Sexism is still all too common in non-league football, according to Larkhall Athletic secretary and director Tracey Hill.
Tracey Hill has been Larkhall Athletic’s secretary for more than a decade and a football fan since the 1970s – but she says she is subjected to regular sexism | Photo © Richard Briggs | Inset photo courtesy of Tracey Hill
She says she is on the receiving end of sexist attitudes virtually every week, despite loving the sport since the 1970s, having attended games since the 1980s and having been involved as a football administrator for well over a decade.
And she is tired of the way she is treated by men who are clearly living in the Dark Ages as far as football is concerned.
Her experiences paint a shocking picture of football in 2025, with some men still regarding women as knowing nothing about the sport – a situation even more outrageous considering the rise of the women’s game in England and the Lionesses’ successes over recent years.
She told the Bath Echo: “I’ve loved football since I was really little. I’m from near London. From when I was about eight to 10, I was a Chelsea supporter briefly. My brother was Leeds United but Chelsea wore blue and I liked blue.
“By the time I was 11, definitely by the time I was 12, I was a Liverpool supporter and I’ve been Liverpool ever since. I had a poster of Kenny Dalglish in my bedroom when I was a teenager, all that kind of stuff.
“It was really tough liking football when you were a girl [in the 1970s]. I wasn’t able to play at that age. I went to an all-girls’ school, and I did ask them if we could play just five-a-side and they said ‘No way’.
“My brother played football all the time, and was taken to watch too, but it was never an option for me.
“The first game I ever went to, I think I was 17. I went to Highbury [Arsenal’s former home] with a mate. I think I went to Highbury twice and then I started going to Brentford a lot, because my mum’s ex was a season-ticket holder, so I could spend some time with my mum and go to the football.
“Brentford were in [the equivalent of] League One then. It was such a great ground [Brentford’s former home Griffin Park].
“I moved to Bath in 1993 and then moved to Larkhall in 1994, so I’ve been in Larkhall for more than 30 years.
“In 2007, Gerald Rich, who runs the greengrocers in the village and who’s been involved with the club for decades, finally wore me down – he said ‘You’ve got to come and see the Larks’. I was suddenly free on Saturdays so I said ‘OK, I’ll give it a go’.
“I went up with a mate and it was like ‘Oh my God, this is amazing, absolutely amazing’. It was Western League Division One. We got promoted that season into the Premier Division and then we went up to the Southern League in 2014.
“I became football secretary the year before that, so I had one year in the Western League. This is my 13th season as football secretary.
“But being a woman in non-league football is a challenge. I’ve been involved for such a long time and there are lots of clubs I know well, but even so I do struggle to be taken seriously by older people.
“There’s a massive backlash with some younger men as well.
“But the [Larkhall] players are pretty good. We were at Beaconsfield Town in the FA Cup [in August], a couple of players were warming up by the touchline and I was standing by the dugout.
“One player turned to me and said ‘What do you reckon [about the game]?’ and I was like ‘You’re actually asking me what I think of the game? OK, I’ll tell you’ and he said ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah’… oh God, that was amazing.
“I do know my football. I played six-a-side a bit when I was about 17 and I’ve been watching football enthusiastically for most of my life.
“I’m not so good on the tactics because I’m not involved in that capacity, but I write match reports and I understand what I’m looking at.
“I get asked kind of covert questions, very often at away games. People say ‘Is it your son playing?’ – and the unspoken question is ‘What are you doing here?’.
“It happens virtually every week, somebody says something. I get this all the time and I’m sick to death of it. But I’ll keep plugging away in the hope that I can change some men’s outdated views.”
