They handle such things as international relations, ethics and sports equity, elite player development and coaching.
The FA has also done many great things that have helped the game in England. An important thing for the future of English football is that we keep producing good young footballing talent. The FA has overseen this by setting up coaching academies and national football centres of excellence. These centres of excellence are where the best young footballers are sent to learn from the best coaches and trainers in England. This helps them progress, and lets them play with and against the best players in their age group. They also make sure that they are educated well, so that if they don’t make it in football, they do have a backup plan and other options.
The FA controls the England national team, and also appoints the manager. They have a say in who can and can’t be selected for various reasons.
One of the most recent, and high profile cases of the FA refusing to allow a player to be selected for the national team, is when they banned Rio Ferdinand from playing for England. Ferdinand was at the time being charged for failing to take a drugs test. Against the wishes of the England manager Sven Goran Eriksson, the FA refused to allow him to be selected whilst the case was pending.
The FA, through its extensive training programme for coaches, has always had as a priority improving the technical quality of coaches across the country. This in turn improves the quality of players, as better coaches mean better players.
The first step to become a coach is to enrol on a FA Coaching Course. By getting on the coaching ladder individuals have the opportunity to progress up through the various FA Coaching qualifications and to enhance their skills and knowledge in coaching.
The FA is also involved in running campaigns for the good of the game not only in England, but worldwide. Campaigns such as “kick it out” have been a huge success. “Kick it out” is a campaign aimed at eliminating racism from the game in any shape or form. It wants to remove racism from stands, pitches and from football in general. Due to the FA’s funding, the campaign has done a great job of achieving its goals, and is teaching the next generation of youngsters not to be racist.
Sean Halsey, P.E. homework, Ms Price
Football’s governing bodies
Just as the FA controls football in England, it in turn is controlled by European and worldwide governing bodies.
UEFA is the governing body for European football. It controls tournaments such as the UEFA Champion’s League and the UEFA cup. Its job is to make sure football is run properly over the whole of Europe, and it has a hand in decisions that affect football worldwide along with FIFA.
FIFA is the governing body for International football. Its decisions affect all international football teams and it has a hand in setting new rules and regulations for football as a whole.
