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34 // Ladies Gaelic Football Association PLAYER WELFARE SURVEY PEIL Winter | Issue No 4 | Volume 14 he LGFA circulated a Player Welfare Survey Mid 2018 to players on a range of topics to gather information and feedback about certain player related issues and concerns. The response rate was excellent with 1414 responses to the questionnaire. There were responses from every county in Ireland, along with Britain and International Units. There was data collected on a range of topics including: • C lub Ladies Gaelic football playing experience • Fixtures and Structures • Injury/ Player Welfare • Health, Wellbeing and Lifestyle The data gathered was carefully reviewed and analysed and a number of recommendations were made for consideration to help support player welfare issues. RECOMMENDATIONS Based on the findings, the following recommendations for the LGFA with regards to Club Player Welfare: 1. Develop a fixture planning workshop to be rolled out to all county boards. This workshop would focus on numbers of games, length of playing season, age group and maximising participation. 2. Identify and train LGFA Fixture Reviewers to assist counties to review their fixture plans and set master fixtures with aligned competition guidelines. 3. Increase online resources, campaigns and accessibility to key health and wellbeing issues with regards to concussion and mouth guards. 4. Explore the idea of creating more awareness of the injury fund scheme and how it operates. 5. Update the LGFA specific injury prevention warm-up and encourage players and coaches to understand the importance of recovery and recuperation after an injury. 6. Increase awareness of LGFA Coach Education courses including further promotion of the Key2Coaching workshop and what support and workshops are available to clubs. 7. Explore the idea of a Club Player Conference focused around mental health awareness, communication, exam/life stress, body image, peer support and addiction amongst other topics. This day can provide support and guidance to players and clubs. 8. Create partnerships with organisations that are leaders in T mental health issues so players can be supported with the more relevant and cutting edge practices and directed to where the expertise exist. 9. Develop clear guidelines for best practices in relation to training methods for clubs to enhance player development and performance e.g. S&C 10. Educate clubs players on their role as peer support to their teammates, and provide them with the tools and resources needed to assist those in need. The LGFA will be working hard to implement as many recommendations from the survey as they can in 2019 and will be having a very innovative approach by establishing there first Player Conference in January 2019. If anybody would like to read the full player welfare survey finding you can contact clare.dowdall@lgfa.ie