How is men’s mental health affected within male professional football?

Research question: How is men’s mental health affected within male professional football? Research methods: Within this qualitative study, eighteen current first-team professional footballers were interviewed from across the English Football League (EFL) to explore how male professional footballers are affected by mental health. Braun and Clarke’s thematic analysis (2006) was applied along with “The Silences Framework” [Serrant-Green, L. (2010). The sound of “silence”: A framework for researching sensitive issues or marginalised perspectives in health. Journal of Research in Nursing, 16(4), 347–360] to allow the voices of this marginalised group to be heard. Results and findings: The five key themes of social networks, environment, masking vulnerabilities, help-seeking and support, and mental health emerged from the data. The mental health theme is split into two sub themes: impact on self and reaction of others. Implications: This study makes an original contribution to the knowledge base as it is the first study to innovatively apply The Silences Framework to a sporting context. This study has applied The Silences Framework to show that professional footballers are affected by their mental health, and without appropriate access to support they continue to suffer in silence. This is likely to have negative consequences in their personal life, their football career, and their eventual transition away from being a professional footballer