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At the end of November, Svenska Fotbollssupporterunionen, SFSU, hosted their 10th AGM in Helsingborg. In connection to the meeting, workshops were held on the themes of communication and financial solutions. The topics gave a lot of knowledge and inspiration to the member organisations, ahead of another busy season in Swedish football. The first day kicked off with a presentation from Patrik Sundberg from Allmänna Supporterklubben and the media bureau POST. With his experienc

The SLO requirement enters its sixth season, as SD Europe celebrates its tenth anniversary celebrated its first AGM with representatives from 15 different countries. In the ten years of SD Europe’s existence, structured dialogue has been a core part of the organisation, materialising in the introduction of the Supporter Liaison Officer requirement in the UEFA Club Licensing and Financial Fair Play Regulations (Article 35) in 2012/13. It has been a busy five years for the SLO

On May 24th, this year’s Europa League final was played in Stockholm between AFC Ajax and Manchester United. In total six SLOs from the three Stockholm clubs (AIK, Djurgården and Hammarby) were on duty in order to advise colleagues from the two finalists as well as visiting fans. The focus for the SLO support team was on service, logistics and providing local knowledge. “This was the first time a team of local SLOs was deployed at a major European final. It is to be hoped tha

Eleven SLOs were represented at the meeting, and the network has grown by 40% The SLOs who attended the second club SLO European network meeting at the VELTINS Arena in Gelsenkirchen were as follows: Adrian Gruenig (FC Basel, Switzerland), Beverley Mayer (St. Johnstone, Scotland), Andrey Kyuchukov (Dunav Russe, Bulgaria), Kiriakos Giantsidis (PAOK, Greece), Lasse Bauer (Brøndby, Denmark), Maurice Dumas (Feyenoord, Netherlands), Riccardo Bertolin (Roma, Italy), Thomas Kirschne

The event will build further on the previous two workshops, on Governance and Finance, as well as the 16 exchange visits between the partners. The initiative is co-financed by the Erasmus+ programme of the European Union and Uefa. The third workshop of SD Europe‘s Erasmus+ project will be take place this weekend (16-18/6) at the stadium of Schalke 04, one of the biggest member-run clubs in the world, and in Germany, the country most suitable to welcome an event on members and

As part of SD Europe’s Erasmus+ project ‘Clubs and Supporters for Better Governance in Football’ Supporters in Campo from Italy will visit Sweden to take part in the Summer meeting held by SFSU in Malmö 10-11 of June. Over the 2 days topics as ‘Positive Supporters Initiatives’,  ‘Democracy in football’,  ‘Development in Sweden’, ‘Democracy and membership governance in Italy’ and more will be discussed. Sofia Bohlin Sofia Bohlin, Chairperson of SFSU says: “Our annual summer me

On International Women’s day, March 8th, the Swedish Alliance for Women in Sport (SAFWIS) hosted their first annual sports gala. Among speakers were the Minister of Sports, Gabriel Wikström and Brianna Newland, Assistant Professor at University of Delaware. At the event, held in Stockholm, 50 role models was presented and Sofia Bohlin, board member of SD Europe and chairperson of SFSU, was one of them. “- It’s a great honour and I am proud that women’s involvement in sports i

With the Swedish football season over for another year, the time was right for a delegation of supporter liaison officers (SLOs) to pay a visit to Germany to exchange experiences with and learn more about the work of their counterparts at two German clubs. The visiting delegation was made up of SLOs from 12 Swedish clubs plus Madeleine Ödquist of the Swedish Football League (SEF), who organised the trip in association with SD Europe. While in Germany, the SLOs held meetings w

This weekend, Supporters in Campo will welcome their fellow Clubs and Supporters for Better Governance in Football project partners Svenskafotbollssupporterunionen (SFSU) to Verona, where the organisation will hold its General Assembly. The event will also serve as the first in a series of project exchange visits between partners. Hosted by founder members Verona Col Cuore, the supporters’ trust at Hellas Verona, the main aim of the event is to allow Supporters in Campo’s mem

The recent UEFA Europa League qualifying match between HJK and IFK Gothenburg in Helsinki presented a great opportunity for a bilateral exchange of experiences on the role of the SLO. Two days of discussions began on matchday -1 when Ville Nylund, event manager and SLO coordinator of the Football Association of Finland (FAF), met with the Christian Olsson, a member of IFK’s SLO team, to talk about the SLO work in Gothenburg and Sweden as a whole with a view to developing the

Apart from the regular standard training, education and strategy meetings, 2015/16 saw a number of developments of landmark importance in the evolution of the SLO project. In January 2016 SD Europe were awarded observer status on the Standing Committee of the European Convention on Spectator Violence (TR-V) for a renewable period of three years. And towards the end of the season SD Europe organised, with the support of UEFA, the inaugural European SLO network meeting in Swede

The date has been set for the first Clubs and Supporters for better Governance in Football project workshop: from 13-15 June, project partners and contributing organisations will gather at FC United of Manchester for two days of debate, discussion and collaboration; all under the theme of Governance. It’s a word that has become ubiquitous in sporting circles over recent years, and as such, governance can be defined in many ways. This workshop will address those debates, but a

SD Europe’s SLO coordinator, Stuart Dykes, spoke to the 50 or so delegates in attendance about the SLO work in Sweden set against the European context. Other presentations were given by representatives of the Stockholm police, two Djurgården SLOs (on behalf of all three alliance clubs), and the City of Stockholm. Delegates also heard about the ticketing policy in place at Hammarby and the ENABLE project, which seeks to identify, share and develop good practice in the manageme

2014/15 has been another busy year for the SLO project as various licensing bodies across Europe organised training workshops or events for their club SLOs, the UEFA SLO bilateral meetings were introduced, new translated and localised handbooks were published, initiatives with direct impact on the SLO were started, there was an effort for its better understanding by and cooperation with non-football stakeholders, its communications improved with a new UEFA electronic newslett

Read the original article here. Violence in Swedish football has been reduced by at least 20% since 2012, SEF say, and Supporter Liaison Officers (SLOs) are playing a key role in it, as “their hard work is spreading consensus among the fans“. SEF’s moto is “Everyone is welcome and everyone should feel safe at a football stadium” and they describe SLOs as “people from the fan base who have a good knowledge of their club and its supporters and are responsible for the interactiv

In December 2014, the steering committee of the Swedish SLOs met in Göteborg together with security officers and representatives of the Swedish FA and League, following an announcement by the police for the introduction of a national strategy on security issues. All representatives expressed their concern on the effectiveness of the strategy and also the approach of the police towards security, as it suggests a seven-step action plan with the final being the stop of football