Fairfax Stuff. Series on Youth Development (Wellington)

I agree with this. But it's definitely not free. Comparable to junior club fees at most high schools.

School football is also really fun!  There is a real tension - do you completely change a working system for the needs of the elite?

This is a fair question. Is school really the place for elite player development? Probably not.

Schools seem to think that their first XI is the elite - when the reality is at teenage years, players will be growing/playing at different rates with different needs. Do school cater for this well?

How well does it work for others in terms of providing lifelong playing, enjoyment, and skill growth - which is still relevant?

Are schools setup to provide well structured coaching programs? Do they rely on parents to coach? How do they support parents to gain skills if they are new to coaching? 

I'd argue for the later group that Schools struggle to do this well, or  more importantly nowhere as well as Clubs manage to do.

In the past if you didn't want to play for school you had to get sign off form the school, which basically only happened if you were good enough to play Central League.  I think that means the schools have always felt that they had "first dibs" on players.  I'm not sure that's right necessarily and schools do have to move with the times, but it also seems that the academies aren't consistent with who they allow to play for school which makes the situation messy.

In Wellington John Hornal has been the major roadblock for any time of innovation in this space. His retirement after nearly three decades  is at least cause for some hope that change might be possible.

Schools still behave/bluster like this, but the reality is the education act doesn't grant schools powers over non-school extra-curricilar activities. They can be ignored.

interesting convo as it seems Wellington in some ways is experiencing the opposite issue that (some) of Auckland is with certain schools getting first dibs on players up here.

Neither system seems to benefit the players much.

I really would hope that a move for all 1st XI football to midweek and the integration of lower school football into clubs would help most players, however the top end players are always going to have people wanting them in their program so they will still be pulled in both directions.

for me in the short term there needs to be some kind of rule at NZF where national team coaches (at any level) are not affiliated with clubs or schools but instead if they need to pad out their hours are employed by NZF or a federation.  Otherwise the pull of players to those clubs/schools is too strong.

And this is not just aimed at those coaches doing it at the moment, the problem has existed for ages.

To be fair the system works fine in Wellington for the majority of players, who aren't really that 'in demand'. They just play wherever they feel comfortable, and that's fine. Some play at school, some play for their clubs. 

I used to feel a lot more strongly about this issue when I was working at the pointy end of kids' footy and there was a lot of demand on players. Everyone (including me) thought their thing was more important. 

But that was only an issue for maybe 30 kids in every year of kids in the whole city. Kids who were at Wellington College or St Pat's or Scots but were also good enough to be a promising prospect for a club or academy.

I do think it's worth keeping it in perspective.

And as for the game avoiding conflicts of interest. I agree it would be nice, but it's a small game in a small country with a small amount of money. The bloke that was paid by Capital Football to do a review of womens' football recently is also a Board member of NZCT who provide the bulk of Capital Football's funding. Now THAT is a conflict of interest but as Richard Reid quite rightly pointed out when I mentioned it to him "everyone working in sport has a conflict of interest". Which is true pretty much. There just isn't the money or marketplace to avoid them. Would be nice, I agree, but again it needs to be kept in perspective.

Surely though any school-aged kid at an academy could still link up with his school for national qualifiers and nationals. All those games are played midweek, no? Happens in Nelson, where Nelson Suburbs/Tahuna club players will represent Nayland College, and Richmond Athletic/Wakefield players will represent Waimea College. They don't play for their school on Saturdays, only in First XI fixtures such as the national tournament. At least then they get to represent their school. There is no school competition here in Nelson though, they would all play for clubs, except Nelson College randomly have their own club team.

academies consider tournaments the devil., and an active threat to player health and wellbeing.- i.e overuse injury. Iirc one local college operates a modified Phys ed program for academy players - on a monday if they have played the days prior, they get recovery sessions instead of full p.e.

I think this is where the real conflict of needs stems from. Academies believe in the 10000 hours approach but it must be purposeful, and if they can't manage player loading and well-being, they are not looking out for their players. School's fallback on the they last "just want to play with their mates" line, when they are seeking to win tournaments, gain prestige - something in itself not being an academy goal, which is technical player/skill  development.

