Funding of NZF Youth Sides

Subsidies, ASB, WC and other partners. I would be interested in what government handouts it got because I doubt it be much if any.

Fisher and Paykel, VW, McDs, tab handout... Any others?

I don't dispute that Tegal as I raised in my points above that they are prepared to help in hardship cases but to what extent? What are they going to do though if they get 5 or 6 that cannot afford it? What if it's a fringe player and they go 'well he is on the cusp, let's pick the next kid down that can afford it'

If you had to stump up $2k next month, could you?

I don't know the ins and outs of it, but I suspect neither do you. 

Maybe its a payment plan they work out. Or any number of things. You say its a reward, but perhaps We don't have the luxury of giving out 'rewards' to kids? As long as the best kids are still there, I have no problem with it. I also do accept that it isn't exactly ideal, but that's life, you have to prioritise your allocation of scarce resources. 

No I don't know the it's and out's of it either, but when you are in an information gap, you fill it with speculation as happens on forums. 

I disagree with you on the reward thing. Kids are frequently told, work hard, train hard, play well, perform and the honours will come. To be picked for a national team in any sport recognises your ability and that you have demonstrated that. The only outlier is probably Wayne Gretzky whom is a difference being in the ice hockey field.

If you play well in Super 15, your reward is an AB jersey usually. Of course being picked for a national team is a reward or if you prefer a world that sportsman frequently use, a bestowed honour.

And the $2k?

I dont know how NZF spend their money, but when it comes to this type of arrangement coming in as a practice, then questions are entitled to be asked

The other thing is that this throws the door open to 'not necessarily' the best kids being there

A couple of points here

1, why is that the kids have to cough up $2000 to represent their country at a FIFA tournament when the adult men(AW's) get to share $5 million from their participation at a FIFA tournament. OK they are pro,s but surely they might have been happy with $1 million less, which could have funded the other 8 teams. We do not have the luxury of paying $5million to one team however hard they worked to get it.

2, If you start charging to represent your country then you will get a team from rich white families. People are saying that $2000 is not much. Tell that to a brown family from South Auckland(where I am sure there are potentially some very good talent) Also if some kids are paying and some get sponsored what does this do to team harmony? 

3, Fred made a good point about Oceania being such a weak Confederation that we end up getting  just about every age group (eight)qualifying for just about every FIFA tournament. This is very hard to support for such a small country. In fact we are probably the only country that does have such a heavy commitment to every FIFA tournement.

4, Funny how we live in a country where kids have to pay to represent their country, yet the Government gives $30+ million so a bunch of rich yachtsmen can sail off against some of the richest men in the world in a wank fest contest that nobody on the planet cares about.

Ok so you are saying its a reward but we don't have the luxury of giving out rewards? I don't follow you

Can't find fault with that

Absolutely if we "reward" performance , where will our next crop of football admiin and little Tegals come from...as for $2000 being a bargain , I think little Marco might not have looked outside his own affluent { daddys } circle .....

Personally speaking Im desperate to bestow a few things on you ......   but you cant live on honour ...and how much honour is there to be a national rep just because your trust fund is particularly beneficent...

Sigh. I'm basing my opinion on the fact that they said they'd help out people who can't afford it. So its not just going to be people with trust funds who go. 

I hoped to have a reasonable discussion about this, because it is interesting,and I do sympathise with the opposite point of view to the one I hold. But it seems that isn't possible on here, as usual. 

Yawn

Small change???? For SOME but not for all.

Fred de Jong is also quoted as saying "it is not a huge demand. "

I think its an equality thing, regardless of how little income it brings in. Women should have the same opportunity to go to these tournaments. 

I agree. I think if you make a cut to the women's program, then you will get an uproar. If they wanted to cancel programmes, they'd need to do the same on each of the mens/woman's coin i.e both u17s or both u20s

I thought we were. I don't think we are too far apart really. I guess the question really is 'is there a different solution' so we don't have to go down this road.

Agreed!

Still reckon that the AW's should not have got such a big slice of the WC payout. More of that money should have gone to grassroots football. Sure the players worked hard to get us to the WC but we could not afford to splurge such a big slice of $$$ on such a small group. Surely in such a small country like ours playing in a WC is reward enough for a player.(plus standard international match payments) Qualifying for the WC should have been a windfall for NZ football overall.......more so than the players.

The reality is that if we don't qualify for this years WC then NZF will be staring down a financial black hole. We will not be able to afford to send teams to FIFA tournements unless alternative funding is found.....which brings us full circle.....where is that money going to come from if it is not from parents?

Partially from the parents anyway. 

Payments to players for tournaments like the World Cup is always a big issue. I will always think they get too much, its clear NZF needed that money more than the players. There is obviously some unknown (to me) sequence of events that led to such a payout. 

Yeah fair call that. I think I'm coming across as more concrete on my opinion than I actually am. JV is right, I think we are on the same sort of page. I'm just taking the position of 'well, if that's the reality of it...then I don't really have a problem with it'

But at the same time I recognise that its far from ideal. For most of the reasons that others have given (aside from the 'rich kids only' argument)

The cost is interesting. 46k per tournament adds up, considering the number of age group men's and women's tournaments we enter in. Someone else can do the math. 

