GIVEN the abundance of impressionable young boys within footballing circles in the 1970s and 80s, it is hardly a surprise that the sport was targeted by the kind of predatory paedophiles that were operating in other areas of British society during the same period.

However, the scale of what has been unravelling over the last week or so, not to mention the degree of cooperation between different offenders that might have existed and the complete indifference that was displayed by sporting authorities and the clubs at which the offences were taking place, remains deeply alarming.

To recap, four former footballers have now waived their anonymity to admit they were victims of sexual abuse and 11 people have contacted the Cheshire police force since the weekend to report abusive incidents.

Three of the former players – Andy Woodward, Steve Walters and former England international David White – spoke to the Guardian to say they were abused by Barry Bennell, a convicted paedophile who carried out his abuse over a 13-year period that saw him employed by Crewe Alexandra, Stoke City and Manchester City as well working at a children’s care home and a Butlin’s holiday camp.

The fourth, former Sunderland midfielder Paul Stewart, says he was abused by another person, who cannot be named for legal reasons at the moment, but who is known to have had links with Bennell, raising fears of an organised paedophile ring that was operating in the North-West.

The most startling thing about this week’s revelations is that they are not really new, they have just been buried and ignored for the best part of two decades.

Bennell was sentenced to four years in prison in the United States in 1994 when a 13-year-old boy returned to Staffordshire from a football club tour to Florida and revealed his coach had abused him. When Bennell returned to Britain after serving his sentence in the US, he was arrested again, and in 1998 he was jailed for nine years after admitting 23 charges of indecent assault, two charges of a serious sexual offence and two charges of attempted serious sexual assault.

So what happened then? Damningly, nothing. The Football Association turned a blind eye, regarding the episode as an isolated incident that was not worthy of wider investigation. Crewe Alexandra, the club where much of Bennell’s abuse took place, shut up shop, with the Crewe Chronicle noting matter-of-factly that the chairman, John Bowler, was “unavailable”. Bowler is still the chairman today, and while he has made a couple of bland media statements this week, there has been nothing in the way of a meaningful acknowledgment that his club might have been at fault.

Just as unforgivably, the mainstream media at the time showed no interest in investigating things further. In 1997, a Dispatches documentary for Channel Four exposed the Bennell story, but no one sought to question whether sexual abuse within football might have been much more prevalent than was then appreciated.

And all the while, a generation of youngsters were forced to hide their shame and embarrassment and try to come to terms with the fact they had been systematically abused by someone they and their families had placed their trust in.

How many? Who knows. More victims might be empowered to come forward, but some might prefer to remain silent. Others, unable to live with the horrors they encountered, might have opted to commit suicide in order to maintain their silence forever.

Sadly, it is too late to prevent Bennell’s victims having to go through what they were forced to endure. Having been released from prison with a new identity, the man described by the American authorities as having “almost an insatiable appetite” for young boys is understood to be living in Milton Keynes attempting to live a new life.

It is not too late to right some of the wrongs that have occurred though, and while the police are carrying out their own historical investigations into what happened in youth footballing circles in the North-West, the Football Association should be launching and funding its own independent inquiry into the abuse that took place and the way it was subsequently mishandled or ignored.        

The FA like to trumpet their role in “safeguarding the game” – if you cannot guarantee the safety of the youngsters within your sport, phrases such as that mean absolutely nothing.

An inclusive inquiry, preferably with co-operation from the Premier League, Football League, League Managers’ Association, Professional Footballers’ Association and every FA-registered club in the country, would achieve two important aims.

First, it would help assist the police to uncover historical wrongdoing and ensure all those involved, whether individuals or clubs, are held accountable for their actions. Are there people at Crewe today who were there when systematic sexual abuse took place? At the very least, there are people who were present when Bennell was convicted. What did they do to support their employees’ victims?

Were there people within the FA who should have done much more when it became clear that abuse had occurred? Were there other coaches, potentially still operating today, who were complicit in Bennell’s crimes or even his accomplices?

They are hugely important questions, but as well as revisiting the past, the FA also needs to be looking to the future. Are the current rules and regulations robust enough to ensure that Bennell’s crimes could not be repeated today?

It is all too easy to point to improvements in safeguarding legislation and naively assume that we live in a different world. Yes, there is a greater awareness of the risks around potential sexual abuse now, and yes some of the things that were deemed common-place in the 1980s, such as Bennell having young boys living with him in his home, would today be regarded as unacceptable.

But it is dangerous to think that everything has been transformed. The NSPCC has set up a dedicated phone line for victims to report abuse in football, but do we really think an 11-year-old would feel empowered enough to accuse one of their coaches of abusing them? And if they did, are we really convinced their claims would be taken seriously?

The FA has the power to address those concerns. Having buried its head in the sand once, English football’s governing body cannot afford to do so again.