FA Bans Solid Walls Around Football Pitches for Safety
The Football Association has moved to outlaw solid perimeter walls around pitches across much of the English game, a sweeping safety step that follows the death of former Arsenal youth forward Billy Vigar.
Vigar, 21, died after suffering what was described as a “significant brain injury” while playing for Chichester City at Wingate and Finchley FC in September 2025. It is believed he collided with a concrete wall close to the playing surface. The incident sent a shock through the game’s lower tiers and forced a hard look at the structures that frame so many non-league grounds.
That review is now complete. Conducted by independent health and safety experts ahead of the 2026-27 season, it has delivered a clear verdict: solid brick, breeze block or concrete barriers have no place around pitches in the modern game.
In a formal ruling, the FA confirmed it “no longer permits solid brick, breeze block or concrete barriers around pitches across the National League system for men [steps 1-6], and the Women’s National League [tiers 3-4]”.
The instruction cuts across hundreds of clubs, from ambitious promotion chasers to long-standing community sides playing in front of a few hundred regulars.
The language around compliance is firm. Any such barriers already in place “must be removed as soon as reasonably practicable, or covered with suitable protection if they cannot be removed for structural reasons,” the FA said. Clubs have been told directly they will be required to act.
This is not a cosmetic tweak. Many traditional non-league grounds are hemmed in by hard, unforgiving walls that have stood for decades, seen as part of the fabric of the place. Now they are a liability. The governing body has made it clear that safety takes precedence over nostalgia.
Clubs will not be shut down overnight. Matches at affected grounds can continue, but only on the condition that those responsible “assess the safety of their pitch perimeter barriers on an ongoing basis” and set out plans to make changes “within a reasonable timeframe”. The FA expects progress, not excuses.
Money often decides how quickly good intentions become reality. On this, there is at least some help. The FA and the Premier League will provide funding to support the work required, a recognition that many semi-professional and women’s clubs simply cannot absorb the cost of major structural changes without assistance.
The decision does not arrive in a vacuum. After Vigar’s death, a public petition calling for a ban on brick walls around football pitches gathered more than 4,000 signatures, reflecting a wider unease among players, coaches and supporters who spend their weekends in these environments.
Pressure also came from above. In June 2023, the government and the Professional Footballers’ Association wrote jointly to the FA, Premier League, English Football League and National League, urging a more proactive stance on player safety in this specific area. That letter now reads less like a warning and more like the starting gun for the reform that has followed.
For years, the hard edges of non-league football were seen as part of its charm. Tight terraces, low walls, the sense that the crowd sits almost on top of the pitch. After Vigar’s death, that romance collided with reality.
The sport has answered with regulation. The next question is how quickly every corner of the pyramid can turn that ruling into concrete — or rather, into something much safer.
