It’s the dream of countless children worldwide: becoming a professional football player.
We all know a kid with a ball seemingly stuck to their foot at all times. They are in the school team, a local team they train with at weekends, and in their spare time they are in the park or the back garden kicking a ball about and working on their technical skills. They take their ambition extremely seriously because they want to be scouted.
Football clubs take scouting seriously too, because spotting talent early can make them insane amounts of money. Manchester United’s famous Class of ’92 went on to win every domestic and European competition available, and they didn’t spend a penny buying the likes of Beckham, the Nevilles, Butt, Scholes, and Ryan Giggs who helped them get there.
In more recent times where financial fair play rules have been causing problems for clubs, desirable homegrown players are worth their weight in gold. They represent pure profit for the clubs which can then be spent more freely on bigger and better players.
Believe it or not, children as young as 6 can be asked to play for a big club’s youth team. In order for that to happen though, the club’s scouts need to know the child exists. So how do you get your football fanatic child in front of the scouts that you hope will recognise their talent?
Places Scouts Look for Talent
Getting scouted by a serious football club is difficult, there’s no hiding it. However, they spend lots of time and money actively looking for promising youngsters, which is to your advantage.
If your child is talented, scouts want to find them.
They won’t find them in your back garden though, so where are the best places for your child to play football if they want to be seen by a youth scout?
Trials and Camps
All clubs will hold open trial days and football camps during the holidays or things like that.
Sometimes attending will be as simple as signing up and registering your details, but other may be more of an invite only situation. The best thing to do for your son or daughter is get in touch with the clubs closest to you and ask them about it. Join mailing lists, keep checking the website, etc.
You will find that access gets more and more exclusive as the children get older. You probably won’t be able to walk your 18 year old into Tottenham’s academy and ask them to take a look at him/her. Your 8 year old might have an easier time getting seen though.
There are all sorts of programs that run for kids to play in front of influential people, and if you get involved with the football community in your area you will start to hear about them.
Local Football Teams
Youth scouts do travel to watch smaller clubs train and play matches, so getting your kid into a local squad is a really good idea. Chances are they will want to be playing anyway if they are football mad, but if not, get them signed up.
Small community clubs often have links with bigger clubs too, and they all want the best for the children who play for them, so if your little one is standing out word will get around.
Scouts have even been known to watch school matches.
Any scout worth their salt will have a whole network of contacts in the area and further afield, giving them tips on players to watch and so forth, so they could technically show up anywhere.
Preparing Your Child for Success
Even if your child is a great little footballer, competition for the attention of the best clubs is fierce. Your son or daughter will be judged against the very best talent in their generation, so being a big fish in a small pond isn’t enough.
They might only get one or two chances to play in front of a scout who can transform their lives, so when that chance comes, they need to be ready.
Training and Playing
In simple terms, kids who want to play professionally need to play as much competitive football as possible.
That means playing in the school team, playing for a local community team, playing 5-a-side, playing against kids that are a bit older and bigger than them. The more experience they have and the more varied that experience is the faster they will develop.
Of course, no one can improve their competitive performance without training, so this makes up a large part of their preparation.
Keeping in mind that children are children and their bodies are still developing, the 3 key areas to think about are:
- Technical skills – Think about passing accuracy, dribbling skills, control, shooting, tackling. Techniques that can be worked on and improved with practice.
- Tactical Understanding – Reading the game. Making smart decisions in terms of positioning, marking, making runs etc. Understanding your position in relation to everyone else’s including the opposition.
- Fitness and Physicality – Speed, strength, explosiveness, stamina, endurance. Be careful here, especially with younger children, don’t push them too hard.
Now obviously, what you can expect will be limited by each child’s age, their maturity, their natural body composition, etc. So keep your expectations age appropriate.
On Game Day
I could say your child will need to play well and adeptly demonstrate their skills, but that would be a bit obvious wouldn’t it.
What a scout wants to see is a child who understands their job as part of a team, and who does that job well. They don’t need unnecessary skills and flair – I’m not saying you should discourage it, but showing off shouldn’t be the aim – they want to see a solid performance.
A kid that keeps calm on the ball, doesn’t go down every time they are tackled, and has a mature approach to the game will stand out. So work on temperament. This is an area a lot of children struggle with, especially if they copy the players they watch and idolise on TV.
Remember too that scouts see things the average football fan does not.
They spot good runs that are missed by teammates, they spot kids who communicate effectively, and they will be paying as much attention to what your child does off the ball as on it. So encourage your child to have a positive attitude and to help their teammates have the same. Showing sportsmanship and respecting the referee will also go down well.
Promotion and Marketing
This may not be necessary, but some parents take on an agent or manager role for their children.
You might want to consider filming their games and keeping short clips of their most recent and impressive moments during games. Then you can create a short highlights reel like the one above.
You can put this up online and contact as many scouts, clubs and youth team managers as possible asking them to watch it.
If they are particularly strong on the ball you will want to highlight this with several clips, whereas if they are like a tank between the sticks show a selection of their most difficult and impressive saves.
Keep the reel to 3 or 4 minutes long maximum, and keep the focus on the football rather than flashy effects. Lastly, remember to include a photo with your child’s name and your contact details at the start of the reel so they can get in touch.
You can use social media to spread the word about your child too, setting up accounts dedicated to their football journey. This is unlikely to be as impactful as directly contacting the right people with a highlight reel, but you never know.
If your kid is already doing well in an academy somewhere you might think this part is unnecessary. Remember though, a good 50% of players leave the academy system before the age of 16. Even if they do get past that stage, 97% of academy graduates never play in the Premier League.
Keeping a highlight reel just in case your child is one of those released might be the key to them signing up with another club soon after. Harry Kane, Declan Rice and Jamie Vardy are all examples of top players who were released from big clubs before they were 16 – if it can happen to them it can happen to you and yours.