For many, sport can be seen as the perfect distraction for those wanting to escape the pressures of everyday life. Whether it’s finding a new sports club, supporting your local football team or going to support a loved one on a Saturday morning, sport and its impact on people’s mental wellbeing is a link that only seems to be getting stronger. This connection is one that couldn’t be more emphasised than here, in our fine city. Through Norwich City FC’s trailblazing campaigns for World Mental Health Day as well as UEA Sport’s fundraising for men’s mental health campaign ‘Movember’, you would struggle to find a place doing more to emphasise mental health in sport than Norwich. As a result, it is only right to highlight and praise the work of those inspiring these initiatives. 

Over the past year, Norwich City FC’s work with suicide prevention charity Samaritans has been praised right across the sporting community. “Incredibly Powerful” was the response from the football body ‘UEFA’ in response to an incredibly moving video brought forward by Norwich City for World Mental Health Day in 2023. The video aimed to highlight some of the underlying issues of those suffering and to encourage everyone to always check in on the people around you even if they seem okay. Radio host Roman Kemp called the video in a post on Twitter as, “the best bit of Mental Health Awareness I’ve ever seen.” Although, Norwich City’s efforts to emphasise mental health didn’t end there. 

In addition to Norwich City’s inspiring video of 2023, before their 4-0 win against Hull City in October this year, all the 25,000 players and fans inside Carrow Road took part in football’s first ever ‘minute unsilenced’. With statistics showing suicide takes someone’s life in the UK every 90 minutes, the length of a football match, Norwich City took the chance to allow fans and players to interact with their feelings and check in on those around them. To add to the already special atmosphere taking place, on standby at the stadium were Samaritans volunteers there for those who needed support and guidance during the extraordinary event. In a 90-second video produced by the club after the event titled ‘Break the Silence’ you could clearly see that fans were truly taken back by the event. One of the video’s creative directors, Jay Phillips, stated that “The ‘1-minute unsilenced’ felt like a great way to fans starting a conversation. Not just in the stands, but in pubs and at home too.” This was supported by Neil Clarke one of the videos other directors who argued that “by talking about mental health challenges, making it part of life and normalising it… we all have a chance to stop someone we love from disappearing forever.” Not only have Norwich City helped raise awareness, but they’ve broken ground in the football community. It will be fascinating to see whether the FA and teams across the country will be inspired to raise awareness themselves. I personally hope to see organisations not just in football but across sport in general look at Norwich City’s work and put in foundations to make the ‘minute unsilenced’ and other initiatives a regular occurrence throughout the country. 

However, it’s not just our city’s football club where the relationship between Sport and Mental Health is being highlighted. Here on campus, UEA Sport has been a firm supporter of the Men’s mental health campaign ‘Movember’. A campaign that seeks to take on issues surrounding most notably Male suicide as well as prostate and testicular cancer, ‘Movember’ is one of the largest mental health charities in the UK. With suicide being the highest killer of men under the age of 50 and too many being taken from us too early, ‘Movember’ seeks to break down many of the stigmas’ people currently face and want to help people come to terms with their issues. With these objectives at its front and centre, UEA and its use of sport to raise awareness, has been able to raise thousands of pounds for the ‘Movember’ campaign in the last few years. Whether it’s people growing moustaches, going on daily runs and walks or charity bake sales fundraisers have become the new craze within the UEA sporting community.  

As the UEA fundraising total continues towards its goal of £20,000 for this calendar month, it’s not only the students who are doing their efforts to raise awareness for the ‘Movember’ campaign. We had the pleasure of speaking to Chiara Tecchio, the Student Sport Marketing Coordinator at UEA Sport, who has been hard at work on a fascinating project into the complex relationship our students have with sport and the effects it has on their mental health. In conversation with us she highlighted that she was, “highly intrigued by people’s lived experiences, and how those have shaped their perception of the world.” She told us that after her chats with some students that, “the link between mental health and sport is nuanced.”  She emphasised that despite an overarching theme of sport enabling people to, “escape, to tap into another dimension and to find community,”, sport can also be incredibly demanding on people’s mental health. Therefore, sport and its nuanced relationship with people’s mental health only emphasises the reason to applaud these initiatives and highlight that mental health awareness in sport can save lives. Chiara will be presenting her work in a documentary expected to be released to the UEA Sport YouTube channel by the end of November and I would highly recommend you spare the time to watch it if you can. 

Consequently, the role that sport has on raising awareness for Mental Health issues cannot be put in higher regard. With our city at the heart of this message the relationship between sport and mental health will only continue to grow. To support these initiatives and especially that of UEA Sport’s ‘Movember’ fund, I couldn’t encourage you more to sponsor and support those fundraising and help the University reach £20,000 raised before the end of the month.