Modern apprenticeships in professional football: some policy implications

Purpose – This paper aims to examine the two year Modern Apprenticeship undertaken by trainees in the English professional football industry. Design/methodology/approach – In the first round of this three‐year project representatives of seven English clubs were interviewed in the summer of 2005; follow‐up interviews were conducted in the summer of 2006. To contextualise these results, a representative of a leading French club who was responsible for youth training was asked about provision in that country. Findings – The paper finds that the apprenticeship system in France is more extensive and expensive but it produces players who are more likely to do well in major international competitions such as the World Cup. This in turn is due to the fact that more resources are allocated to training aspiring footballers; such spending includes extensive government subsidies. However, attrition rates are even higher in France than in England; at a micro level the system there is less successful. Practical implications – This paper argues that the British government is in one sense spending too much money subsidising youth development in football; 75 per cent of all apprentices are never offered a professional contract. However, in another (macro) sense, it is not allocating sufficient resources to youth development in professional football given that England has never been in a World Cup final in 40 years. Originality/value – Although a number of articles have been published concerning the physiology of training aspiring footballers, very little has been done by way of examining the resource allocations associated with the training given to young apprentices in the game, which is one of the UK's key sporting industries.