Kenyon, J. and Palmer, C. (2007) Can we have our ball back please? Rising inactivity levels in Great Britain’s youth
and the impact on elite football. Journal of Qualitative Research in Sports Studies. 1, 1, 69-75.
Can we have our ball back please? Rising inactivity levels in
Great Britain’s youth and the impact on elite football.
James Kenyon and Clive Palmer
(Sports Studies, Hope University, Liverpool)
Abstract
A survey by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) indicated that
football is the most popular sport in schools in Great Britain (DCMS, 2004). If this
is the case, then there should be little or no problem for football clubs to select quality players from a seemingly growing pool of talent. With this situation in mind the
authors set out to discuss the current state of football development in place, in Great
Britain by considering the range and types of opportunities available for young people, aged 9 to 19 years old, to play football towards elite level. In recent years the opportunities for young people to play elite football have been modelled on a system of
Long Term Athlete Development (LTAD, Balyi, 2004) taken up by the Academies and
Centres of Excellence for coaching football. The success of this long-term approach
to developing sporting talent will be questioned and contrasted with the concerning
rise of inactivity levels of children in Great Britain (BBC Sport, 2005a).
Although Team GB have not yet ruled out competing in football at the 2008 Beijing
Olympics, the 2012 London Olympics will most likely be the first time that Great
Britain has entered a men’s football team into an Olympic competition since 1972;
after the distinction between “professional” and “amateur” footballers was abolished
in 1974 (The Football Association, 2004). By looking to this competition, success will
be measured by whether Great Britain can achieve a medal. This essay will question
whether that success can be attained, given that the talent pool of potential players
has alarming indications of rising inactivity levels across Great Britain.
Inactivity of children in Great Britain
“You have to start at a young age. We need sport for the good of our nation.”
(Richard Caborn, the Minister for Sport, speaking to BBC Sport, 2003)
The Department of Health (2004) states that the annual cost of physical inactivity
in England is £8.2 billion. This figure includes both the costs to the NHS and costs
related to the economy, such as absence from work for illnesses related to physical
inactivity and obesity. Because of this, the popular view is that increasing physical
activity levels in Great Britain will save the NHS millions of pounds in the future. For
example, if 10 per cent more people in Great Britain became more active (fitter), the
69
Journal of Qualitative Research in Sports Studies 1, 1
country would save £600m annually on its health bill [the NHS] (The Observer, 2006)
and that more than 6,000 premature deaths would be prevented each year (DCMS,
2002). A major claim here is that by encouraging the young people of Great Britain
to pursue an active and healthy lifestyle they are more likely to carry on this “good
habit” into adulthood (Almond and McGeorge, 1997).
To combat rising inactivity levels in Great Britain’s youth, the Government was aiming to get 75% of pupils doing two hours sport a week, either in or outside of the
curriculum, by 2006 (DCMS, 2002). Despite ever-increasing concerns about child
obesity and increased time playing video games (Shafi, 2006), pupils are still playing
shockingly low levels of sport in school (BBC Sport, 2005a). In 2005, BBC News reported that only about one-third of schools were meeting that target of 75%.
Football opportunities
With rising obesity and inactivity levels in children in Great Britain, one can come
to the obvious conclusion that there are no longer as many sport-talented children
available as was once the case. This considered, rising inactivity levels have a direct
impact on the size of the “pool” of children with talent that could be fully trained into
elite footballers.
In order to train and transform a talented performer to an elite athlete it is widely accepted that it requires three hours of practice daily for ten years. This is known as the
10,000 hour or ten year rule (Ericsson, 1993; Ericsson and Charness, 1994; Bloom,
1985; Salmela, 1998; all cited in Balyi and Hamilton, 2004). Sports Coach UK (2006)
believes that the Long Term Athlete Development Model (Balyi and Hamilton, 2004)
will produce a greater number of athletes who are capable of performing at the highest level. Sports Coach UK (2006) also believes that LTAD focuses on maximising
player development to encourage life-long commitment to sport, and thus an active
lifestyle. For clarity, the Long Term Athlete Development Model that could be applied
to football; the Late Specialization Model (Balyi and Hamilton, 2004), has 5 stages of
performance development, beginning with the FUNdamental Stage at ages 6-9 ranging to the penultimate stage, The Training to Win Stage at ages 18 and older.