Players need to decide for themselves  I suppose which mindset works for them.

It would be timely to hear from Chch forumites in the youth space; where after decades of these issues the schools first XI comp was moved to midweek a couple of years ago - and possibly given more mana by playing at English Park and other Fed-friendly facilities like the Russian's football centre. Foal, Slushy, others - thoughts on how it happened and where it's at now after 2-3 years. 

Doesn't happen like that in Wellington. Clubs and schools both take a them or us approach.

thanks Smithy for those comments - very interesting.

Unfortunately in Auckland the schools vs club issue is a very real one and while we don't have the number of academy's wellington has there are clubs up here doing some really good things in a development sense, while the schools are very much about winning the comp and most schools don't give a toss about the players and where they go after they are finished with them.

However schools offer the contact time that clubs may not be able to do in some cases so they are still a part of a development pathway that needs to be included in whatever framework is sorted going forward.

Power is the other issue and when I spoke about national team coaches not being at clubs or schools that is another massive problem as players get promised this and that to play for this school or that club because the coach is in a position to dangle that to players.

Saw this on twitter earlier - School denying credits to an academy player in the Wellington Region:

https://twitter.com/martynsims/status/889006044688433152

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https://twitter.com/martynsims/status/889006204441116673

I read this and immediately thought "holy hell, what NCEA credits can you get for playing football."

But reading the tweets it's about "credits" in Year 9. Third form. I'm not sure what these might be but much less worrying than Years 11, 12, or 13 actual NCEA credits.

Some interesting articles and a great thread. I'm going add my thoughts to a couple of points in one email so bare with me.

As a disclosure my son has been at Ole since 2014 which will no doubt affect some people's opinions of what I have to say :)

The pull only affects 30-odd kids so is it really a problem ?

I agree with this in principle but I think the number is bigger than 30.

Whilst this situation has always been an issue for the 'top' players, with more and more attending academies it's only getting worse. Look at U17 age grade for example. Wests, Nix, Olympic and Karori all have teams in the top grade. If we assume squads of 16 and assume they all go to their respective academies that's already 64 in the bracket of 'club vs college'. I accept not all of them might be considered as 'top' quality but the fact they are playing for a club at this age puts them in this position.

Extend it to G14 and the number gets much bigger. Is G14 too early to be considered in this agruement ? Maybe in the old days, but not anymore. I know a number of kids who have been questioned by their colleges as young as Year 9 as to why they aren't playing for them.

Is it a minefield ?

Absolutely !

In my day you were either one of the best 16 in Wellington, and playing for the Rep team, or you weren't. Each college was associated with a club (by some unwritten rule) and if you were any good at 15 you were going to club training sessions and playing for them on occasions during the season (sometimes by stealth so you weren't caught by your college but you took the opportunity anyway).

But it was an easy progression. College, reps, club and it was all pretty local.

Now the kids are going to schools from all over Wellington, they are travelling over an hour to college, an hour to training 3/4 times a week and some are even leaving college early twice a week. My boy has done 13 hour days since he turned 12. During the holidays he may leave home 4 hours before training to be sure he can get there on time due to public transport (or the lack of). It's tough, but we live in the middle of nowhere and have no choice, but it has been managed by us and Ole brilliantly.

I thought I knew junior football in Wellington until I started looking into where he would go. How any parent who hasn't been involved in their kids football can make an informed decision is beyond me.

Should NZ send teams to age-grade World Cups ?

This is where my time at Ole clouds my judgement. IMO age grade representation should not be a goal.

I don't care about the path my boy takes and I don't care at what level he ends up. I just want him to be the best he can be and to be playing for the rest of his life. As long as you are willing to learn and to work hard, the journey is not over.

I'd argue the same about end of year tournaments and trips overseas for kids as young as 11. What do they really offer in terms of development ?

Do we need to be Iceland ?

I read a fair amount of football books (my wife cant understand how I can get a kick of out mathematical flow-rates and how they relate to passing patterns !) and I recently read about how Germany turned themselves from also-rans to world beaters and it was along similar lines to Iceland but they ended up with a different style of play.

