bellbuzzer said:
the kids in this country,6 and upwards play on full-size pitches full-size goals,fullsize footballs,consequently the early developers(physically) stand out,and then get groomed in the good old english way. The FA have been in denial since Hungary humiliated us back in the fifties,they are responsible for the kind of player that english clubs churn out,by doing absolutely nothing but perpetuate the system that keeps them in power.Eventually the prem will be devoid of english players because we have wasted the talents of kids that never had a chance to shine in the early years. Technically and tactically our players fall further and further behind, how many scouts from spain and italy bother to look over here, how bad is the standard in the lower leagues,which are predominantly home produced? The best thing for the future of english football (not the prem) would be for the national team to fail miserably in SA ,thus high-lighting the cancer that is the FA,and removing the whole she-bang. They are a disgrace.And fifa are just corrupt.
This is probably the most likely reason for the lack of technical ability. The Brazilians, Dutch, Argies, etc all tend to excel at technical ability because they are coached from youth using the philosophy of small-sided games in training and playing. This coaching philosophy is slowing being adopted by the "english" national teams (which in my opinion includes England, US and Canada).
The US introduced this philosophy in 2005 (
http://www.usyouthsoccer.org/doc_lib/small_sided_games_manual.pdf) and have had some pretty good success with it as the standard of the US team has increased during that time.
We in Canada have also adopted this approach to our coaching in the past 2 or 3 years, although in current practice our coaches are very much like England in that we chose the biggest strongest kids early on and depend on their power and pace to win games until they hit their late teens where their lack of ball skill means they get killed in international competitions. This is unfortunately highly influenced by Hockey coaches who see soccer as off-season fitness training. :( To combat this philosophy, the Canadian Soccer Association has introduced the Long-Term Player Development (
http://www.canadasoccer.com/wellness/W2WC_Matrix_ENG.pdf) system into it's coach training so that players can focus on the areas of their skill development that are age appropriate.
With those changes, we now have competitive 7-a-side soccer leagues for kids U9-U11 with mini-sized fields and nets at House League, Division 1 and Premier levels. At U12 they shift to a full 11 v 11 game with full-sized nets on a full-sized field although those fields are just barely the minimum measurements. They also introduce a Regional level at this point where the top players at each group play and begin grooming for the provincial and national teams which begin at U14. As they progress through U12-U18 the fields and amount of time played gets increasinlgy longer. This is a start, although some would argue that small-sided games should continue well into a child's teen years with little emphasis placed on positional play.
With regards to the comment about the southern countries having an advantage because of their weather which makes them more of an outdoor culture, I'd chalk that up as an excuse. We in Canada have some of the harshest winters on the planet but we still hold competitive indoor seasons playing 7-a-side on mini fields on domed fields and Futsal leagues through the winter months. I'm actually a huge proponent of the game of Futsal in player development as it is a very fast paced game that requires excellent technique. The 6' + guys tend to struggle in this game as it is less physical and more technical than outdoor soccer. It's where the guys like Ronaldinho and Ronaldo have developed their superb technical ability. Here's a clip of Ronaldinho showing him playing Futsal as a kid and an adult to compare.
<a class="postlink" href="http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1374289816694973820#" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 694973820#</a>
Unfortunately, until we instill in our coaches and parents that quality football teams are more "successful" than match winning teams with large kids on them, we will continue to produce inferior teams on a national level and this is Canada's biggest problem. Even though we have leagues and divisions for the youngest kids it's the bigger althletic kids who make it into the provincial and national programs and not the more skilled players unfortunately because winning is the name of the game at the youth level.
