Missing part of performance: What clubs get wrong about players’ partners

As a Sport Psychologist, I have worked with a range of key stakeholders during the course of my career: athletes, coaches, sport scientists and parents.

However, romantic partners have rarely been actively supported or meaningfully integrated into the wider performance environment – either during my training or in my subsequent work in elite sport.

Most clubs now employ a Player Care Officer, who will help families with the logistics – relocation, finding schools, and in some cases building a social network from scratch. That work matters, and the partners we interviewed valued it.