2 youth tournaments a year. WC for U17 + U20 mens one year. WC for U17 + U20 women's the other year

True. I will say then, it does seem strange to do something that would cause such an uproar just  to save 92k (probably less if they help some out) a year. 

They obviously do need to balance the books up in some way, and these kids seemed like a good way to get some revenue to help do that. I mean, what are they going to do, not pay it and miss out on the world cup? This does raise some pretty valid questions, and as I've said, I understand why people are asking them. 

The money that the players got from WC2010 was negotiated between the PFA and NZF of which Glading said he was happy with the arrangement. I think his attitude was essentially 'If you guys get us there, we'll get a large whack of cash and we are prepared to give you a sizable chunk of that as incentive as any money is better than no money'

The thing I think they need to do is try to get one off sponsors for each tournament. If you sponsor this team for this WC, they'll be known as the XYZ Junior AWs. With it being on TV and being on shirts (although I don't think FIFA allow sponsorship on shirts) you'll get exposure and they will be known as that team for 2 years. The reality is, they will get TV time for it as well because the island teams wont be going anytime soon.

When you think $50k naming rights for 2 years, thats not too outrageous is it?

I'm writing this without the benefit of yet reading any subsequent posts, so apologies if I'm repeating what has been said. 

it's arguably rich kids only from 12th Grade , when FTC kicks in

IMO if pay to play (or be selected) is offensive then start from the beginning. 

This is a great point. The way the current system is set up it has started filtering out those who can't afford to pay a long time before they will ever be asked to pay $2k towards travelling with a national rep team. Which doesn't make that decision right but does make the discussion a much broader one.

For instance, I'd be fascinated to know how many NZ age-grade reps over the past 5 years paid to attend a private football academy at some point. Not because I think private academies are necessarily bad, but because it might help to illustrate the extent to which 'pay-to-play', or more correctly 'pay-to-represent' is already embedded in the system.

I did a quick count through the 2012 annual report and it looked like NZ rep teams played around 45-50 games overseas last year. Many of those games were at tournaments, which would bring the average cost per game down, but still, that's a shit-load when you think about the number of people involved.

Would there be any other team sport in NZ trying to support a similar amount of overseas activity? Maybe rugby?

Does anyone else have examples of sports who either do or don't charge their rep teams to go overseas?

Another really good point.

At first glance the $4 or 5m that went to the players from the last World Cup seems like a fortune.

However, divided over the 25 or so players who I think qualified to get some money it's actually an average of around $200k each which seems more modest, and probably significantly less than players from other countries got.

On balance though, I agree. Our current pros are already making a living from the game (however modest) having been given a leg up through NZ rep teams in the past. I think it would have been extremely politic of them to give up some of what they got to support future young pros coming though.

Following that thought, is a potential solution to this to ask anybody who represents NZ (at any age) to sign a contract committing a small percentage of any future earnings from playing football to a fund specifically for the purpose of paying these costs? Not dissimilar from the type of contracts that I understand many of these private academies make their particapants sign.

What sort of $ might that be?

I guess I never thought about that when arguing my point. If that's the case, it's disappointing. In an idealic paradise, you want to make sure no one has slipped through the cracks and I guess if they cannot afford to, then you are going to have players with talent that will miss out. In reading the outliers book, I guess if those kids pay and get better coaching then they will accelerate past the others anyway but I guess one wonders if it was the same playing field for everyone, who would come out on top.

I have no idea of the number(s) who choose not to participate in FTC due to financial priorities. Here in Chch a fund was set up by Mainland Football to help address this problem. I'm pretty sure it can also help out with club subs, boots, and Rep Program (Sth Island Tournament)

What can be seen is that after 20 months of FTC that group of players is very much stronger than those not in the scheme. I would say that the gap was nowhere near as wide in Jan 2012. So money well spent? It indicates to me that the Federation has to get that initial intake bang on. Personally I think it is madness to identify at 11 years your U-17 squad (for instance). I also think that worrying about players missing out is inevitable and also for reasons not restricted to $. Parental choices around their kids sporting options would cause more to miss out then straight economic opportunities. 

My eldest boy is Year 2000. This year is the first year of eligibility for NTC. Assuming because he is "in the system" or at least identified early he makes the cut for the duration of the program. 

so 4 x $700 FTC then 6 x $485 NTC  and 2x Sth Island Tournaments and 1 x National Comp at approx $1100

= $6700 over 4 years to possibly get a trial for U-17's which Sth Island players never make anyway (cheap dig, yes) 

if we then got asked for another 2K to do a World Cup , given the above acceptance of forking out we would hardly bat an eyelid.

For sure the longer FTC goes and the increased likelihood the same players always get picked the more it'll be viewed as an elitist closed shop. But if the organizer can show "the FTC are the best players" then it will not change. 

That of course still don't make pay for play right.