MY GAME IS FAIR PLAY

My Game is Fair Play”

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Fair play is a fundamental part of the game of football. It represents the positive benefits of playing by the rules, using common sense and respecting fellow players, referees, opponents and fans.

To give fair play more visibility, FIFA created a programme that turned the generic notion into a simple design and an easy-to-understand code of conduct that must be recognised and respected by players and fans alike. While fair play should apply in football throughout the year, FIFA has, since 1997, dedicated one week of its international match calendar every year to praising and promoting the spirit of fair play. During these FIFA Fair Play Days, FIFA calls on its member associations to organise activities dedicated to fair play and to highlight its importance both on and off the pitch.

Fair play is also acknowledged and rewarded at every FIFA tournament. The Technical Study Group evaluates and rates the behaviour on and off the pitch of all participating teams in a FIFA competition. The FIFA Fair Play Award is then conferred upon the team with the best fair play score during the tournament.
The Annual FIFA Fair Play Award , presented at the FIFA Ballon d’Or gala, recognises special acts of fair play and often goes to individuals or groups who otherwise enjoy little share of the spotlight.

 

World Fair Play Day all around the world

(FIFA.com) Saturday 26 June 1999

Referees all around the world can look forward to a weekend of trouble-free matches on 26 and 27 June as FIFA marks its third World Fair Play Day.

National associations, their leagues and clubs will once again be joining in the global movement to promote Fair Play in word and deed, on the pitch and off it.

The focus of attention will be on matches at the Women?s World Cup in the United States, with a total of eight matches to be played that weekend in Chicago, New York, Boston and Washington DC, including those between the United States and North Korea, and Germany and Brazil.

The impact of last year?s World Fair Play Day in the middle of France 98 helped make it a major success, especially with the historic photograph of the US and Iran teams posing together before the match. Similarly, it was decided to hold this year?s Fair Play Day again in the framework of a World Championship ? while all national associations are being encouraged to run their own projects, especially at grass-roots level.

It is the third time that FIFA has co-ordinated a weekend of Fair Play activities among its 203 member associations. The previous two editions have seen a series of activities at national level, with the FIFA Fair Play logo always in evidence in the stadiums. The distinctive logo also appears on a variety of items, such as the captains? armbands, referees? coins, water-bottles, T-shirts, caps and pennants -- as well as the ten-point FIFA Code of Conduct, which reads :

For the Good of the Game, Always:

1. Play to win
2. Play fair
3. Observe the Laws of the Game
4. Respect opponents, team-mates, referees, officials and spectators.
5. Accept defeat with dignity.
6. Promote the interests of football.
7. Reject corruption, drugs, racism, violence and other dangers to our sport.
8. Help others to resist corrupting pressures.
9. Denounce those who attempt to discredit our sport.
10. Honour those who defend football's good reputation.

The World celebrates FIFA Fair Play Day

(FIFA.com) Tuesday 16 September 1997

Football matches throughout the world next weekend (September 20/21) will be united under the single banner of Fair Play as associations, leagues, clubs and players all join together to celebrate FIFA World FIFA Fair Play Day.

Earlier this year, FIFA chose the coming weekend as the first-ever World Fair Play day, as it fell in the busiest period of football worldwide and also coincided with the final of the FIFA Under-17 World Championship for the JVC Cup, in Egypt.

FIFA’s guest of honor in Cairo will be Sir Bobby Charlton, who will walk out with the teams in the Cairo National Stadium and send messages of Fair Play to viewers throughout the world.

But Fair Play will also be at the center of football attention in dozens of other countries, big and small. For example:

• In England, children will carry in oversized FIFA Fair Play flags at all the Premier League matches.
  
  
  
• Children will walk hand-in-hand with the players at all the Bundesliga matches in Germany.
  
  
  
• No less then 216 matches in Tunisia will feature the ten points of the FIFA Code of Conduct around their stadia.
  
  
  
• In Nigeria, seminars and clinics are being organized for school children and there is a national essay-writing competition on the theme of Fair Play.
  
  
  
• Referees and coaches meet at Fair Play seminars in Azerbaijan, where players will also feature in a TV debate.
  
  
  
• Teams winning matches in Chile will stand to applaud their beaten opponents off the pitch and families at youth tournaments will exchange symbolic gifts with the families of their opponents.
  
  
  
• The message of Fair Play will be focused on at all levels on the island of Cuba, including sports academies and national team training sessions.
  
  
  
• The opening ceremonies at the Asian World Cup qualifying matches will also be focusing on spreading the Fair Play in the symbolic team hand-shake ceremony.

Many other countries will be running a variety of Fair Play projects, including messages on scoreboards and loudspeakers, articles in match programs, features in newspapers and magazines and TV and radio programs. FIFA has also distributed a special Fair Play video clip to TV stations in some 100 countries.