Hello, my name is Ali and I am an 18 year old football referee with Dyspraxia. I was diagnosed with Dyspraxia when I was about 4 years old and it has affected my motor skills such as my handwriting and coordination as well as a couple of other aspects in me. Because of this I had to stay back a year in school and I have honestly never looked back and I am who I am because of my primary school teachers, my parents and my teachers. 

I have always been an armchair football fan, but I always struggled to get involved in football because of my coordination difficulties and my lack of hand eye coordination which has led to me struggling to play football and it has also made coaching difficult because I haven’t been able to demonstrate any of the drills. 

This all changed in year 10 when we had a careers week at the end of the summer term where my teachers and I helped work out ways to be involved in football without having to play it. It turned out that refereeing ticked all the boxes, a way to be involved in football without playing it and a way of earning money and more importantly, it helps me keep fit. Thankfully the Westmorland FA were super supportive of me by sending mentors to help me and they have been very kind to me when I have pestered them for more games because refereeing has become an essential part of my weekend routine. 

As well as this, in January last year, the Westmorland FA gave me a stepping stone to being involved with adult football matches by getting me in contact with the FA Partially Sighted football league where I've had the pleasure of refereeing England internationals and 5 months later I am now regularly officiating fixtures in the division 4 Westmorland league and being an assistant referee for Morecambe academy football matches whilst mentoring younger referees in the Westmorland area. 

My plans in football in the near future are to be promoted from level 7 to level 6 in the promotion pathway which I am on course to do this season whilst mentoring other referees who need it whilst creating my refereeing course for people with Dyspraxia and I also want to keep getting promoted in the pathway for as long as possible.