that was quite a good call. So, thanks for that, Liam.

Liam: My pleasure. My appearance will bring crowds. David, I mean, I’ve been to, a Hull City DSA event. I mean, did people come just for me, or did they come for what actually, you had going on?

David: I think you were the biggest drawer of the evening. To be fair, the anticipation for your presentation was unprecedented. no, people turned out, but we had a good meeting and I know you came to a fixture as well this season. So, we’ve seen you a couple of times and that means a lot to us because our links with Level Playing Field are important to us, of course. And I think, you know, people see that you’re a group put together, but you have a structure to follow that. You’re not just, a bunch of fans who got together. You want to go down a structured pathway with Level Playing Field to get recognition for the work that you’re doing. And we found that because of that, the club have been very responsive and we’ve built up a good relationship and they’ve invited us to attend their next coffee morning, which will be timed with, I think, the release of more, ticketing information. So, it’s bound to stir up interest from fans. A good opportunity for us to be there and again to make ourselves better known to, some of the supporters who don’t do social media, for example. There must be some who don’t.

Liam: Simone, what have been your successes and challenges as a DSA?

Simone: Challenges has been, obviously, to begin with, it’s establishing, you know, where do you stand in terms of like, you know, with the club’s expectations? The fact that our ground is owned by somebody completely different. So, it’s kind of making those network connections, making sure you’re all singing from the same hymnbook that you’ve got, you know, similar, aims and objectives because obviously the stadium will have their own aims and objectives when it comes to, you know, accessibility. The club obviously do. And then, you know, we’ve all got fresh ideas ourselves. So, I think initially the challenge was sort of seeing where we stand, getting to grips with what is the vision, what are the aims. and I think the kind of the plan that you’d given us originally, you know, the one big five-year aim, three smaller aims, that’s been really successful, working through that. I mean, we’ve just had the news that we’re now going to have the audio descriptive commentary from the new season, which is fantastic news. And, I know some of the members of the DSA had done quite a lot of work with Jodie Jones, from the club around that, so that’s a real big win for us. Quite a lot was done over the FA Cup journey. So obviously the Unite For Access, we use one of our FA Cup games for that. So, we really got ourselves out there. There’s some brilliant media coverage, programme spreads, really starting to kind of get our name out there now with fans. And we have got a lot of fans now contacting ourselves, wanting to get involved and sort of going forward, we’re hoping to have, like, a launch event at the start of season to get anyone and everybody in who’s, you know, a disabled supporter or a carer of a disabled supporter to just sort of, like, showcase what we can and can’t do at the moment, get more ideas, feedback, and just try and make more positive changes to the new season, really. So hopefully that’ll be another huge success.

Diane: And for yourself, Diane?

Diane: Challenges, I suppose getting people to contribute and not only our steering group from the DSA, which was quite hard, but the people that we are, kind of like that we are so getting everyone together and kind of asking them for what they want. They want a DSA, but they’re not always forthcoming and telling you what it is they want. I’ve had a few discussions with supporters on why that is. I guess one of the other biggest ones was communication with the club. And, because we don’t have a DLO or a DAO and we haven’t had one for a really long time. So, I think that was one of the biggest changes within the club.

Liam: I suppose that follows into my next question, really, is how have you worked to establish that relationship with your club? Because a bit of inside baseball, you had someone who was really pro DSA and unfortunately, they left the club to go to another club. Just for clarity at the moment, I think there’s a job description out there for a DAO/ DLO, so they are looking to appoint one. But, I mean, how have you found building that relationship, whereabouts it may have been positive at the beginning and then your advocate left.

Diane: We were in quite a fortunate place. Being with the Chelsea Supporters’ Trust, meant that we had lots of contacts at the club already. Not always necessarily the correct contacts, but the person you’re talking about who left, who was a wonderful advocate for us, it was so great that I was in there before the DSA got set up, which meant I had a really good relationship with her anyway. And then that kind of just grew and blossomed and then I’d had a few – we’d had an access tour with that member of staff and somebody else as well. And they told me it was probably one of the best meetings they’d ever had. And I come out of that meeting so positive and I thought, this is great. It means our connections are getting much stronger. And of course, when they left, I was concerned because the takeover from that position and then getting somebody new in was quite worrying. I was kind of like, we’ve lost contact. We don’t have anybody now and it’s a crucial time now. We have got somebody else appointed in that role and they’ve got a team and we know all of that team and, we’ve had meetings with that team already and, they seem very proactive and it’s really, really good.

