Trans women banned from playing soccer by UK Football Association amid Supreme Court ruling

Just weeks after the UK Supreme Court ruled that a woman is defined by biological sex, the Football Association has barred transgender women from playing women’s soccer in England.

The Football Association, the professional and amateur soccer governing body known as the F.A., announced in a statement on Thursday that, effective June 1, "transgender women will no longer be able to play in women’s football in England" as a result of the Supreme Court ruling last month.

“We understand that this will be difficult for people who simply want to play the game they love in the gender by which they identify, and we are contacting the registered transgender women currently playing to explain the changes and how they can continue to stay involved in the game,” the statement reads.

The transgender sports ban will impact all levels of women’s soccer, including professional games and at the regional and amateur level, and is being implemented because in the wake of the UK Supreme Court ruling all public and private groups in Britain have to adjust their policies to have different spaces and services for different sexes.

Pride Sports, a UK organization working to improve LGBTQ+ inclusion in sports, told the New York Timesthat there are currently fewer than 30 trans women playing women’s soccer in England and Scotland “without incident,” all of whom will be affected by the ban.

Just days prior to the April 16 unanimous UK Supreme Court ruling, which is expected to impact bathroom, hospital wards, and sports clubs, the F.A. updated it’s policy on trans women soccer players to allow tans women with testosterone levels below 5.0 nanomoles per liter of blood for a full year before a match to continue to play, CNN reported.

But the F.A. updated their policy again on May 1 in accordance with “expert legal advice.”

“This is a complex subject, and our position has always been that if there was a material change in law, science, or the operation of the policy in grassroots football, then we would review it and change it if necessary,” the F.A. statement said.

LGBTQ+ activist group Stonewall told CNN that the F.A. jumped the gun and made a policy change before the implications of the Supreme Court ruling are fully understood.

“Trans women young and old who love football will be deeply distressed that they are no longer able to take part in games, at all levels. Trans people remain protected under the law and need to be treated with dignity and respect – and this announcement lacks any detail on how those obligations will be honored,” a Stonewall spokesperson said.