Safe sport
Grooming Warning Signs in Youth Sport: What Safeguarding Guidance Lists
Grooming warning signs in youth sport fall into two groups: changes in how a child behaves around training and matches, and changes outside sport, such as secrecy, unexplained gifts or a friendship with a much older person. The NSPCC Child Protection in Sport Unit (CPSU) defines grooming as the process of trapping and preparing a child, the adults around them and even the environment so that abuse can happen. The signs below come from its published guidance and are indicators for attention, not proof that abuse is taking place.
How does grooming work in a sports setting?
The CPSU describes grooming as a core part of many sexual abuse cases, and notes that children can also be groomed for radicalisation or criminal exploitation. Abuse can occur in sports clubs, online and in public spaces.
Its guidance lists the tactics people may use inside a club: seeking access through jobs or volunteer roles with regular contact with children, testing whether small rule breaches are challenged, building trust through attention or gifts, and using control over training time or facilities to make a child dependent or isolated. The table summarises these as the page presents them.
| Tactic | What the guidance describes |
|---|---|
| Seeking access | Applying for roles with regular contact with children, especially where boundaries or policies are unclear |
| Testing the culture | Breaking small rules to see whether anyone challenges them, then going further if they do not |
| Building trust | Offering advice, attention or gifts to the child, their family or other volunteers, and becoming seen as indispensable |
| Exploiting power | Using control over training time or facilities to create dependence or isolation |
| Keeping secrets | Using secrets to control or frighten a child and to create shame and silence |
| Manipulation | Reverse psychology or strategic withdrawal so the child feels in control or guilty |
| Online communication | Using social media or messaging apps, sometimes posing as someone else, which can move grooming away from the club and speed it up |
Source: NSPCC Child Protection in Sport Unit, Protecting children in sport from grooming and sexual abuse
What warning signs can appear within sport?
The CPSU lists several signs that may be visible to coaches, welfare officers and other parents at a club.
Because grooming also targets the adults around a child, the guidance treats changes in adult behaviour and weak boundaries in the club as part of the picture, not only changes in the child.
- Sudden changes in participation
- Avoiding training, sessions, games, matches or events
- Becoming withdrawn or upset, or being unable to focus
- Fear of certain places or areas
- Fear of certain people
What signs may appear away from sport?
Outside the club, the CPSU lists sudden behaviour changes, including spending more or less time online, being absent or missing from home or school, and being secretive about how time is spent. It also lists unexplained gifts, misuse of alcohol or drugs, a friendship or relationship with a much older person, sexual health problems, sexual language the child would not be expected to know, being upset or withdrawn, and mental health problems.
NSPCC advice reproduced by the Team Grassroots site defines grooming as building an emotional connection with a child to gain their trust, and adds that signs in older children can resemble normal teenage behaviour. The CPSU also notes that abusers tend to target vulnerable children, for example those in care, d/Deaf or disabled children, or children with low self-esteem, and that vulnerability can be short term, such as after a house move or bereavement.
What are clubs advised to do?
The CPSU recommends safer recruitment with references and vetting checks, while noting that vetting only catches people already known to the authorities. It also recommends challenging small breaches of codes of conduct every time, training so that everyone understands acceptable behaviour, and clear reporting steps so people know concerns will be handled properly and confidentially.
Further advice covers online communication in policies and codes of conduct, listening to children and involving them in decisions, and keeping an open culture in which acceptable behaviour is discussed. Concerns should go to the club welfare officer and be reported under the national governing body's policy. The guidance gives Childline (0800 1111) for children and the NSPCC helpline (0808 800 5000) for adults.
The Whyte Review of British gymnastics found that allegations of sexual abuse, including grooming, featured in about 30 submissions, and that these behaviours did not appear systemic in the way physical and emotional abuse did. It also noted a better understanding within the sport of sexual abuse than of the effects of physical and emotional abuse.
