Football and Parenting: Less than 0.5% of players aged under 9 signed by professional teams will graduate to the first team

A series on being a parent to a youth grassroots footballer

My son, Finn, is like most football-loving kids in England. He dreams of being a professional footballer and much of his spare time is spent watching, playing, or reading about football. 

For the 2023-24 season, he will play U11 grassroots football, which for those outside of England, it means he is not a part of any professional football academy. Since the age of 6, Finn has played for the same team (MSC for short) and with most of the same players. Most of the team met during soccer school sessions put on by the club. It enabled the club to form a U7 team, which was the first year of organised football available.  

Over the years, I’ve got to watch a lot of grassroots football. My Saturdays, some Sundays, and the occasional weekday has been dedicated to taking him to matches and watching fixtures in the northwest of England. There have also been tournaments, training sessions, and camps. I’ve learned a lot about the players that professional academies track and sign. Some of Finn’s teammates have been picked for trials and development training by the academies of Premier League teams.

Although Finn plays grassroots, it is at a strong level, the highest in a three-tiered league. Many of the kids he has played against have either had trials with professional academies or played in them already. Indeed, a former classmate of Finn’s was the goalkeeper at Blackburn Rovers at one time.  

I’ve watched Finn play in front of scouts from Premier League teams. The same scouts have also invited his team to play tournaments at their training grounds to gauge the players’ talent against other teams from the area.  

I will be the first person to say, my son doesn’t have it mentally or physically at 10 years old. He doesn’t have it right now, but that doesn’t mean he won’t have it later. There are countless stories of players from Chris Smalling to Jamie Vardy to Jason McAteer to Jack Elliott who were never given a chance, or much of one, in academy football only to become professionals later in life.