The basis was to put millions into junior coaches and facilities to ensure youngsters were getting the best coaching possible from as early an age as possible.

Initially the German FA ran it. But as it became established they challenged the clubs to do the same. Will NZ ever be able to do that ? Not in my lifetime, which is why I think Declan stated we shouldn't look to just follow Iceland.

When Spain were dominating the world, teams tried to copy it but by the time they could play in a similar way Germany had already come along and blown them out of the water. Now everyone wants to be Germany !

Don't try to do what everyone else is doing. Look how you can improve on what you see and aim for that instead.

Different tactics with the Nix or one structure from Ole ?

Whilst I can understand people thinking Ole/Wests junior teams are 'rigid' if they've only seen them once or twice I strongly reject the view all teams play in the 'exact same way' as Liam put it.

All the juniors play 'in triangles' which leads people to think they are 4-3-3 but the smaller ones will play 2-3-3 (which can become 2-1-5 on attack), the older ones may use 2-3-2-3 (which can become 2-3-5 on attack) and I've even seen a junior team try 2-1-2-5 and it was incredibly effective in the circumstances !

But this is just game-day, training can be vastly different and regularly revolves around 4v4 for the little ones and 7v7 or 8v8 for the bigger ones.

To say they are rigid is doing them a real disservice.

Colleges sense of entitlement.

I'd like to think anyone involved in education, a club or an academy would always put the child's needs ahead of their own but I've had enough experience with my own kids (I wont go into what my daughters college did to ensure everyone played netball for the college and not a club) to know that's not going to change for a long, long time.

I have no sympathy for colleges with that attitude and I will fight for what's best for my kids ahead of what they think is best for the college.

Haha,

The moment I wrote 'credit' I knew it was a mistake !

The school runs a 'credit' system at year 9 and 10 in order to prepare the kids for NCEA level 1. They earn the marks during the year in the same structure as NCEA and 'graduate' at the end of the year with achieved, merit or excellence in pretty much the same way.

There are an amount of credits the kids can 'earn' from being involved in extra-curricular activities for the college. Playing in a college sport team, being in the school play or band automatically earns you those credits which count towards your final mark.

He was given 0 which I argued was unfair as he trained 5 days a week and played on a 6th, so when exactly was he supposed to earn those credits.

They agreed it was unfair and said it would be taken into account this year.

Sometimes your kid can be the best they can be but its not good enough and measuring their success by what level they play at vs how much of their potential they realise is not a good yardstick when seeing how well you kid has done (and I am looking at it through parent eyes). I read an article the other day about a 17yo boy for whom success is being able to do up one single button on his shirt in less than 6 mins. Easy for most people but for him, that is huge.

If schools are about growing the person then they should care about helping these kids realise their full potential vs measuring success on a scale that says if you don't play 1st XI/CL/JAW, you are a failure.

Re: playing 4-3-3 as a system, I understand that this is common practice in quite a few youth programmes globally for the reason that it is the simplest system which is suited to possession football, as Martyn has alluded too. Good write up about that here: https://soccertofootball.wordpress.com/2016/12/27/...

Isn't 4-3-3 recommended in the Whole of Football plan? Or did I imagine that?

In all of NZF's material 4-3-3 is THE formation. In fact, they practically insist that you use it with young players, which makes me wonder why the NZ U20s didn't use it (they are a development team after all)...

So much ego within our coaching and coaching setups. Everyone thinks they can do a better job than the other person and there is more cock swinging than actual thought about what is best for the kids.

We have a setup where we have NZF doing federation and NTC training, we have a number of private academies all doing their own interpretation of coaching systems, we have schools and their setups and then also clubs with streamed squads and club academies.

Any player that wants to get somewhere in NZ in reality from age 7 or 8 onwards needs to be doing their club football and some sort of academy training.  Once they hit their teens then the federation trainings kick in and they are also doing their club and academy training. Once they hit secondary school then the school trainings etc kick in. So many have 4 different coaches a week and 4 different types of scene they are playing football in.

All the while each of the various setups is telling anyone who will listen that they are doing the right things and the other systems are rubbish. 