Liam: Niraj, I know you’ve got a good relationship with your club. I mean, how. How have you found building that?

Niraj: To be honest, quite straightforward. It’s, again, I think something Diane said is the time, really. We were basically fortunate enough, I mean, lures, myself and Jill. We were on the FAB and we’re obviously on the DSA steering committee. So, we already had a very good relationship with the ED&I side of things within the actual football club itself. We were involved in all sorts of aspects, not least pledis as well. To be fair, we’ve actually managed to, whilst on the ED&I group, within the FAB, we’ve managed to make some changes already. So, the transition from doing work with the EDI manager at Brian Hove Albion Football Club to then representing DSA was actually quite seamless, or has been quite seamless.

Liam Bird: And Brian?

Brian: I think what you can do is, as well as working with the club, we’re also working with the, Brighton Foundation, which is the, charity arm. We got our brand ambassador with Guy Butters. So, I think what we tend to try to do now is to network around the club as well as within the club. And that also includes some of the other, supporters’ groups, that we’ve had. We’ve just had our first donation from North West Sussex Seagulls, who’s, another official supporters’ club within the group of Brighton supporters’ clubs. So, I think it’s important that we embrace a whole range of organisations, not just the club itself.

Liam: David, I’m going to come to you and ask you, what strategies have you installed at the DSA to make sure that you are seeking as many disabled voices as possible who attend football at your club?

David: Yeah, we reach out, I think, primarily through, social media. We try and create a big presence on Twitter, an active Twitter feed and consultation with other clubs through Twitter. Facebook group is blooming. We’re getting more and more members coming on there. But we do reach out to the Hull City Supporters’ Trust, because they link into the FSA, which opens it up to other supporter groups from other clubs, which is good for, networking, and our friends at the, southern supporters. So, we have used a networking situation through social media and the other supporters groups to try and reach everybody that we can. We’ve also put things in the Hull Daily Mail, the local newspaper, to try and pick up those that don’t do social media. And we’ve used the Nextdoor app as well to try and open up ourselves to just to people who maybe wouldn’t come across this. And, it’s been quite, quite successful so far.

Liam: What’s the Nextdoor app? I have not heard of that.

David: It’s an app for your locality. So, things going on for me is the Hull and East Riding area. So, I’ll see notifications. A lot of the time it’s businesses promoting themselves, but other times there’s craft fairs taking place. Open gardens are very popular at the moment. People will raise things like that, but they’ll also raise local issues as well. Sometimes can get a bit political. But, it’s a good way of networking with the people in your locality. And, you know, you’re targeting very much a local audience through that. So, yeah, it’s a Nextdoor app.

Liam: This is a question for everyone. I’m interested to know how you see the current state of accessibility for football in your respective leads. I mean, at the moment we’ve got Championship and Premier League. I’ll come to you first, Brian.

Brian: I think, as Niraj explained to me, quite recently, is that it’s a very mixed picture, within the Premier League. We are very fortunate in the Premier League than the fact that we’ve got a number of a very new stadia that have probably been built within the last 10-15 years, many of which have got absolutely superb facilities, for disabled supporters. We went to the – we have a sensory room ourselves at Brighton, but we also had the opportunity, when we went to a Level Playing Field event at Tottenham, to actually go around their stadium and to see some of the facilities there, which are absolutely fantastic. So, I think what we see is probably a very mixed bag. Some old stadia, but some very new stadia. So, I think what we will see over time is a general improvement as stadia get refreshed, as people focus more on providing a wider range of facilities for disabled fans.

Liam: Simone?

Simone: I do think, I mean, we also support some Premier League teams within my family, as well as Championship. So, I’ve kind of experienced several Championship clubs and several Premier League clubs in terms of accessibility and I personally do think there is a very big difference. You can see the difference, again, it could just be the fact that there’s a lot of newer stadiums. There’s always going to be room for change and room for improvement regardless of what league you’re in and it’s really important. I found, you know, I also went to the Tottenham event and just by going and doing these visits and working together to, you know, share good practice has been really, really sort of instrumental in terms of us looking at our stadium and thinking, wow, we want to strive to achieve, to be like that. What could we do to make these changes? So, yeah, networking between each DSA and doing visits where possible has been really good for us.

