Sky Sports premiere ‘Football’s Toughest Opponent’ climate change documentary

Sky Sports have aired a new hour-long documentary called ‘Football’s Toughest Opponent’ shedding light on the beautiful game’s climate crisis.

The documentary delves into the relationship between the climate and football, exploring how the sport contributes to climate change, and what those within football – from governing bodies to clubs; managers to players – are doing to respond.

The threat of the climate crisis is a very real one for football clubs, fans and players across the world, the extreme weather conditions now being seen in the UK having a huge impact. In Football For Future’s recent short film ‘Play On: Football’s Climate Story’, Tadcaster Albion AFC’s chairman Andy Charlesworth explained the impact, stating:

“Our club has been flooded seven times since 2020, and it’s clear this is as a result of climate change. The sad thing is – we’re not the only ones. Clubs across the country and around the world are also suffering the effects of storms, extreme heat etcetera.

“If you listen to the scientists, it’s only going to get worse. If we want to play on, we need to keep raising awareness; improve flood defences; and act now to stop climate change from getting worse. Non-League clubs can only do so much.”

In ‘Football’s Toughest Opponent’ the audience are told how, by author of ‘Playing Against the Clock’ David Goldblatt, how extreme flooding will impact nearly a quarter of stadiums in the country: “Extreme weather leads to extreme flooding.

“In England, this is really serious. My calculations are that around a quarter of professional stadiums in the top four leagues are under threat of annual flooding or actually being under water by 2050.

“When we talk about coastal stadiums under threat, Southampton’s St Mary’s is really close to the water and really low. Grimsby’s Blundell Park and Scunthorpe’s Glanford Park are in quite a bit of trouble.”

Current manager of Southampton, one of the club’s that are under threat from potential flooding, Ralph Hasenhüttl, was asked about the 2021 northern Europe flooding in Sky Sports’ documentary:

“It affected everybody, nobody could imagine that this could happen so quickly. The intensity of the rainfall, I think we have never seen before, and this was surprising for everybody. And it has to be because of the warming of the climate because this is the only thing that really changed, and this was the reason so many problems in Germany and Austria this season.”

Football’s Toughest Opponent is available On Demand on Sky Sports.