Everyone hates NZF, clubs hate the schools, the coaching academies hate each other and the schools hate the clubs.  An exageration I know but it gives you a rough idea of whats going on.

Talk to any coach in NZ dealing with kids and youth football and ask them what they think of another coaching setup or coaches and they will slag off the other setup. 

I don't know about this either. I've heard several coaches from various different set ups making pretty respectful comments of the others over the last 12 months.

Ballsed that formatting up didnt I ?

Any kid from roughly 12 onwards who is a good player and playing at a decent level could find themselves in the federation system. 1 training usually on a Sunday per week during the season proper (2 nights during the off season). They will have two training nights a week with their club (leaving 3 other nights free), 1 training night with an academy such as coerver or wynrs for example and 2 trainings a week ( mornings) with their school as well as 2 games on a saturday.

3 or 4 different setups each week,  Its entirely doable and is going on all the time. Different coaches, different ideas and some of the ideas conflicting.

I remember Bill Tuiloma a number of years ago doing Wynrs, club, school and AFF. Not so long ago Mathew Ridenton was doing school, club and AFF. I cant remember if he was doing coever as well. Currently there are plenty of the NFF and AFF kids doing 3 or 4 different systems. None of them are coordinating their trainings or even talking to each other about their curriculum, they all operate around each other. 

I'm quite aware of how you could do it but I'd argue any kid serious about playing at a decent level will have already spent a couple of years in an academy environment by the time they reach 12 and wouldn't go near FTC or their school.

I don't know why anyone would consider an academy who only train once a week. If ever there was an example of an academy taking money and giving false hope, that would be it for me.

Well there is what is going on and what people dont believe would happen.

This is going on right now, has been for a long time.

The point is that our coaching systems in NZ are such that the kids are getting  coaching messages from 3 or 4 different coaching environments. Thats whats actually going on, not what I think is going on, its whats actually happening.

All I would say is if you break it down academies exist to make money and the only way they do that is by selling a dream of professional football.  At the end of the day surely for the majority of kids at these academies the bets they could hope for is a US college education and some NZFC appearances.  Working out whether that is worth $10k a year and five nights of football a week is up to the person paying the bill.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/football/domestic/95139832/football-development-project-capital-footballs-plan-to-provide-clarity-to-the-wellington-youth-space

James Dean, as stated elsewhere, not all academies are the same. Some are for profit, others are non-profit trusts. Parents, do your research.

True

Even if they are not-for-profits, the point about investment vs likelihood of success is still a relevant one.

And not all academies are charging $10k a year either. I reckon I've paid less than $15 a session the last 3 years. How much would you pay an hour for little Johnny to learn the piano ?

As for the investment vs likelihood arguement, it all depends on what your desired outcome is. Professional footballer, highly unlikely.

But the experience of being in a professional environment, being pushed for excellence, having significant male role models I consider to be priceless.

To often other parents have asked me 'why do you bother, he wont be a professional footballer'. He may well not be, but that's not the point.

So having read the latest piece - capital football want to engage with club, school and academy to try and keep all three pillars happy, presumably. What missing is the detail of the engagement model with players and parents I dare say.

The discussion about age grade tournaments access sounds like pure self interest. 

This sounds like a political compromise, in the brewing, not an evidence based/best practice approach solution.

Who is a not for profit trust? Show me one registered charitable trust running an academy.

There is no evidence based best practice. It's all debatable.

If there was a clear way everyone would be doing it.

That's a fair point, that there is a debate to be had. The proposition I read in that article seems to be about promoting the federations and schools interests , over the academies. 

I personally find it interesting that players are not seen as keen stakeholders in the discussion, and there is no.mention of player or parent engagement.

What value do you expect kids to add to the discussion?

Or to be honest most parents...

Parents are stakeholders, given they are the source of funding for football, be it academies or FTC.

I think you'd find that some kids are sick of getting grief from their colleges about their active choices as well, and are happy in U17/14th grade with their longstanding club.

You'll find Ole and Shane Rufer in the register if you look, as well as some other regional player development charities.

I stand corrected. Many apologies.