Liam: Diane, do you feel we’re moving in the right direction?

Diane: Yes, I do. But it’s for my liking a little bit too slow. I like things going at a faster pace, because, to be honest, you know, disability’s been here forever and as it increases, or as it seems to increase, then we should be making adaptions quicker. I don’t like people that drag their heels. I do want everything done now, now. And I know it’s not possible. And I think that’s part of the problem with, some of our members on the DSA. They want everything done now. And I understand that because some of them have time that’s not necessarily on their side, as they like to tell me. And so they want to enjoy, in particular, football right now, and they want to enjoy it to their best, to their best game, every game. And that’s not always possible. It is moving, it is improving, but it’s too slow for my liking. Far too slow.

Niraj: I was just going to add, actually, that because we’ve all been talking about accessibility into the stadium or around the stadium. But I personally think, and being a disabled fan myself, I haven’t been to many away games. And what puts me off is the lack of information. Not about the stadium, because you can find some websites, you can bring them up, but it’s more about where are the accessible parking spaces, the accessible hotels, the restaurants, the bars, that type of thing, what, which is the easiest way to get into the stadium. So, a lot of these factors, I think, personally put disabled fans off, even travelling. I also think the actual travelling part of this, isn’t the best it could be. But going back to the current state of accessibility, I think the stadiums are fine, the ones that I’ve been to, I’ve been to Spurs. I think Spurs is in my opinion, one of the best ones I’ve been to. But it’s information around the stadium, because if I’m going to go, say I’m down in Brighton, if I want to go and watch a match at Anfield, and we recently did play them. My children went, but I didn’t because there just wasn’t sufficient information for me to have the confidence to make that journey. What we are doing, one of the first projects that myself and Brian are taking on, is we’re actually thinking on, actually writing a guide. So, I’ve been in touch with all the Premier League clubs and I should be getting in touch with the Championship clubs as well, just to try and get some more information about the points I mentioned about the parking, the restaurants, the bars, the hotels and that kind of thing. So that’s one of the first projects we’re going to take on.

Liam: So, the lack of information was about a quarter of fans who took part in our survey stated that that was a barrier to attending live sport. And I’m sure you can insert that into away travel as well. And you’ll be very aware that at, ah, Brighton, if you’re coming by public transport, you’re coming by train. And that train station can get very busy after a game. So, trying to exit that station can be problematic. I know, for instance, that Fulham Disabled Supporters’ Association are focusing on Putney Bridge, which for those people outside of London is an inaccessible tube stop. And the closest tube stop for you to be able to get to Fulham is a 3 miles away. It’s actually either going to the station that’s just around the corner from Diane’s, ground at ah, Fulham Broadway, or you go into Hammersmith. They’re the two accessible stations so you have to go 3 miles to be able to get to go and watch a game at Fulham if you need step free access. So again, it’s a great way of showing actually that DSAs can do work not only inside their stadium but out in the surrounding areas. And you’re 100% correct. The more information you’ve got, more empowerment that the supporters going to feel to make that decision to go to an away game or not.

David, how do you feel accessibility is going in the wider scheme of football?

David: We had some mixed feedback this season. We had positive feedback from our fans going to Blackburn and Birmingham, for instance, but negative with Plymouth. But that problem was caused by our own supporters, able bodied fans standing up in front of wheelchair users, for instance. So, there’s a problem with our own fans that the Plymouth stewards failed to deal with.

Liam: So, I suppose my question to you all then is how can DSAs actually bridge that gap to educate nondisabled supporters regarding the impact that they can have on your fellow supporters? And do you think that’s a difficult conversation to have? I’ll come to you, Simon.

Simone: Yeah, I think it is something that definitely needs work on. I think it’s something that’s never going to be exhausted. We’re always going to have to keep trying to put out the message. There’s always going to be issues, but just getting it out there on match days, using your big screens, using your matchday programmes, posters, around the stadium, using the clubs and the DSA social media. So, putting videos or whatever out there, using players, if you can, to kind of get that message out, just to kind of keep drilling it into fans. And hopefully eventually the message will get across and more and more people will start to become more considerate and just explaining about different disabilities as well. I mean, it could just be that it’s very much an unknown and people don’t always understand a disability or what that entails. So, kind of educating people, isn’t it?

