Grassroots before greatness in soccer – why the grassroots system should be the backbone of the sport.

A couple of months ago, I was fortunate to be invited by GSIC powered by Microsoft to be on the panel in their presentation of a new white paper on grassroots and high performance. This topic strikes a chord in me personally, as I feel that the importance that grassroots sports plays in developing high performance athletes is not stressed highly enough.

To start off with, is grassroots and high performance one and the same? Absolutely not! Grassroots is about having fun, honing your skills, and most importantly getting the support of parents to volunteers to coaches to the wider community as a whole. It is an opportunity for players to fall in love with the game, make mistakes, and learn from them. High performance is about excelling within the sport played at the highest level.

Then why is grassroots such an important part in the development of a high performance athlete and also the game as a whole?

This is where kids get their first experience of the game

In most sports, athletes do not begin to realize their potential until mid to late teens. With so many distractions nowadays, kids will continue to do something they enjoy doing. If the experience is not fun or relevant, you may miss out on a potentially top-class player simply because he lost the love of playing.

Grassroots soccer helps kids to fall in love with the game as it revolves around child-friendly soccer and helps them use their imagination and to be creative.

Develops fundamentals and nurtures talent

Grassroots teaches the fundamentals of the game which forms the foundation of a player’s development. It not only helps develop football skills, but it also helps nurture skills from communication to leadership to fair play to being able to learn to handle oneself under pressure.

Whilst many think of only the players’ perspective when we talk about grassroots, this is not entirely the case. We also have the club administrators, coaches, referees and managers who also play a very important part in the game. And performing at this level helps them nurture their relevant skills as well.

Identification of talent

One of the ways to identify talent is by observing players over a long period of time playing in their own environments. Grassroots provides a massive pool of players from very diverse backgrounds having different skill-sets. This enables scouts to observe players who may have otherwise gone unnoticed.

Building communities

Soccer has the power to bring people together from all walks of life. Grassroots soccer helps people come together, play or watch the game they love being played, and build strong relationships within their community.

Drives innovation

There is no better place to test out innovation within grassroots, be it new ideas within the game or technological innovations. This is where ideas could be tested, refined, and implemented.

Grassroots gives that opportunity for young players to chase their dreams and should never be undervalued. And we should all play our part to contribute to the development of the game at this level.?