Youth Player Development Around the World
Post by Gazza on Sept 6, 2005, 1:07am

No Premiership this weekend, so because I was bored and I'm a bit of an anorak I thought I would bring you a bit of info on Player Development in England - just for anyone who is interested.

Who's In Charge?

Player development here is not directly managed by The FA. The FA have a monitoring role, and set the rules, but they do not directly engage in player development.

Instead it is the role of the Football Leagues - that's your Premiership, Championship, League One and League Two.

Structure

Every Premiership club must run an Academy, and every League club that does not run an Academy must run a Centre of Excellence.

There are various standards that Academies and Centres of Excellent must meet. Obviously the standards for an Academy are more demanding than those for a Centre, but they cover the same topics.

These include:
- quality of facilities
- accreditation of coaches
- child protection
- player:coach ratios
- maximum number of players
- mandatory minimum training of coaches each year
- insurance
- an agreed football calendar.

Additionally, Academies are expected to provide:
- physiotherapy and medical expertise
- study and homework areas
- career guidance
- a learning programme meeting achieving certain minimum technical outcomes
- annual player feedback and reports to parents.

From here I will deal solely with Football Academies, but most of these things are true to some degree for Centres of Excellence also.

Games

A topic close to all of your hearts.

Players who are in a Football Academy are allowed to play only 30 games per year. Any more and they put at risk their continued inclusion at the Academy.

Parents have sole discretion over where these games are played and who for.

Academies recommend that players play those games with their Academy - against other Academies - but it is up to parents. The player could continue to play for his local club, as long as he didn't play more than 30 games per year. This certainly happens.

Games within the Academy are seen as an extension of the coaching programme, not as competitions in their own right.

This description, I believe, is a great way to illustrate the difference between a constructive coaching programme and what we have in all NSW PYL clubs, bar none that I have seen anyway. By way of comparison I think this is exactly what Kelly Cross does with his boys at NSWIS.

11-a-side football is not brought into the Academies until players are 12 years old.

Player Registrations

Apart from setting limits on the number of players Academies can sign, there are restrictions on who is signed and when.

Players can not be signed to terms until they are 9 years old and must reside within 60 minutes travel time of the Academy until they are 13, and then 90 minutes travel time until they are 16.

So What?

Who cares?

Well, the English model is one where the governing body just does that - it governs. The FA have decided not to be in the business of coaching, just of coach education, and instead they have put in a framework that makes others do the coaching for them.

Is this relevant in Sydney?

Well the obvious difference is that in England there is a payoff for coaching kids. You can sell them. That provides justification for the expense of setting up and properly running the Academy.

Where does that money come from in Sydney where the money essentiall flows upwards to Soccer NSW?

Soccer NSW have the power to levy every player in NSW and thus spread the cost of Elite Development across the masses, reducing the individual cost to the Elite player.

If Soccer NSW wants the clubs to develop players for them then arguably they need to help with the funding. Perhaps providing coaching staff to every club for a certain number of hours per week, or just cash.

Most important of course is a clear framework (Lions Roar will agree with me here) that has clear penalties for non-compliance and clear methods for the measurement.

So there is some info for you if you are interested. This information comes from a variety of sources - The FA website, the Surrey FA who are my local County FA, and from the club Manager at one of the bigger local youth clubs around here.

I live in an area that is very poorly served by Centres of Excellence and Academies, just because there aren't many League clubs around. A few boys around here have signed papers with League clubs but continue to play for local clubs just because it's convenient and they want to.

Look forward to contributions from others on what they know about things in other countries.

Gaz.

Re: Youth Player Development Around the World
Post by 777 on Sept 6, 2005, 10:09am

Gazza
I did the same thing last weekend. The Northern Ireland people are undergoing the same development turmoil that we are going through. There strategy is outlined here with a few local entities substituted for more relevance. The interesting idea is the part clubs might play in the coaching infrastructure. Ideally, in time, as FFA finances improve thru Asian involvement, clubs coaching will be subsidised and monitored by a central technical body.

YOUTH DEVELOPMENT STRATEGY
1. Provide a common football curriculum to ensure that young players are set on the same development path, irrespective of their gender or where they live.
2. Establish a national/regional network of youth Football Development Centres to supplement the existing youth leagues and competitions. The Football Development Centres should act as hubs to maximise community participation in football and provide specific programmes to foster the development of talented players. Clubs and/or associations are to play a key role in facilitating these Centres with funding from the FFA.
3. Provide new investment in infrastructure to develop talented young players by establishing a Football Academy to develop talented footballers and to provide the nucleus of future international school and youth teams.
4. Establish a new National Technical Department of the FFA and coaching programmes


POLICY
1. The FFA, along with all appropriate State bodies, football associations and leagues, should sign up to a new common youth development policy, setting out agreed objectives and structures for the development of youth football.
2. The youth development policy should be underpinned by the following guiding principles:
• coherence
• inclusion
• equity
• player-focused approach
• coaching excellence
• tailored programmes
• progression for talent.

SMALL SIDED FOOTBALL
1. Small sided football should be the basis for developing football skills for primary school-age children. All existing eleven-a-side leagues for primary school-age players should move to small sided football, with allowance for structured competition.
2. Councils and education authorities should provide dedicated mini-football pitches, marked out to specifications agreed with the FFA and participating leagues.


FOOTBALL DEVELOPMENT CENTRES
1. Accredited senior clubs/associations should establish youth Football Development Centres for primary and post-primary school-age players. These should include:
• mini-soccer programmes as the first step in promoting participation in football at community level
• community programmes through which the Football Development Centres would act as hubs to maximise participation by young people in structured football development initiatives
• programmes targeted at talented players.

2. Football Development Centres should also be established in areas where there is no senior club.
Consideration should also be given to the scope to cascade the Football Development Centre concept through clubs at other levels of football. Eg. Football Development Centre ‘coach the coaches” programmes for local clubs.
3. Football Development Centres should be registered with the FFA and meet specified standards in terms of coaching, facilities and training development programmes.
4. Programmes within Football Development Centres should be designed to enable players to continue to play competitive football with their club of origin.
5. The FFA, in consultation with the Australian Sports Commission, should produce an implementation plan that incorporates a programme for establishing Football Development Centres, taking account of the need to expand the number of development officers.
6. The FFA and the Australian Sports Commission should co-ordinate a needs assessment of facilities and equipment required for football development centres.
Australian Football Academy
1. The AIS Football Academy concept should be further developed to foster the technical development of the most talented young players and to provide the nucleus for future international school and youth teams.
2. The Academy should be based on successful international models such as the French Football Federation’s academy at Clairefontaine, tailored to meet the needs of Australian players.
3. Players attending the Academy would remain registered with their club of origin.

Coaching

> FFA should consolidate its coaching activities within a new technical department, headed by a technical director to oversee and co-ordinate the development of coaching across all levels. This could be taken forward with the help and advice of the Australian Institute of Sport.


Representation
The FFA should take appropriate measures to ensure that representatives of senior clubs are given
an effective voice in relation to youth development.

Evaluation
The FFA , in consultation with the Australian Sports Commission, should develop a programme for ongoing evaluation of the implementation of the youth development policy.