Liam Bird: 100%. 100%. I think the education is a huge part of it and I do think that education comes from – on a local level – disabled supporters’ associations and the active work that they’re doing.

And this is kind of coming at you, really, Diane, because you are having an offshoot from the Trust to create a DSA at Chelsea. I mean, why do you feel that the club or the supporter base needed to have a disabled supporters’ association and couldn’t just work under the trust?

Diane: The Trust said they’d neglected disabled supporters. It wasn’t something that was high on their agenda, if you will. I guess it was never brought to their attention. So, the reason why I thought it was really important was our voices needed to be heard. We needed to have our say in what happens in the stadium on match day, for away days, and for us to be heard without fear. that’s come up quite a lot, that people were afraid and still are afraid. I’ve tried to kind of like, say to them, just come through me, which is, I guess, how it all started. If people were afraid to speak to the club, I wasn’t. I was never afraid. I would happily voice things that were going wrong and, you know, as time went on and on and more people were coming to me with issues and problems, it was kind of like, we need something here. Everyone needs to have that voice, because otherwise you just get silenced.

Liam: My question really would be to you, Niraj. This might be an unfair question, but you were non disabled and then had your accident and then became disabled. When you didn’t have your disability. I mean, how much engagement did you have regarding disability? Was it even in your periphery?

Niraj: Well, as Diane was speaking, I was thinking exactly that. I used to get the park and ride from the racecourse and on every journey there’d be this one gentleman in a wheelchair at the front of the bus and I’d look at him and wave to him and within 30 seconds I’d forgotten about anything and was thinking about the football match itself. No, is a simple answer. I didn’t really give much thought. Obviously, if there was someone disabled and they needed assistance and there was no one else around, then I’d be quite happy to offer it. But that’s as far as it went there. There wasn’t much more thought than that. I think as Simone is saying, and Diane, we’re all saying, as educating people, there are more and more people, and things like ADHD and various other types of hidden kind of disabilities is becoming more and more apparent, not just in the sports world, but generally speaking. So, I think people are getting more and more aware of it. I think people are a bit scared and frightened of what to do if they encounter somebody. I think that’s particularly an issue. And one of the things I was really impressed with when I went to Spurs is their stewards had different coloured lanyards and different coloured bibs on to signify that these people are qualified to deal with disabled supporters because they were trained for it. And I think, every club should have some of them like that. And we’re going to be certainly looking to try and implement that.

Liam Bird: And Brian, why is it important that a club does have a DSA?

Brian: I think, again, what we’ve said so far, it needs to get that commonality of voice to make sure that people don’t feel that they’re on their own, that it’s only them that are complaining. You know, there is a collective responsibility on us to ensure that the issues raised by individuals are resolved by either with the club or with other supporters’ groups, or just other supporters. And I think also, Liam, that there is a huge opportunity to campaign on this, this whole respect of giving people space, making people aware of hidden disabilities, so that it becomes more inclusive. And as Niraj rightly, pointed out there, it’s not necessarily in our conscious thought that people are having difficulties in grounds, in access, in transport, where in point of fact, we all know intrinsically they are having problems. So, what can we do about it? And that is the purpose, I believe, of all clubs having a DSA, to ensure that those things are addressed.

Liam: And, David, why is it important that disabled supporters engage – actively engage with their local DSA?

David: I think it’s the only way that we can learn from what fans are thinking and how they’re feeling when they support their club, whether that be home, games or away games. You know, we got negative feedback from our trip to Huddersfield this season because we went on a Saturday shortly after Sunderland had been, during the week, and the toilets had been – basically had been ransacked and they hadn’t been repaired in time, some of them. So, I have Crohn’s, ah, disease, for example. So, I’m quite aware of toilet facilities, of football matches, and when you see the locks broken in the away toilets and you’re thinking, you know, it’s not very good for people who have got bowel disease, for example. And so, you get feedback. It’s the only way that you can really get feedback is if you have some sort of comment system in place which a DSA can really act as a conduit for fans to give this vital feedback and try and look at ways of making supporters’ lives easier. Especially, I think travelling to away matches is one of the difficult ones. When there’s so much noise and antisocial behaviour going on, it makes it difficult for people with ADHD and things like that. They find it very, very traumatising sometimes. And back to the educating our supporters, that’s a difficult one, isn’t it? Trying to educate them on people’s needs when they have an autistic tendency or something like that, but we can learn from the experiences and we can learn from good ones as well, so the DSA plays a huge role in bringing it all together and feeding things back.

