Women's World Cup integrity briefing

UEFA and the nine European national associations taking part in this summer’s FIFA Women’s World Cup finals in France have been briefed about integrity measures to be implemented for the tournament.

A workshop in Madrid, organised by the world football body FIFA and hosted by the Royal Spanish Football Federation (RFEF), involved tournament hosts France, as well as England, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Scotland, Spain and Sweden – the nine associations from this continent contesting the world women’s national team title at the finals from 7 June to 7 July.

It was the last in a series of three workshops staged this month in which FIFA, the 24 national associations participating in the tournament and their respective continental confederations have joined forces for a comprehensive briefing on integrity activities around the finals – providing the participants with a platform to share expert knowledge on football matches and competition protection initiatives.

UEFA Integrity Officers from the nine European teams joined UEFA representatives in Madrid©RFEF

In Madrid, the nine European associations’ integrity officers gained a particularly crucial insight into how integrity operations will work at world football’s most important women’s national team event.

UEFA has set up a network of integrity officers within its 55 national associations, who are liaising with the local law enforcement agencies, and are also implementing education and prevention schemes in their respective countries.

The agenda for the European gathering in Madrid included a range of interactive activities, individual and group exercises, and case studies - including presentations from UEFA and the French Football Federation (FFF) - that aim to prevent any method, such as match manipulation or corruption, which might jeopardise the integrity of the game.

“All three workshops were a great success and will definitely help to protect the integrity of the competition,” said Vincent Ven, FIFA head of integrity.

“UEFA is pleased to offer its support and share its expertise as part of the implementation of a comprehensive and collaborative integrity programme around the FIFA Women’s World Cup,” added Angelo Rigopoulos, UEFA’s managing director of integrity and regulatory.

For a number of years, UEFA has been running extensive integrity activities in a bid to rid football of the scourge of match-fixing and corruption, and has developed, and finances, a number of initiatives designed to protect the integrity of the European game.

These include a betting fraud detection system covering more than 30,000 European matches each year; onsite and online education programmes for players, referees and club coaches; a code of conduct, established in cooperation with football's stakeholders; a wide-ranging regulatory framework; formal cooperation agreements with European law enforcement agencies; a permanent working group on match-fixing; and a confidential reporting platform which allows individuals to provide information to UEFA concerning match-fixing or corruption.

“As important as actions is the cooperation between football associations. The saying ‘together we are stronger’ has special importance when the protection of football is concerned,” said Alfredo Lorenzo Mena, the RFEF’s integrity officer.

“This meeting [in Madrid] is a practical example of the determination of football governing bodies to keep football clean and without any unlawful interferences.”

Click here to read about UEFA’s integrity activities

Click here for further information on FIFA’s work in the field of integrity in football