By Dr Chris Platts, lecturer in sports business management

A career as a professional footballer has long been regarded as a highly sought after occupation for many young males within the UK and, against this backdrop, since the 1970s increasing attention has come to be placed on the way young players are identified and developed within professional clubs. Indeed, the most recent step in this process has seen the development of the Elite Player Performance Plan, which aims, among other things, to 'increase the number and quality of Home Grown Players gaining professional contracts in the clubs and playing first-team football at the highest level' by seeking 'to implement significant gains in every aspect of player development' (Premier League, 2012).

While much of the attention around the development of players has centred upon their ability to gain a professional contract and compete at the national and international level of the game, concern has also been expressed over the number of players who, having been developed at professional clubs, fail to secure a professional contract, and the ways in which clubs should help young players safeguard their futures through alternative career training and robust welfare provision. Within this context, there have been very few studies that have analysed the education and welfare provisions that are offered within professional football academies and centres of excellence, and fewer still that have done this from a sociological perspective.

Within this context, the aim of this study was to examine the realities of young players’ day-to-day working-lives, the experiences they have of the educational programmes they follow, and the welfare-related matters that arise within present-day academies and centres of excellence. Using data generated by self-completion questionnaires and focus groups with 303 players in 21 academies and centres of excellence in England and Wales, the findings of the study suggest that, despite a number of changes to education programmes, players continue to be socialised into a largely anti-academic culture that has traditionally underpinned the world of professional football. It is a cultural expectation of many players that in order to focus sufficiently on football, they must forego other areas, such as their education. Alongside this, it is vital for players who wish to gain a professional contract to demonstrate a 'good attitude' and a high level of commitment to the more central members of their working lives (especially coaches and managers). Indeed, it was also clear that the deep-seated values players held in relation to the professional game as part of their individual and group habituses were shaped by the networks of relationships into which they were born and had been developed during the more impressionable phases of childhood and youth. In this regard, the desire shown by parents for players to succeed and the antipathy coaches and managers showed towards education helped to shape the players opinions with respect to the value of education.

Operating within this context players were often expected to copy work from the internet, the tutor and each other, receive extra help from tutors and hand in work late in order to make sure players passed the course.

Alongside their disregard for the importance of education, players’ welfare needs were significantly compromised by the strong degree of suspicion and obvious degree of mistrust that characterised their relationship with club management. This mistrust, which emanated from players’ fears that confidential matters would always 'get back' to others inside the club, meant that players were unlikely to report personal and professional issues, such as issues with injuries or problems in coping with living away from home, to members of the club for fear of being stigmatised in some way. As has been reported in the past, players welfare was also compromised by the actions of the managers and coaches during training and games, who sought to intimidate and deride players through the use of verbal and physical forms of abuse. Issues around player welfare was exacerbated, in almost all cases, by players’ observations that they were treated as if they were 'bottom of the club' and whose welfare needs were not generally well understood by those working within academies and centres of excellence.