A Teaching Games for Understanding Program to Deal With Reasons for Dropout in Under-11 Football

Young players report that they dropout of organized football due to excessive emphasis on technical execution, low success, and the lack of autonomy and motivation experienced by players during training sessions. Purpose: To determine whether a TGfU intervention during a youth football program led players to improve in variables related to dropout. That means tactical-technical competence (decision-making, skill execution), success (successful game performance), autonomy (number of decisions made, player autonomy, number of game involvements, player participation), and motivation (enjoyment, intention to be physically active). Method: Twenty under-11-players and two coaches were recruited from 17 clubs. A pretest-posttest design with a multi-method approach was used. Coaches were trained and mentored in TGfU. Data were collected using Game Performance Assessment Instrument, enjoyment and intention to be physically active scales, and two focus groups with the players and the coaches. Results: Players improved in decision-making, skill execution, successful game performance, number of decisions made, number of game involvements, and intention to be physically active (p <.05). Participants attributed the results to the TGfU pedagogical features emphasized during the coaches’ training and mentoring. Conclusion: Considering the reasons for dropout in football, in terms of excessive emphasis on technical execution, low success, and the lack of autonomy and motivation experienced by players, TGfU could be a useful pedagogical approach for teaching-learning organized youth football. The TGfU pedagogical features emphasized during coaches’ training and mentoring could be crucial to obtain these results due to the fact that they were the sub-themes highlighted during the focus groups.