Liam: I feel like we can keep talking for another hour, but we won’t. So, I’ll make this my last question and I’ll go around the table with this. Looking back in your first year, what advice would you give to others who are thinking about starting a DSA at their club? I’ll start with you, Brian.

Brian: Comes down to three simple things. Talk to the club, get engagement with the club, tell them what you’re trying to do. See how much support they can give. Talk to yourselves at Level Playing Field. You’ve got the framework, you’ve got the contacts that new DSAs are going to need. And thirdly, really ask the experience of others. We talked about it before. Other DSAs, particularly DSAs that are just in front of you in their maturity. It’s not always the guys that have been around for 20 years that’s going to be the most useful for a new DSA. It’s going to be the ones that are. That are going through the journey now in one, two years involvement that might give you the most relevant steer on setting up your DSA.

Diane: Diane, take your time. Take your time because you need to get it set up right. Rushing it and rushing it too quickly might be a bit of a mistake. We still aren’t completely launched, but I think we’ve done really, really well with the year that we’ve sort of like where we’re at now, so. And that’s taking its time again, that whole – you need to have a really good relationship with your club, contacting you and other DSAs.

Liam: David?

David: Build relationships with your club’s fans liaison team, the DLO. Build relationships with DSAs around you, you know, in Hull, we’re the end of the motorway in Hull, so we have to sort of reach out in a slightly different direction to the likes of Chelsea and so on. We sort of heading inwards, if you like. But we’ve made contact with Leeds United and other clubs and, as we mentioned earlier, Coventry have been really proactive on social media, promote things like the EFL highlights a bit at the end of EFL highlights, every week features a different club and the work that they’re doing in their community. And quite often it’s disability based. You know, you can draw attention to people like that. They can seek it out then on the ITV player and they can go back and watch things that other clubs are doing and yeah, the ones who’ve been around like a long time, the Swanseas and the Cardiffs, who’ve got ambassadors, they’ll give you a viewpoint for a long-term plan. Brian’s right, you probably need to lean on a more recently formed DSA for your short-term goals. But if you want to look at long-term goals, reach out to the guys at Swansea because they will come back and help you.

Liam: Niraj?

Niraj: Well, everything that everyone else has said, the one only thing I would like to add is when I was on FAB and I was speaking to Gillian, who’s the chair of the time, about setting up a DSA, I was petrified, completely petrified. So, the first thing I thought was I need someone good, someone experience to partner with. And Brian was absolutely fantastic and continues to be fantastic with the experience he’s got in working in his career and m working with, he’s got contacts with other supporters’ groups. So, I’m learning as I go along. So having someone beside you on your side who’s experienced, I think is very, very important.

Liam: Simone?

Simone: Kind of echo things that have already been said, really. You know, take your time, don’t try and run before you can walk. Really kind of get to know your club, get to know your stadium and your surroundings, and get to know each other. So, when you’re first forming your committee, it’s really important to get to know each other and share them, share the roles as well. Share the burden. Don’t take everything on yourself as a chair. You know, allocate roles, dish things out and you know, if you’ve got that, that collaborative work in, just kind of set the standards really for going forward. And like other people have said, getting to know other clubs, other DSAs and just sharing good practise because then everyone will improve and do the best that they can for their supporters at their club.

Liam: Perfect. Thank you so much to all of you for giving up your time. I know this has kind of overrun a little bit now, but I really do appreciate, that you’ve given up so much of your time and anyone listening who would like to know more about the respected DSAs who have taken part in this podcast. We’ll have links in the episode description so therefore you can find out a bit more information about them. If you’d like to know more about how to set up a DSA or know if your respective club actually has a DSA, please contact Level Playing Field via email at info@levelplayingfield.org.uk that’s it for this episode. If you go into a sporting event, please have a fantastic time. Till next time, Bye bye.

Mix: Nice to meet you all. Thank you!