A full LTAD system in place for football in Great Britain would seem ideal enough
in theory, but the Football Association’s Director of Football Development, Trevor
Brooking, believes the biggest problem, for now, on the drain of home grown players,
is that people who play 11-a-side football at school stop playing after school because
there is no natural link between schools and club football (BBC Sport, 2005b). This
would mean that if a theoretical LTAD programme was in place, late developers and
talented players who may have been missed by Football Academies and Centres of
Excellence are forgotten and would be discontinuing their theoretical Long Term
70
James Kenyon and Clive Palmer
Athlete Development. In reality though, once someone has left school and has not
been taken on by a Football Academy or a Centre of Excellence, they no longer play
and usually discontinue all physical activity. The discontinuation of physical activity
leaves the discussed gap in the “pool” of footballers available, with talent that could
be fully trained into elite athletes. Trevor Brooking also believes that a lack of pitches
and poor facilities at a grass roots level are just two more of the factors leading to the
drain of home grown players (BBC Sport, 2005b).
Football Academies and Centres of Excellence
“What clearly is a concern at the present, for the FA and those who want to promote
the Englishness of the system, is the quantity of players. It must be a concern [if] clubs
are taking the short-term solution to problems and turning to players from their youth
ranks.”
(Huw Jennings, the current Premier League’s youth development
manager, speaking to the Guardian Sport, 2007)
Although Centres of Excellence have been in existence for many years, in 1998 the
Football Association introduced a rule for all professional clubs that the club had
to supply either: a Centre of Excellence or a Football Academy for the youth of the
local community. Following the introduction of Football Academies in 1998, it was
believed that clubs would have the potential to save millions in transfer fees each year
by having a chartered program of excellence for their elite youth players. Although
there are no rules on the recruitment of International players, local players can only
be recruited within a 90 minute drive of the Centre/Academy.
Football Academies are at the centre of The Football Association’s Charter for Quality
programme. Academies […] bring together the best young players to give them top
quality coaching, development, education and medical care.
(The Football Association, 2002)
As will be made apparent, it has been well documented in the media that an increasing amount of Premier League Football clubs are recruiting more youth players from
over-seas countries and, consequently, some Premier League managers have been accused of harming the national side by not fielding enough home-grown players (BBC
Sport, 2007a). Liam Brady, Arsenal’s head of youth development and its academy
manager rejects criticisms of the young foreign influx, “It’s like the pool of players
is shrinking all of the time in the British Isles […] there’s not the amount of players there used to be” (The Guardian Sport, 2007). As discussed, increasing levels of
inactivity in British children mean that there has been a reduction in the quantity of
talented British players. This has had a direct impact on the number of home-grown
players good enough for selection by Football Academies and Football Centres of
Excellence. As a result of this, some high profile Premier League Club managers and
Football League managers plainly insist that the Academy and Centre of Excellence
71
Journal of Qualitative Research in Sports Studies 1, 1
system isn’t working well enough for British youth (BBC Sport, 2007a; BBC Sport,
2007b; BBC Sport, 2007c; The Guardian Sport, 2007).
The success of a theoretical Long Term Athlete Development programme in Centres
of Excellence and Football Academies would be dependent on whether the FUNdamental Stage (Stage 1 at ages 6-9) had been coached effectively prior to the player being selected by the Centre/Academy. As already discussed, the best and most
qualified coaches are encouraged to work with elite athletes at the Centres of Excellence and Football Academies or Football Association Clubs (i.e. The Premiership,
Championship and the rest of the leagues). With this being the case, it means that
there is an obvious lack of top-class coaches who can lay the foundations at the FUNdamental Stage (grass-roots) to produce young footballers capable of being selected
by Centres of Excellence and Football Academies and trained into elite footballers.
