Meet the Doncaster Rovers fan helping improve mental health through weekly kickabouts

A Doncaster Rovers fan is helping improve people's mental health through the medium of regular, social football sessions.

Ryan Oldfield, from Cusworth, founded Mental Health FC back in 2023. Having struggled with anxiety all of his life, as he got older he found it difficult to get enough people together to play five-a-side football - one of the few activities he found helped him with his condition.

In an attempt to pull various groups of people together he sent out a speculative social media post, initially just to test the waters.

Ryan picks up the story: "When I put the first post out, a lot of people were interested. So we set a date, set a time, and then 11 people turned up on the first one. As long as we got a five-a-side, then I was happy. But then with word-of-mouth and social media it just blew up - in a good way.

"We added different sessions at different locations, at different times and then it's just taken off from there really."

Indeed, the not-for-profit group is positively thriving with seven sessions taking place throughout the week. Five of them are in and around Doncaster, another in Scunthorpe and one in Sheffield. Ryan stresses that while the kickabouts are under the umbrella of 'mental health wellbeing', participants are not forced to discuss such matters.

"They're not forced at all in any way to share anything about their mental health. Some people do, some people don't, but for some it's enough just having that social connection. We just let people do as they want to make them feel happy."

Anyone following Rovers on social media can't help but have noticed some famous faces backing Ryan's venture in recent months.

The organisation's Twitter/X feed (@MHFooty) is littered with pictures of the likes of Gavin Baldwin, Luke Molyneux and plenty of others supporting Ryan's efforts.

He adds: "James Coppinger in particular has been amazing for us, helping us get the kits from Rovers and other stuff.

“And these endorsements really help us because as soon as you put James Coppinger or Billy Sharp on there, it just flies. Obviously it takes time to get these people on board, but as soon as you get them on board, it's free marketing."

A recent event that Ryan attended emphasised that point, as he promoted Mental Health FC at a charity padel tournament in Sheffield that saw ample Rovers players compete against other local teams such as Sheffield Wednesday and Leeds United. At the event Ryan got a clutch of selfies with a variety of players, all helping with exposure - but he admits his own struggles almost saw him miss it.

"I'd struggled the day before and that day," he says. "My anxiety was out of control. Obviously, with certain things, like if it's a meeting or a phone call I'm quite relaxed because I can reorganise it. But with this padel event I knew that, with or without me, it's going ahead.

“So that's when I get a bit more panicky. I knew I had to just throw myself into it and in the past I've never done that before. So instead of just staying at home with the anxiety, I've been pushing myself out. It was difficult, but good."

Three years into his venture, Ryan is looking brightly towards the future - with one simple aim for the charity: "I just want to keep reaching new people in Doncaster.

"Hopefully we can work more with Doncaster Rovers because obviously that is our prime target audience. But we also want to do more specific sessions, for example for women-only, or kids or walking football. The more I can do for Doncaster, the better."

* To find out more about Mental Health FC and the dates/times of their weekly kickabouts, visit mentalhealthfc.org or follow on Twitter/X @MHFooty.