FA Review of Grassroots 11-a - side

[normanvasey]

Surely Norman the under 18 football has not declined in this area over the years. In fact it is certainly a lot stronger now than say 10-12 years ago.
Not surprised the FA turned down the 18-21 years group for PDFL. At this age a lot of young players go off to college or have jobs working on Saturdays.
A lot of A teams and some reserves have under 18 players and that for a club is the way to go.
Not sure about the old boys either the only such team locally was perhaps Ortonians but that became just another club over the years (but a good one too).
Have to agree with the old sage from Whittlesey (must be nearly a first) a changing in young players' attitudes is not helping but the change in the league format again may help boost things and perhaps Norman you should see how this goes for a couple of seasons at least.\
By the way Norman still waiting to hear what happened to that surplus of referees!

I made it quite clear in my post that it is the 16 to 18 year old section that is rapidly declining both nationally and locally, hence our desire to do something about it. Again The FA did not turn it down, they gave us almost immediate sanction for the competition. It was when we asked for the odd player outside of this age range to be included that the solids hit the fan because others locally objected. Great shame!
The under 16 year old group are going from strength to strength because thy have they great advantage locally in belonging to the P'Boro Junior Alliance,recognised by The FA as amongst the top in the country. Take a bow Hazel and Davis Burgess! It's when they leave the Junior Alliance that the fall off begins in earnest.
Chris is correct about this age group going off to further education and working etc. I can add another half dozen good reasons why they participate less in football. The really difficult bit is doing something about it. When a club is declining the first thing that goes seems to be the A team and then the ressies, thereby working against the inclusion of the younger and less able players.
I hope Chris is right when he says the new league format may help in this respect but that won't prevent us from exploring other avenues.
The FA fully recognise these problems and are already employing a "Get into Football" officer at County level to progress the game. As Tesco say every little helps.
Scouse Mouse mentions that the Liverpool lads were happy to include all ages, that generosity of spirit appears to be lacking around here.
To end on a positive note, in our area we are bucking the national trend and expanding as a league, we have a number of initiatives in the pipeline to improve and streamline our activities and hopefully become even more fit for purpose. It is good news on the referee front too,it's a pity that RWT doesn't publisise more the tremendous amount of work he does for ref's, month after month.

The glass is more than half full, not half empty. (End of Party political broadcast).

[geordielec1971]

Norman do you feel sum people dont read or listen ????? Lol

[Glasgow Rangers Champions]

i personally feel the decline in football among youngsters has declined due to the state of our country and the way times have changed, as a kid i remember all the lads playing footy at school, after school and at weekends. Kids were always aloud out by their parents to play and off course in the winter we had a 5 aside league inside which ran every tues and thursday in the eve again after school. Now tho look at most Citys and towns and you see no such thing, prices of renting halls or pitches have got so high clubs cant afford it and the goals that kids would play with get taking down by local councils in the summer when it is possible for the younger kids to take advantage of them. Parents are forced to work longer hours and therefore get less time to spend introducing kids into football. All you see at schools now a days is after school football clubs that you need to pay for, i remember after school clubs being part of the school not an extra and again not all parents can afford this. Oh and lets not forget society has led us to believe as parents that your kids are not safe to go out to the local parks either without a pervert or pedophile supposedly lurking around the corner .... add all this together and then you will start to see why there is a rapid decline in youngsters playing football..