Perceptions and experiences of youth footballers registered in nurseries (13-15)

Background: Football nurseries for youths have historically served to expand grassroots football to develop talent. Research on youth footballers has focused predominantly on elite youth football (Reeves et al, 2009; Sieghartsleitner et al, 2019) and a study explored youth development in football nurseries in Malta (Cassar and Gauci 2015). Notwithstanding these contributions, it is timely that the experience of youth football and talented player development is explored further by capturing the voice of young footballers in nurseries. Building on recent research on the Developmental Model of Sport Participation (Côté and Vierimaa 2015) and the Long-Term Athlete Development model (Balyi et al. 2013), this study explored the perceptions and experiences of coaching sessions of youth (13-15) registered in football nurseries in Malta.

Research: The key research questions were: What are the experiences of youth footballers during the sessions? What are the perceptions and experiences of youth footballers regarding their relationships with the coach and peers? Mills et al. (2012) identified a series of factors perceived to either positively or negatively influence youth football player development, while Flores-Aguilar et al. (2021) emphasised the impact of peer relations. The study will explore how youth footballers develop during their coaching sessions in relation to awareness of themselves and awareness of others; resilience to cope with feedback, and setbacks; and sport-specific attributes such as perceptions of coaching sessions and competitiveness.

Methodology: At the time of the study, twelve from fourteen top division senior football league clubs in Malta had well-organised and resourced Youth Football Club Nurseries (YFCN) for boys; two had provision for girls (Youth Football Association 2015). A stratified random sample of six out of the fourteen top division football clubs in Malta was selected as a fair representation of the population. An in-depth semi-structured focus-groups was held at each of the six YFCN. Forty-two youth footballers from six nurseries volunteered to participate. All were boys. Focus groups offered ‘deeper’ understanding of social phenomena through dynamic group in-depth discussion conversations and deliberation of thoughts, beliefs, and perspectives. Thematic analysis (Braun et al, 2019) was used to analyse the data.

Key findings: The coach, sessions and environment emerged as key themes. Youth footballers experienced and affirmed that they wanted coaches that are fair, remain calm, are caring, do not shout and encourages all participants. The coaching style impacted resilience, motivation, mental-wellbeing, and decisions for dropouts. Most youth footballers preferred to play and have fun, rather than win every game and not play. All participants shared the belief that success and the development of game strategy development were important, however, a focus on winning was perceived important to some of the youth footballers. Peer relationships were positive, but subgroups and micro aggressions contributed to self-esteem issues. This study recommends a similar study for girls’ youth football. When individual youth footballers are bullied, or feel excluded by their peers, coaches have a role to play to prevent and eradicate adverse experiences in youth football. Training for coaches to manage peer and coach relationship is desirable as part of a coaches’ continuous development. Also, youth football nursery programmes should signpost phases of transitions of continued participation at recreational and high levels of performance for youth footballers.

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