On World Mental Health Day, communities worldwide unite to highlight the importance of mental wellbeing and access to essential support.
This year, Oceania Football Confederation (OFC) joins the movement with its campaign “Be a Support Player, Play for Mental Health,” championing safeguarding in sport and promoting football’s power to heal, connect, and build resilience. The day serves as a reminder that there is no health without mental health.
Throughout 2025, OFC has placed safeguarding at the forefront of its operations, protecting the mental and physical wellbeing of everyone involved in the game. OFC recognises that Safeguarding and mental health are deeply connected, creating safe, respectful, and inclusive environments that allows players, coaches, and officials to thrive both on and off the pitch.
“The Oceania football community is made up of people of diverse ages, genders, nationalities, and backgrounds,” said OFC’s Head of Social Responsibility, Teeny Aiken.
“OFC has made a commitment to ensure football leaves no one behind and 100% of participants feel safe in football. This means that every individual, no matter their level of involvement, experience, physical and emotional safety, respect, and dignity.”
OFC’s safeguarding practices includes education through the FIFA Guardians Safeguarding in Football programme, regional capacity-building initiatives, and competition orientations that have equipped nearly 1,900 players and officials across 13 OFC tournaments this year with the knowledge to identify and report safeguarding concerns.
These initiatives reflect OFC’s wider commitment to Sustainable Development Goal 3: Good Health and Well-being, ensuring football across Oceania remains safe, inclusive, and empowering.
In alignment with the 2025 international theme, “Access to Services: Mental Health in Catastrophes and Emergencies,” OFC continues to use football as a vehicle to promote wellbeing, particularly in communities recovering from natural disasters across the Pacific.
Through its Just Play Emergency Programme, OFC continues to help children and communities recover emotionally after disasters. Following Tropical Cyclone Pam in 2015, Just Play launched its Emergency Programme in Vanuatu, using football to support children’s recovery through lessons in hygiene, safety, and teamwork.
The programme has since responded to crises across the Pacific, including Tonga’s Hunga Tonga–Hunga Haʻapai eruption and tsunami, reaching over 5,000 children through partnerships with UNICEF and the Tonga National Emergency Management Office.
More recently, Just Play supported the Vanuatu Football Federation in delivering psychosocial assistance to children affected by the 7.4 magnitude earthquake in Port Vila in December 2024.
“The contribution has made a significant impact on the emotional wellbeing of children affected by the disaster,” said the VFF Social Responsibility team. “Together, we are helping children heal and recover from the trauma they’ve endured.”
By combining its safeguarding and Just Play initiatives, OFC continues to demonstrate football’s unique power to heal, protect, and inspire. This World Mental Health Day, OFC calls on everyone in the football community like players, coaches, volunteers, and fans to be a support player, look out for one another, and help ensure football in Oceania remains a safe and positive space for all. Play for Mental Health.
Download OFC’s World Mental Health Day media toolkit
For more resources: Safeguarding | Oceania Football Confederation