Defending where football lives
Football is more than a sport.
It shapes identity, culture and community for people around the world.
That makes it a powerful way to reach people – including many who may never choose to engage with a traditional climate campaign.
We use football to make climate and nature relevant to people’s lives, bring the issue into mainstream consciousness and build support for the action needed to protect the future of the game.
We work across the UK, Brazil, the US and Mexico, adapting the same football-first approach to different cultures, communities and moments in the game.
Why football?
Reach
Cuts across age, geography and background like nothing else. And because football is played in communities everywhere, it can make visible how increasing extreme weather is affecting people around the world.
Cultural weight
Players, clubs and competitions have huge cultural influence. And few things command attention across the public, business and politics in the way football does.
Community
Local pitches and grassroots clubs are where relationships are built and people belong. For many, football is a lifeline – so when extreme weather stops the game, it also disrupts connection, routine and community.
Extreme weather
Extreme heat can make matches unsafe for players and fans. Droughts and flooding leaves pitches unplayable and damages stadiums and grassroots facilities. Wildfire smoke and poor air quality disrupt training and matches.
Start with football, not climate.
We’re reframing climate action as cultural preservation: we make the climate conversation about celebrating and protecting football culture and the communities football lives in.
Football has great social and cultural importance with long traditions and community impact across generations of fans.
Through authentic storytelling, trusted voices, and emotionally-led content, we remind people what they already love and show them that safeguarding it for future generations is, in fact, climate action.
That means if you love football, you have a responsibility to care for its future.
Alec Cutter | Netflix
What we’ve learnt works for fan engagement
Football first
Start with the game and what fans already care about, then connect climate to it. The idea should feel rooted in football culture, not like a climate campaign.
Player power
Use trusted, influential football voices to make the issue credible, personal and harder to ignore.
Extreme weather
Lead with the heat, flooding and other impacts people can see and experience. It makes the issue tangible and immediate, without asking fans to engage with the language of climate change.
Practical change
Show what can be done – and give fans and institutions something concrete to get behind (such as how to adapt the game and the places it’s played to mitigate increasing extreme weather).
How we work
From football culture to wider change.
Understand the audience
Audience research, data and cultural insight into what football communities care about.
Find the football story
Identify where climate and nature intersect with something fans already value in the game.
Mobilise the game
Players, clubs, fans, broadcasters and football moments make the issue visible to a broad audience.
Visible engagement
Fans and football institutions demonstrate support, share stories and take practical action.
Build pressure for change
Visible mainstream engagement creates the conditions for political, business and industry change.
Our theory of change
When the mainstream moves, policy-makers and business decision-makers pay attention.
Green Football
Green Football unites football to protect the game we love and the planet and nature we share. Our work starts with one simple belief: if football means something to you, then so does its future.
We’re a not-for-profit campaign unleashing the power of fans, clubs, players, schools, broadcasters and grassroots to tackle climate change and protect nature.
Since launching in 2023, we’ve built a growing movement mobilising football to take action to tackle climate change and protect nature.
In 2024, Green Football was centred around food, with fans and players pledging to try a veggie option in an effort to reduce their carbon footprint. The campaign engaged 115 professional clubs, as well as 100 footballers, pundits and famous fans. Green Football also reached millions of fans through social media and out-of-home activations, with a significant number pledging to take an action
In 2025, the campaign focussed on kit, one of football’s hidden environmental issues, as part of Green Football’s Great Save. The campaign brought clubs, players and fans together to keep kit in play for longer by donating, selling, swapping or repurposing it. From local activations to features on national broadcasters, the football community took action on and off the pitch to protect the game and the planet.
And in 2026, Green Football defended where football lives. Football holds communities together. But the places we play and watch the game are under threat from extreme weather and so is everything the game gives us. The campaign saw clubs, players and creators share stories about the grassroots pitches that made them, and what the game means to them beyond the 90 minutes.
