How community sport helps prevent alcohol and other drug harm

Sporting clubs are often the social centre of a town, especially in regional areas. Players, coaches, volunteers and families come together there every week, so clubs are a natural place to share health information and build support networks.

Taking part in community activities like sport strengthens the protective factors that help prevent alcohol and other drug harm: a sense of belonging, self-esteem, motivation and positive relationships with adults and peers. You can read more about protective factors and how they work in prevention strategies.

Many Local Drug Action Teams (LDATs) work with local clubs as part of their Community Action Plan. Some cover the costs of playing so every young person can join in. Others train club leaders, add education to training sessions or help clubs set healthier policies through Good Sports, the Alcohol and Drug Foundation’s program for community sporting clubs.

These seven programs show the range of ways LDATs have worked through sport.

ACTIVATE club fee support in Frankston and the Mornington Peninsula

The Frankston Mornington Peninsula LDAT, led by the Frankston Mornington Peninsula Primary Care Partnership with fourteen local partner organisations, set out to make community sport and recreation open to every young person in the area.

So that cost didn’t stop anyone joining in, the LDAT’s ACTIVATE program paid for club fees, equipment and transport. This let more young people join local sporting and non-sporting recreation activities. The LDAT worked with sporting and recreation clubs, local businesses and services including the Brotherhood of St Laurence.

Watch the 2018 video about ACTIVATE (2:10 minutes).

Redtails Pinktails Right Tracks in Alice Springs

The Alice Springs LDAT, which includes the Central Australian Aboriginal Congress, supported the Redtails Pinktails Right Tracks program, a program set up by locals for locals to link sport with community health.

The program worked with football, netball and softball teams across Central Australia. Sessions explored how alcohol affects a player’s health, their performance and the whole club, and how clubs can build safe, inclusive spaces where players and volunteers feel valued and part of their club. Working with the Congress gave the program strong links to public health and clinical expertise, which it took out to teams and communities.

Peer support through country football in the Wheatbelt

The West Australian Country Football League (WACFL) LDAT saw football clubs as a social centre for many people in the Wheatbelt, especially young men. Its Peer Support Program ran across the seven clubs of the Avon Football Association.

The LDAT aimed to recruit 21 senior players as volunteers, and 33 signed up as peer support ambassadors. Each completed first aid training, a Rural Minds mental health course, education on local services and Good Sports policy training, so they could look out for their teammates and start a conversation early when someone needed support.

The program also helped shape club culture. Twenty-two clubs in regional WA removed alcohol sponsorship from player guernseys, seven clubs updated their policies through Good Sports, and the WA Government agreed to a three-year mental health sponsorship of country football worth $300,000 a year. Read more about this approach in the peer support toolkit.

Blue EDGE fitness and life skills in Redcliffe

The Redcliffe LDAT, led by the Queensland Police Service in the City of Moreton Bay, ran the Blue EDGE program (Educate, Develop, Grow, Empower) in two local high schools, with the Queensland Blue Light Association.

Over eight weeks, students aged 11 to 15 met before school twice a week for 90-minute sessions of physical training and life skills, with breakfast, guest speakers and mentoring from police, PCYC staff, personal trainers, school staff and community volunteers. Forty-four students enrolled and 43 completed the program. Every participant reported knowing more about alcohol and other drug harm by the end, and instructors saw the group become close and supportive, with growing trust between students and police. Read more about mentoring young people.

Junior touch football in Moree

The Moree LDAT brought junior touch football back to the Moree Plains in 2019, with funding from the Alcohol and Drug Foundation. The competition was free for young people aged 7 to 17, with help to pay association fees, uniforms and equipment.

NSW Touch Association and Good Sports coaches ran the games, and players took part in healthy living workshops, covering alcohol and other drug education and general health, before they played. The competition brought young people, parents and families together, and free accredited coach and referee training helped parents and volunteers keep it going through a new Moree Junior Touch Football Association.

Leading From the Front in Ballarat

The Ballarat and District Drug Action Partnership LDAT, led by Sports Central with Ballarat Community Health, ran Leading From the Front for club members aged 15 to 30.

Participating clubs became accredited in Good Sports and wrote an illegal drugs management plan. Club leaders completed alcohol and other drug prevention training, then hosted a prevention and harm minimisation presentation for members, players and parents. Clubs also received a social media campaign and Responsible Service of Alcohol training. After COVID-19 delays, the program started in 2022 and expanded in 2023 to more football, netball, hockey and soccer clubs.

A club wellbeing team in Myrtleford

The Communities that Care Alpine LDAT worked with the Myrtleford Alpine Saints Football Netball Club in north-east Victoria to set up a club wellbeing team. The aim was to make it easier to talk about mental health and to support players and supporters.

The nine-member team included coaches, club leaders, a local GP, a mental health nurse and local health services, and all members completed Youth Mental Health First Aid training. The team launched online during Mental Health Month in 2020, while COVID-19 restrictions paused play, and planned to offer support in person at game days once sport returned. The LDAT drew on the Healthy Minds program from Good Sports.

More LDAT stories about sport

• Reaching young people through sport in southwest Sydney: street sport and football programs for young people in Canterbury Bankstown.
• Midnight Basketball: free late-night basketball, a meal and life skills for young people aged 12 to 18.
• Kimberley basketball: basketball and alcohol and other drug prevention in the Kimberley.
• Turning dumped bikes into connection: a Yalgoo LDAT program fixing up bikes with young people.
• Port Lincoln LDAT: a youth skate event in Port Lincoln.
• How the arts help prevent alcohol and other drug harm: music, dance, film and song programs with young people and their communities.

The programs above have several things in common:

• They work through clubs. Clubs already bring people together, so LDATs build on what’s there rather than starting something new.
• They make it easy to join. Covering fees, uniforms and transport, as in Frankston and Moree, opens sport to every young person.
• They train club people. Peer leaders, coaches and volunteers who know the club are trusted messengers.
• They partner widely. Health services, police, schools, sporting associations and Good Sports each bring different skills; see community partnerships.
• They mix play with learning. Education sessions before training or games reach young people while they’re there anyway.

These programs draw on the Creating Social Connection, Belonging and Purpose toolkit, one of the toolkits LDATs use to plan their Community Action Plan.

Last reviewed: 4 November 2026