JFA creates new coaching licenses for female coaches

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The Japan Football Association (JFA) has announced plans to create an Associate-Pro (A-Pro) Licence Coaching Course to produce more female coaches.

Japan is set to introduce the WE League, a new women’s football league in 2021 – the A-Pro license and course has been created to see women become coaches at WE League clubs.

The JFA said that the league will be the foundation for growth of women’s football in Japan.

“This project was launched with the intention to reignite the popularity of women’s football in Japan ahead of the kick-off of the WE League. Football’s player population has currently hit the ceiling in Japan, but women’s football still has great potential for growth,” Vice Technical Director of the JFA Technical Committee, Ono Takeshi said.

“With the growth of our football family, more families will talk about football and attend more football matches, and that is the future we are envisioning. By making football part of our culture, we strongly believe that we can heighten the overall level of football in Japan.”

The course will involve both lectures and practical components. International opportunities such as training courses and language classes will also be held, with the hope that participants will be able to work overseas after the completion of the course.

“The ‘Nadeshiko Vision’ is a principle that is set to heighten the overall level of women’s football in Japan. In 2015, part of the article was amended from ‘everyone involved in women’s football’ to ‘everyone involved in Japanese football’,” Chair of JFA Women’s Committee, Imai Junko said.

“The development of women’s football cannot be accomplished without the support of the entire Japanese football community, and the development of women’s football will certainly contribute to raise the overall level of football in Japan.

“The participation of female coaches must be promoted at licensing programmes of all levels, and the support from technical committees and women’s committees from each prefectural FA is essential. We will provide our utmost efforts to achieve optimal and sustainable results (through the kick-off of the WE League and the A-Pro licence project).”

The WE League will become the top level of women’s football in Japan from autumn 2021. The new competition takes the place of the current Nadeshiko League and will feature between six to 10 teams.

The league’s name comes from the acronym for ‘women’s empowerment’ and is Japan’s first professional women’s football league.

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Capital Football Introduces Pink Armband to Protect Junior Referees

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Image Credit: Marist Canberra FC

Capital Football has launched a visible identification program for referees under 18, requiring them to wear a pink armband during matches. It’s intended to build awareness surrounding the concern across Australian football about the abuse driving young officials out of the game.

The Pink Armband Initiative, effective immediately across Capital Football’s competitions in the ACT and surrounding region, makes junior referees identifiable to players, coaches and spectators. The federation says the marker is designed to set clear behavioural expectations and signal that many match officials are minors still developing their skills.

Capital Football acknowledged a referee crisis as far back as 2022, at which point it restructured its entire referee department in partnership with Football Australia. The pink armband program is the latest layer of that response; this time by targeting the cultural conditions on match day rather than systems of recruitment and pay.

A problem that spans codes and states

Research has consistently linked referee abuse to declining retention rates, with officials quitting in growing numbers due to sustained mistreatment, a trend researchers warn will reduce the pool of skilled match officials available at all levels of the game. Studies also show that young, less experienced referees are disproportionately likely to be subject to abuse.

Capital Football is not alone in reaching for a visible solution. Similar programs operate across Football Queensland, Football South Australia, Football South Coast and several other federations, while Basketball Victoria and Basketball South Australia have adopted comparable measures through the Green Whistle initiative. The spread of these programs across codes and states reflects a shared administrative problem: many grassroots referees are teenagers and volunteers who do not officiate for money but because they love the game, and abuse is eroding that foundation.

For a federation overseeing nearly 29,000 registered players, fewer referees means fewer matches. Fewer matches means reduced participation. The pink armband is a low-cost intervention with structural consequences if it works.

Football Victoria Backs Campaign to Shield Junior Players from Gambling Harm

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More than 600 sporting clubs across Victoria have enrolled in a state government program designed to limit young players’ exposure to gambling, with Football Victoria now urging its community clubs to join before a late-July registration deadline.

The Love the Game initiative asks clubs to formally commit to a set of principles: refusing sports betting sponsorships, developing internal harm prevention policies, and building environments where coaches, parents and players are equipped to discuss gambling risks with children.

The program’s public health rationale has a sharper statistical edge than its community-facing materials suggest. A 2025 study of Victorian secondary school students aged 12 to 17 found that nearly 30% had gambled at some point, and among those who had gambled in the past year, 7.5% met the criteria for problem-gambling and a further 26.8% were classified as ‘at-risk’. The research, commissioned by the state government and published earlier this year, also found that students exposed to gambling venues and advertising were more likely to gamble or to do so in a risky manner.

The most recent Victorian Population Gambling Study found that Victorians aged 18 to 24 are the group least likely to gamble overall, yet carry the highest rates of harmful gambling across all age groups. Young people aged 18 to 34 are around five times more likely to bet on sports than older cohorts.

When the data lands at the clubhouse door

Football Victoria’s support for the program reflects a broader recognition within community sport that participation rates and club culture are connected. The environments clubs create shape whether young people stay in sport and what norms they carry with them into adulthood. For football specifically, which draws participants across a wide range of socioeconomic backgrounds, that responsibility is not evenly distributed. Approximately 440,000 Victorians, or 8.5 per cent of the state’s population, are classified as being at some risk of experiencing problem gambling.

The Victorian Government’s program gives clubs more than symbolic membership. Registered clubs receive practical tools to develop governance frameworks around gambling harm, resources for coaching staff and volunteers, and standing as part of a growing network of clubs taking a formal position on the issue.

Researchers have described the current framing of gambling harm as a matter of personal responsibility as inadequate, arguing it is a public health issue requiring a systemic response. Community football clubs, with their reach into households across the state, are one of the institutional levers available to make that response visible.

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