Learn more about Green Football by visiting our campaign page.
| c. 20M | fans reached each year |
| 115 | clubs have taken part, many returning year-on-year |
| 200+ | players, pundits and celebrities have supported the campaign |
| 1,000+ | pieces of media coverage |
| 100,000+ | fan actions and pledges for climate and nature |
Founding members:
Highlights
Green Football Weekend 2023
Armbands
Green Football Weekend 2023
Broadcast coverage
Green Football Weekend 2023
Green Football Cup
Green Football Weekend 2024
Wembley launch
Green Football Weekend 2024
Recipes
Green Football’s Great Save 2025
RÆBURN
Green Football’s Great Save 2025
Charity shop drops
Green Football’s Great Save 2025
Media coverage
Manchester United and England legend Rio Ferdinand was among the pundits who spoke about kit sustainability in the media.
Green Football 2026
The Pitch That Made Me
Jamie Carragher, Lee Hendrie, Michael Dawson, Hayley Ladd, and Alexei Rojas were among the players to share their grassroots stories, highlighting the importance of defending the places where football lives.
Earth FC
Earth FC (known as Terra FC in Brazil and Tierra FC in Mexico) builds on our experience using football culture to reach mainstream audiences and applies it across different football cultures and geographies.
The campaign works with fans, players, clubs and organisations to show how extreme weather and nature loss are affecting football, and what can be done in response.
In Brazil, Terra FC has brought these issues into some of the country’s biggest football settings – from the Maracanã and the Fla-Flu derby to the Game for the Earth and the Pará State Championship.
The Climate Break, developed with the Pará Football Federation, used the hydration break during matches as a way to show how rising heat is already affecting the game. 60-second climate films on stadium screens and live broadcast across 10 match rounds reaching 16 million fans through TV, YouTube and stadium attendance
During the 2026 Men’s Cup, across the US and Mexico, The Pitch That Made Me brought players back to the places where they first played the game, showing why protecting these pitches matters for the next generation of players, while our city storytelling explored what football and the places where it is played mean to communities in the host cities.
In Guadalajara, our ‘heat wave’ fan activation made the risks of rising temperatures visible and called for action to protect players and fans.
| c. 20M | fans reached since start of the campaign in 2024 |
| 65+ | clubs have taken part |
| 600+ | pieces of media coverage |
| 20,000+ | young people taking positive climate actions |
| c. 5,000 | people taking part in a World Record attempt during the 2026 Men’s World Cup to call for more action to defend where football lives |
Highlights
Earth FC
Player shirt signings
Roberto Carlos, Thiago Silva, Marcus Rashford and Lamine Yamal are among the legendary footballers who have signed the Earth FC jersey.
Tierra FC
Heatwave
Tierra FC took over a fan park in Mexico City to raise awareness of how extreme heat affected the 2026 World Cup.
Terra FC
COP30
At COP30 in Belém, Terra FC hosted its own panels and took part in talks across the conference, highlighting football’s role in climate action. We engaged global leaders, from policymakers to scientists, inviting them to join our team and sign the Football for the Planet Manifesto — calling for collective action to protect the game and the planet.
Terra FC
Climate breaks
Terra FC implemented ‘Climate Breaks’ in the Para State Football Championship in Brazil, transforming mandated cooling breaksinto an opportunity for communication and discussion about the effects of climate change on football.
Terra FC
Game for Earth
Terra FC organised Game for Earth at Estadio das Laranjeiras in Rio de Janeiro. This brought 39 players—including Sadiq Khan and 2002 World Cup winner Edmilson—together to call for stronger cooperation between cities and clubs to protect the game.
Earth FC
World record attempt
As part of the Where Football Lives campaign, Earth FC brought football communities together in a Guinness World Record attempt — the most people juggling a football simultaneously for ten seconds. Proceeds from the project went towards protecting grassroots spaces from extreme weather.
Earth FC
Adaptation toolkit
With Football for Future, we developed a research-based, practical adaptation toolkit enabling grassroots coaches and organisations to mitigate the effects of extreme heat, flooding and air pollution, published in English and in Spanish.
Earth FC
Player storytelling
During the 2026 World Cup, we mobilised professional players and famous fans to tell their grassroots stories. USWNT icon Sam Mewis was among those who shared their experiences.
Terra FC
Media coverage
Prince William visited the Maracanã in 2025, joining young Brazilian footballers on the pitch to talk about protecting the planet through football. The story was reported on around the world.
Count Us In is a small team with global partnerships and reach, bringing climate action to millions through the game they love.
Together, we can defend where football lives and keep the game playable for generations to come.
Get in touch to discuss how we could work together.