| dc.description.abstract | Purpose: The purpose of the study was to investigate coaches' ability to predict the future performance level of young selected football players as seniors.
Methods: In 2015, 481 male district team players were assessed by their coaches regarding the level they believed each player would perform at as seniors and their football-specific characteristics. In February 2023, approximately eight years after the coaches' assessment, the players' actual performance level as seniors was mapped. The study design is a prospective cohort study and was appropriate to answer the research question. Publicly available information on the Norwegian Football Associations website and transfermarket.com was used to map the players' established performance levels.
Results: There was a significant association between high coach assessment as a young player and professional status as a senior, with phi = .141. Of the 481 players, 229 were predicted to have a professional career, of which 12.7% became professional. Of the remaining 252 players who were predicted to have a non-professional career, 4.8% became professional. Those who became professional as seniors were also significantly better assessed in endurance, technical, and tactical skills than the non-professional players (p = <0.05).
Conclusion: High coach assessment as a young player is associated with professional status as a senior in this study, compared to players who had a low coach assessment. Coaches' subjective assessment of players has predictive value, but it is not without variation. Future studies should investigate the predictive effect of coaches' subjective opinion in combination with multidimensional data for talent identification in football. | |