Since the LTAD “FUNdamental Stage” emphasis is on the overall development of the
young player’s physical capacities, fundamental movement skills and the ABC’s of
athleticism (agility, balance, co-ordination and speed) (Balyi, 2001), the potential of
a whether a young athlete could be trained effectively into an elite footballer would be
very much dependent on whether this stage was coached properly. Therefore the long
term athlete or player development plan may risk failure at its earliest stage.
2012 London Olympics
“Football is our national sport and it is really good news that there will be Team GB
sides in 2012.”
(Richard Caborn, the Minister for Sport, speaking to The Times, 2005)
The criterion for the eligibility of football players taking part in the Olympics, established by FIFA, has changed several times over the years. Professional footballers may
now take part but Olympic football teams are now essentially “Under-23” teams (The
Football Association, 2004). This being the case, children who are of GCSE/school
leaver age now, will be eligible to participate in the 2012 London Olympics. As discussed, the main problem at present is the drain of home grown players caused by
people who play 11-a-side football at school refrain from playing post-school years
because there is no continuity between schools and club football (BBC Sport, 2005b).
This problem is exacerbated by the fact that Academies and Centres of Excellence are
recruiting more and more players from overseas; the quantity of world class British
football players is declining. Knowing these trends, it is hard to believe that Great
Britain will be capable of winning a medal in football at the 2012 London Olympics.
The Way Forward: Some Suggestions
Apart from the obvious health benefits of increasing activity levels in Great Britain’s
72
James Kenyon and Clive Palmer
youth and the impact on the cost to the national economy, it could be predicted that,
with increasing levels of physical activity, Great Britain will begin produce higher
quantities of young athletes capable of being trained to an elite level.
Extra funding needs to be ploughed into Academies and Centres of Excellence outside of Premiership football. An average Centre of Excellence outside of the Premiership can cost as much as £1m a year to run, whilst the average cost of a Premiership
academy is almost £2m a year. This a huge expense for smaller football clubs, particularly when the maximum grant for Football League clubs is £138,000 (BBC News,
2007c). Apart from extra funding in Academies and Centres of Excellence outside of
the Premiership, the Football Association needs to address the issue of drop out rates
post-school years and create a successful infrastructure to accommodate footballers
who are not picked up by Academies and Centres of Excellence.
Conclusion
Earle, (2001) states that Long Term Athlete Development is not a “high performance”
[elite] model, but rather an athlete retention model. He states that by increasing each
young person’s success rate, by keeping more young people playing sport longer, there
will be a larger pool of potential talent to fish in. But given that the quality of that
“pool of potential talent” would be very much dependent on the quality of coaching
young people receive at the FUNdamental and Learning to Train stages and based on
the understanding that the top coaches work predominantly at the top levels of the
sport, one can make the assumption that young people in the UK may never reach
their full potential in some sports. Earle’s lecture indicated that the Football Association are in the “final draft” stage of drawing up an actual, physical Long Term Athlete
Development plan for football in the UK. So, some key questions for them now is
what and who will be the focus of this Long Term Athlete Development model and
can they sustain the financial investment in the long-term, for what may turn out to
be limited return or success? One would hope that it would be developing the grass
roots game. This will, in turn, address the issue athlete/player retention, thus creating
larger pool of potential talent. Of course, only time will tell.
References
Almond, L. and McGeorge, S. (1997) Young people and physical activity: a literature review.
Health Education Authority, London.
Balyi I. (2001) Sport System Building and Long-term Athlete Development in British Columbia
[online]. Available at: http://www.sportdevelopment.org.uk/balyibc2001.pdf (Accessed 26th
February 2007).
Balyi, I. and Hamilton, A. (2004) Long Term Athlete Development; trainability in childhood
and adolescence, windows of opportunity, optimal trainability [online]. Available at:
73
Journal of Qualitative Research in Sports Studies 1, 1
http://coaching.usolympicteam.com/coaching/kpub.nsf/v/2ltad04 (Accessed 15th February
2007).
BBC Sport. (2003) ‘Wrong culture’ for sporting success [online]. Available at: http://news.bbc.
co.uk/sport1/hi/other_sports/sport_summit/2884047.stm (Accessed 25th March 2003).
BBC Sport. (2005a) Is school sport failing our children? [online]. Available at: http://news.
bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/other_sports/sport_summit/4339277.stm (Accessed 14th March 2005).
