Sons Sporting Ambition Thwarted?

[GatheringAllTheMoss]

My son has dreamt of becoming an England player in his team sport (not football) for many years. He's reached county level which is fantastic but he's unlikely to go further. Not through lack of talent but more through the lack of opportunities and the advantages that others have. Out of 40 children at county level the overwhelming majority are at private schools. 10 from one school. You can count the number of state school boys on one hand and one is my son.

Private schools start this sport in year 3, state pupils are lucky to get the chance to play, those that do start in year 7. Private schools play at a higher level e.g. private school will field their B team against sons state school A team. The coaches and facilities are at a higher level too.

At club level my son plays with the men's team not with his age group and there is no development route. I can move him to another club but the chances are high that it will be dominated by the private school boys so my son won't be chosen for the team.

I always appreciated that talent would only take him so far and I was willing to do whatever was needed to get him to that point. Just devastated by the reality of what he faces to succeed and that I never really appreciated this.

Well yes. Technically.

but who decides on “good”? Who decides who gets nominated?

if you’ve got a sport like ice skating, for example. You’ve got a kid winning everything, powerful, does big tricks at an early age.

but the selectors prefer the artistic, balletic look, and think the powerful kid will not win world/olympic medals. So the kid who wins everything may not be put on the talent pathway or given the same opportunities because of someone’s preference.

i’ve even seen kids not get selected because tptb don’t like the coach or the club. And let’s not get on to body shape and someone deciding you aren’t worth putting time and effort in to coaching because your shape is “wrong”.

similar with gymnastics. Probably even worse because there once you’re over 7 or 8 if you haven’t been put on the talent pathway by then you’re deemed “too old”. And with sports like that you cannot coach yourself or just take yourself to the gym to practice.

a lot of talent selection is subjective. Some random adult deciding if you, as an 11 year old, will be any good in 5 or 10 years. It will be based on their own personal thoughts as to what makes a talented athlete.

Yep it’s a 2 active parent job. We need two of us for Friday night games as it’s too late for the others mostly. And we’re discussing if dc1 gets into an academy that trains before school if dh takes him for 6:30 and I get the other two into the car at 7 to collect him as dh has to go onto work - it will be a serious commitment.

The body shape thing, who knows what puberty is going to do for anyone's body shape.
But lots of sports are more suited to tall people, tennis, running etc but gymnastics is more suited to short people.

In You can give a child all the kit, training and everything else, it does not make them have talent. The famous Portuguese football player played in bare feet.

It might not make them talented but it is clearly giving them a head start over those without coaches, kit and training facilities.

If half the men's cricket team are privately educated, thats telling you something. Cricket shouldn't really be a money sport, but it clearly is.

I'll also add, back in the day of having a whole 4 telly channels. Kids were exposed to far more sport than now. All the big sport was on those 4 channels, so it was seen.

I remember mum laughing as all the local kids would have an attempt at whatever was currently on the telly whether it be football, tennis or cricket.

Now it feels like sport is hidden away you need to seek it out as opposed to it just being there

Whilst I mostly agree with that, I think the Winter Olympics might be an exception, regular trips to Courcheval or St Moritz are well out of reach for most working class people.

I love sport so yes I do seek it out. I think your main problem is with private schools.

Maybe that’s why the people who live in these countries excel at it.

In Paris 33% of British athletes were privately educated which is far higher than 9% of kids in private schools.

But I don't think its as black and white as the schools making a difference i think its more
a reflection of parents also having time and money to commit to the kids.

Even having a nanny or grandparents help could make a huge difference to families getting kids to sport or dance training.

Op It’s called social injustice and it gets alot worse than this.

My sons both excelled at all sport with my youngest boxing for England. Only ever cost me their club fee and the gear they needed.

The question of how to determine future potential (and therefore selection onto a development pathway) is an interesting one and I would think it's really hard to predict.

Someone has linked the article earlier suggesting that there is more and more evidence that keeping kids playing mixed sports for longer and specialising later is a good thing and I broadly agree with that. But, a lot of the sporting bodies make money from getting children onto development programmes and into academies early, and lots of parents want to see Little Billy identified as having talent at football, rugby, cricket etc.

There's also a difference between individual and team sports. Gymnastics, ice skating, sailing, riding, winter sports etc. aren't widely done in most schools (private or state) and probably need even more parental involvement and financial support for future success.

It's easy to blame the private schools for the problem but in reality there are a lot of other factors that contribute just as much to a child's future success in sport - parental support, financial support, geography, the decisions made by the sports' governing bodies, physicality and changing body shape/size, commitment to train/compete and family circumstances.

How about getting them to and from the club?

Was there never any constraints with what time you were able to collect from school / wrap around care and get them to clubs?

Competitions did they never involve over night stays or travel?

Petrol was just part of my overall expenses. Overnight stays were paid for from sponsorship.

Who do you think is actually ‘putting in the hours’ for a child in Year 3?

Your fortunate to have got sponsorship.

I've a friend with a kid in swimming, its the cost of overnights and the issues being able to get them to the pool early morning.
While juggling other kids, and both parents jobs.

My neighbour said it costs nearly 10k a year for her son. Fees, petrol, comps, hotels. British champs is a week in a hotel so that’s 500- 1k for one comp, including travel, food etc.

she even had to pay for his team GB comps. The sport gets millions in lottery funding so it’s not lack of funding. He will go to a comp with say 10 of them and some will have been paid for, some paid for themselves. It usually depends on club or some random criteria.

I coach the sport on a much lower level so she has a good rant fairly regularly. Have to say it sounds a nightmare. He is going to NCAA next year as he can’t stand it, and wants to go to uni which he can’t if he wants to train here. he has been outright told if he does he will never be selected for GB again.

boxing may have sponsorships, most sports like swimming, ice skating, gymnastics etc don’t. Apparently many GB athletes have OF. The male ones usually as they don’t need to do explicit stuff, just photos in underwear etc brings in the money.

I see NCAA mentioned by a previous poster. The US system is really wild. Hot house private secondary school academies, big money in college (18+) sports. over there the school is the focus and clubs seem secondary for most sports.

I am guessing this is rugby. Most of the England squad are public school. You are not wrong in your assessment although it is changing.

I would be interested to know how many of the “public school” England squad were academy players who were given six form scholarships/bursaries to schools like Harrow, Wellington etc.
Many of these boys will have come up through the club route and that is open to all regardless of school.

OP - My son started playing cricket for his local club at the age of 8 and was playing for county at the age of 9. As each season past the advantages from private school provision became more and more obvious. However, instead of accepting it he decided

Being privileged and working hard are not mutually exclusive.

Well, that's entirely dependent on the sport.

In boxing, yes. In yachting, not so much.

Where exactly should the child put in these "extra hours"?

Having kids at county level in sports I can tell you the school opportunities are only part of it - those that excel it’s those in the best external clubs with the best coaches.