Fraser Carson

Objectives: The women's professional sports industry is experiencing rapid growth, and participation rates are higher than ever. This is encouraging more women to explore work opportunities in the industry. However, the sport workforce has a long-established hegemonic masculinity and many accepted behaviors and actions in male sport teams can be viewed as misogynistic. Despite initiatives to encourage more diversity, these behaviors can make it difficult for women to enter and challenging to remain working in men's professional sport. Methods: To explore the lived experience of women working in men's professional rugby union, a qualitative phenomenological research design was employed, using semi structured interviews, with 12 female physiotherapists. The interviews focused on the challenges they faced, and strategies used for navigating traditional masculinities and stereotypes Results: Thematic analysis identified four higher-order themes (1. Establishing professional identity in a male-dominated environment, 2. Navigating sexual objectification, 3. Career progression and organizational barriers, and 4. Work-life balance and personal costs) that depicted their experiences Discussion: Notwithstanding legislative changes to make sport more inclusive, these physiotherapists described persistent inequalities, microaggressions and exclusions. The findings highlight the need for structural and cultural reform in sport organizations to remove gender biases, and create professional environments where women's expertise is recognized, respected, and equitably supported.

Despite global progression in the research focusing on women in coaching, there is a significant knowledge gap regarding their underrepresentation in continents such as Africa. Guided by the Ecological Intersectional Model, this study aimed to address this gap by exploring the drivers for women to become high-performance football coaches in Africa. Semistructured interviews were conducted to understand the motivations of 10 coaches from five African zones (North, East, West, Southern, and Central Africa). The age range of the coaches was between 33 and 54 years, with ( M _age = 44.2, SD = 7.12 years, M _experience = 10.9, SD = 5.32 years). Reflective thematic analysis revealed that these coaches are motivated by: Approval from coaches and administrators; Identity and Lifelong Connection to the Sport; Role models; Family background; and Challenging male dominance. The findings suggest that women coaches have a genuine interest in entering the coaching profession and highlight the need for stakeholders and football administrators to provide them with support to sustain their interest and promote their career development, if underrepresentation is to be addressed.

Studies to understand the marginalisation of female coaches in Africa are limited and have focused primarily on coaches in South Africa. This study explored the career trajectories of female high-performance football coaches in Africa, focusing on the reflections of 10 coaches across the continent’s five main zones: West Africa (three), North Africa (three), Southern Africa (two), East Africa (one), and Central Africa (one). The participants had a mean age of 44.2 years ( SD = 7.12) and an average of 10.9 years of coaching experience ( SD = 5.32). The findings revealed that the coaches emphasised the need to overcome obstacles, serve as trailblazers, and contribute to the growth of women’s football in Africa. They also highlighted the importance of empowering female coaches by creating pathways to success and achieving a balance between personal and professional responsibilities. Integrating an intersectional lens of the ecological intersectional model, the study illustrates how factors such as patriarchy, agency, and systemic barriers intersect to shape the experiences of these coaches, revealing the complexities of their positions within a male-dominated environment. The study recommends targeted interventions and robust support mechanisms to enhance female representation and success in coaching.

Introduction: Tournament coaching is known to provide different challenges to coaching a team across a regular season. There is limited time to prepare, meaning that team roles and objectives need to be established quickly, and communication must be effective.Method: This interpretive ethnographic case study explored how the coach of a women's national futsal team approached this, while competing at a week-long tournament in preparation for a World Cup qualification event.Results: Following the completion of five interviews (one prior to, three during, and one post tournament), thematic coding produced three main themes: (1) Keeping consistency in development and focus, (2) Communicating openly, and (3) Individualizing approaches.Discussion: The coach established a clear goal for the tournament, with the focus on the team's game plan and ability to implement the tactics they want at the World Cup, which helped create performance targets that were independent of the results to help maintain consistency. A transformative leadership style, underpinned by free communication empowered the players to buy into the system and enhanced motivation and commitment. The coach, with her staff, made a deliberate effort to spend time individually with players, as this allowed players to create autonomy, which enhanced commitment. The findings provide insights for coaching women's teams in general and add further information about coaching in an idiosyncratic tournament environment.

Purpose: Physical activity (PA) is known to help prevent and minimise the impact of Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs). This study aimed to explore the attitudes and practices of general practitioners (GPs) and physiotherapists (PTs) in Luxembourg towards promoting PA and the barriers they face. Material and methods: A total of 174 healthcare professionals (100 GPs and 74 PTs) completed an anonymous electronic questionnaire, which included questions on demographics, attitudes towards PA prescription, the importance of PA as a preventative and treatment modality for NCDs, barriers to exercise prescription, and interest in expanding their knowledge about PA. Results: The results revealed that 56% of HCPs recommended PA weekly, with 43.7% providing detailed guidelines. Most HCPs (71.6%) acknowledged the importance of PA for managing and preventing chronic conditions. The main barriers to PA counselling were lack of time (23.6%), lack of knowledge (10.9%), and patients preferring medication over exercise (30.5%). Conclusions: While the study found that healthcare professionals in Luxembourg have positive attitudes towards PA, there are still limitations in prescribing and recommending PA.

Developing an anxiety disorder can be the source of further cognitive, behavioral, and emotional struggles, impacting the quality of life of people experiencing such disorders and leading to a burden on health systems. Increased knowledge of the neurobiological events leading to the development of such disorders can be crucial for diagnostic procedures, as well as the selection and adaptation of therapeutic and preventive measures. Despite recent advances in this field, research is still at the initial steps when it comes to understanding the specific neurofunctional processes guiding these changes in the brains of people with an anxiety disorder. This narrative review gathered knowledge from previous studies, with the aim of evaluating the neuroanatomical changes observed in individuals experiencing social or generalized anxiety disorder (SAD, GAD), to further link these anxiety-related structural modifications with brain function abnormalities and the expression of symptoms in individuals experiencing anxiety disorders. In addition, contradictory results are discussed, leading to suggestions for future studies.

Editorial: Performance enhancement in rugby

Coaching at a national championship tournament is different to coaching across a competitive season. The team and coaches are away from their regular environment and their normal support mechanisms are distant. While much is known about stressors for coaches in high-performance sport, the current study explored how these were manifested during the intensity of a championship tournament and the coping strategies employed by one coach of a selected, intellectually disabled basketball team. This social phenomenological analysis identified four primary stressors, creating unity and development of trust, management of parents, management of inexperienced coaching/support staff, and crisis management of a critical incident. Coping strategies employed during the tournament included planning, time alone for stress-recovery management and working with a qualified expert to manage a critical incident. The temporariness of the tournament brings unique stressors for the coach and a need to manage these quickly and efficiently, especially for athletes with an intellectual disability. The coach identified that it is unlike any other type of competition, as there is absolute consumption on the tournament and a need to create a rhythm to function effectively. The need for all team members to understand their role and responsibility suggests that a collaborative approach to leadership is essential. Failure to adapt to the tournament circumstances can inhibit chances of success.