BBC Sport. (2005b) Grass roots issue worry with Brooking [online]. Available at: http://news.
bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/4355271.stm (Accessed 16th March 2005).
BBC Sport. (2007a) Ferguson attacks academy system. [online]. Available at: http://news.bbc.
co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/m/man_utd/6369021.stm [Accessed 16th February 2007].
BBC Sport. (2007b) Football factory or money pit? [online]. Available at: http://news.bbc.
co.uk/sport1/hi/football/6303863.stm (Accessed 8th February 2007).
BBC Sport. (2007c) Crewe boss voices academy fears [online]. Available at: http://news.bbc.
co.uk/sport1/hi/football/6304157.stm (Accessed 8th February 2007).
Department for Culture, Media and Sport. (2002) Game Plan: a strategy for delivering Government’s sport & physical activity objectives [online]. Available at: http://www.sportengland.
org/bn1.03_game_plan.pdf (Accessed 10th February 2007).
Department for Culture, Media and Sport. (2004) Partnerships put school sport in new
league [online]. Available at: http://www.culture.gov.uk/Reference_library/Press_notices/
archive_2004/dcms021_04.htm (Accessed 4th March 2004).
Department of Health, The. (2004) At least five a week: Evidence on the impact of physical
activity and its relationship to health. [online]. Available at: http://www.dh.gov.uk/assetRoot/04/08/09/84/04080984.pdf [Accessed 29th April 2004].
Earle, C. (2001) You’ve got me now keep me: An introduction to the principles and practice of
Long Term Athlete Development. Presentation - Loughborough University [online]. Available
at: http://www.sportdevelopment.org.uk/earleltad.pdf (Accessed 16th February 2007).
Football Association, The. (2002) Centres of Excellence [online]. Available at: http://www.
thefa.com/GrassrootsNew/Player/Postings/2002/05/CentresOfExcellence [Accessed 8th
May 2002].
Football Association, The. (2002) Football Academies [online]. Available at: http://www.
thefa.com/GrassrootsNew/Player/Postings/2002/05/10895.htm (Accessed 8th May 2002).
Football Association, The. (2004) Britain’s Olympic past [online]. Available at: http://www.
thefa.com/TheFA/NewsFromTheFA/Postings/2004/03/Wembley_Olympic_bid.htm (Accessed 3rd March 2004).
Guardian Sport, The. (2007) Academies seek pupils to graduate with honours. Page 5. Published 19th January 2007.
Shafi, G. (2006) Burger babies: the future is fat. Student British Medical Journal. 14, 38 – 39.
Sports Coach UK. (2006) Introduction: What is LTAD? [online]. Available at: http://www.
sportscoachuk.org/Improve+Your+Coaching/Long-Term+Athlete+Development (Accessed
2nd October 2006).
74
James Kenyon and Clive Palmer
Times Online, The. (2005) Britain looks to Beijing after Scotland’s snub to 2012 Games
[online]. Available at: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/football/article589352.ece
(Accessed 12th November 2005).
___________________________________________________________________
JQRSS: Acknowledgement Footnote
1.
Since the mentoring process began, I feel I have improved my writing style.
Whilst being prone at times to waffle, the mentoring and review process has
helped me to state what needs to be said in a more succinct way. I have greater
confidence in arguing points critically without being cynical and it has definitely
given me a better belief in my own ability as an academic writer.
2.
James is 25 years old; a mature student in the first year of his B.Sc. Sports Development and Sport Studies Degree. James has a deep passion for sport, whether
it be playing, coaching or officiating and is especially fanatical about his football.
James has coached in a number of sports (predominantly swimming, football
and hockey) working with young people and children mainly from inner-city
areas of Liverpool. James is, as yet, undecided as to whether he would like to stay
in University to engage in a post-grad course with the idea of lecturing himself
eventually or moving into sports development once he has completed his degree.
3.
Dear reader, if this article has stimulated your thoughts and you wish to find out
more about this topic the authors can be contacted on: James Kenyon: 06010476@
hope.ac.uk and Clive Palmer: [email protected].
75