Chelsea striker Didier Drogba; Italy and Juventus midfielder Andre Pirlo; Ivory Coast and Manchester City midfielder Yaya Toure; Germany and Chelsea midfielder André Schürrle; and Argentina and Valencia midfielder Nicolas Otamendi are among the leading players that have declared their support for the Football People action weeks launching today.

Over the two-week period (9 - 23 October) they will be joined by other players, professional clubs and national teams in a united movement against discrimination in football, and in society at large, involving tens of thousands of people across Europe.

Arsenal Ladies star Casey Stoney said: “I am delighted to join the Football People weeks and lend my support to a powerful movement that celebrates diversity, gender equality and inclusion in the game.

“From my personal experience, I believe inspiring actions can bring about a change at an individual and collective level.”

Clubs
Professional clubs, including Premier League giants Manchester City and Tottenham Hotspur, Espanyol of Spain’s La Liga, Sampdoria in Serie A, and Maccabi Haifa in Israel, have all joined the movement.

Anti-discrimination messages in match day programmes, social media, website and TV content around the topic, stadium announcements and on pitch activities with the teams are examples of actions that will be led by clubs.

Leagues and Football Associations
The Swiss and Welsh leagues have announced their support to the campaign. In France, Ligue 1 and 2 will focus their activities on tackling homophobia and have called on players and clubs to get involved through videos.

The Croatian, Maltese, Swiss, Welsh, Irish and German FAs will dedicate match days, both at international and domestic matches, to the action weeks along with other awareness raising activities.

Online and print content on discrimination and how to tackle it will be widely spread in their stadiums and media platforms. Anti-discrimination messages and videos will be screened and display before, at halftime and after matches, and players will line-up next to ‘NO TO RACISM’ banners.

In England, the Football Association have produced three videos with leading international players, Liverpool’s Rickie Lambert, Arsenal’s Calum Chambers and Manchester City’s James Milner, supporting the campaign.

UEFA
All UEFA Champions and Europa league fixtures, EURO 2016 Qualifiers and centralised friendlies will also dedicate a match day to the Football People weeks.

UEFA president Michel Platini supported the period by saying: “UEFA, its member associations and its long-standing partner the Fare network share an unwavering desire to tackle all forms of discrimination in our sport and to help stamp out such behaviour across Europe".