Fight for space and respect: Hessian amateur football in the crisis!

Fight for space and respect: Hessian amateur football in the crisis!

At the weekend, the football community in Berlin meets the DFB Cup final, while the challenges in amateur football in Hesse increase at the same time. Representatives of Hessian amateur football shed light on the current situation against the background of growing problems and visited clubs in Offenbach and Frankfurt. For example, Kickers Offenbach's U17 girls' group, who fights for the title. But assistant coach Alexander Zenker expresses his concerns about the low interest in amateur games compared to the Bundesliga.

Zenker draws attention to the difficulties that are recruited by trainers and referees. Referees are often not available, which subsequently leads to game cancellations and improvised solutions. The negative treatment of young referees by parents and trainers is particularly worrying, which harms the already under pressure. The picture is particularly dreary in rural areas, where there is a lack of coaches, while there is space problems in urban regions, the hessenschau .

overloaded places and youth training

The situation is further illustrated by reports by Harald Seehausen, the President of SG Grün-Weiß Bornheim. He speaks of eleven clubs that have to train and play in parallel in parallel. His hopes for an expansion of the association area are low, since the building site in Frankfurt is extremely valuable. On the positive side, however, Silke Sinning, the President of the Hessian Football Association, notes, rising figures in boys and girls' football. The SG Grün-Weiß Bornheim has decided to become active and train 16 young people in dealing with children to win future coaches.

In addition, the association offers internships for students and maintains close contacts with schools to win even more young coaches. Despite the numerous challenges, people like Zenker and Seehausen are passionate about amateur football.

violence against referee - a worrying phenomenon

Another urgent topic that dominates the discussion about amateur football is violence against referees. According to the Hessian Ministry of the Interior, the 2022/2023 season had 289 games or physical attacks on referees, which corresponds to 0.25 percent of the total of 113,902 games from the 5th division. These figures have risen in some cases over the past few years: While 270 incidents were still counted in the 2021/2022 season, there were 216 in 2019/2020 and 364 in 2018/2019. From 2018 to 2022, the police registered a total of 395 crimes, mostly assault, while at least eleven of these crimes were directed against referees in 2018, 2019 and 2022, such as fr.de reported.

Potential frightening incidents, such as a father's threat to a 15-year-old referee and the tragic death of a 15-year-old player after fighting, have again fueled the debate about violence in amateur football. State Secretary Sauer has made it clear that such incidents are incompatible with the values ​​of sport. The state government therefore promotes projects for violence prevention and fairness in sports in cooperation with clubs and the Hessian Football Association to stop this questionable development.

a positive signal from the DFB

At the same time, there are positive trends from the area of ​​the DFB. The annual surveys on the situation of amateur football show that more soccer games were played in the 2023/2024 season than in previous years. The DFB refers to the positive developments that reports that the total number of incidents of violence and discrimination has dropped by 6.3 percent. In the current season, 909 games were canceled, which represents a decrease of 5.5 percent compared to 963 in the previous year. This indicates a general improvement, despite an increase in the number of games performed, as in a contribution to dfb.de

The challenges in amateur football are diverse, but the commitment of the clubs and the positive trends in the DFB show that there are also bright spots. It is to be hoped that the discussions on the DFB Cup final in Berlin will lead to strengthening amateur football and combating violence and discrimination.