Grass roots development

[Phil McBride]

What is everyones take on the development of grass roots badminton in the UK? In otherwords are the national governing bodies doing enough to promote the game to youngsters and what is the outcome?

A search only revealed 25 threads with that phrase in them:

http://www.badders.com/forum/search.html?searchid=56773

If you are posting please refer to the area of concern and country.

Comments please

[Phil McBride]

Ah.............

So we are all happy with the development and its just as well since we are at the tops of our game at the moment and are just waiting to be knocked off our pedistall(s) by a developing badminton nation :rolleyes:

[AXC]

Most badminton clubs (generally) are too small to handle serious junior development, unlike Denmark where the clubs tend to be much larger and can support all sorts of training setups. BE are setting up cells of excellence and county training schemes for promising youngsters as the clubs are not big enough to do this. The problem with this is that there may be very few "potential" juniors in a county so they end up with not enough juniors to get that real competative edge going when training. Not only that but BE have to rely on the quality of local coaching to carry out this training, which is of variable quality to say the least. England is far too big to bus the juniors to a central training point and achieve economy of coaching scale and good, competative training on a regular basis. I think that Holland used to manage this several years ago as they are a much smaller country.

Whilst I am critical of the way these star juniors are trained locally I cannot think of a better way of doing it unless we start to make our clubs more professional by joining lots of them together to provide the accomodation and funds to support genuine development for our juniors. I cannot see that happening in my lifetime.

[redkingjoe]

By the way, i have several questions:

1 What's the definition of grassroots?

2 Who are the grassroots?

3 What is meant by "grassroots developments"? does it mean 1)developing more "grassroots", 2) develope the "grassroots" or both?

My interpretation of grassroot developement is to promote the sport of badminton so that badminton enthusiasts(old and young) can be increased tremendously as a result of an implementation of grassroots development program, if any. at the same time of increasing ppls playing, the program , if any, sholud be effective in improving the skill levels of those who participate in badminton on one hand and on the other hand effective in identification of talent for converting them into the elites.

4 Are there any grassroot development program in UK? any one in the UK is designated to be in charge of carrying out such kind of program?

[rhombus]

My definition of Grass Roots would be the introduction of the option of Badminton in all secondary schools.
But somehow I don't see this happening. In our area, Kent, clubs are closing or merging just to survive. They are populated with 30,40 and 50 year old players who have children, some of whom are joining clubs,
but enjoy other more popular sports. Badminton is in decline and I see no proactive or innovative ideas coming from the people who run the game.

[johng]

rhombus

Do you know how many schools in kent have junior clubs.not just at secondary level but at all levels

Do you know how many junior clubs there are in kent

Do you know how many senior clubs run junior sections

What proactive..or innovative ideas do you have, that would halt this decline that you highlight, and can I ask what you yourself are doing to correct this

Just checked on Badmintonengland site....they list 14 junior clubs in kent..so perhaps things are not as dire as you suggest

[rhombus]

Dear John,
Having played Badminton in Kent for over 30 years, at Senior 1st,2nd and 3rd team county levels and at many different clubs, I think I know what I am talking about. Our Club has a Junior section which has developed ex- England Internationals such as Peter Knowles, Richard Doling, Neil Waterman and Sarah Hardaker. I think over the years the other county players, coaches and myself have put efforts in to promote the sport. There are very few other areas in Kent that have had such sucess. But having 2 children who go to 2 different local secondary schools, Badminton is not one of the sports supported by the school. 14 Junior clubs in the whole of Kent is a disgrace, Kent is one of the most densly populated regions in the country.
I am afraid that Badminton is considered a minority sport and youngsters are not coming in to it. 30 years ago, in the Knock out Junior Kent Restricted there was an entry of 64 boys. Now they have to hold a round robin tournament because the entries are down to less than 10. What does that say about the state of Badminton in Kent.
Infra structure is lacking, we still play matches in church halls for god's sake. Professional find it difficult to make a living playing Badminton. Ask anyone on the street to name 5 current Internationals and they would be struggling. I've done this recently at work, and round a table of 10 people not 1 could name a current Badminton player.

[Rodrigues]

Sports participation in general for young people is a complicated area and there are no quick fixes to increase take-up. Most sports are affected by lack of numbers at all levels as a result of societal changes. There are so many other things out there for kids these days and compared to more exciting and buzz-inducing activities such as canoeing, climbing, skateboarding, mountain-biking, sailing etc. hitting a shuttle around a court - or even kicking a ball on a field - can seem pretty dull.
Then there are computer games, videos, TV, shelf-filling jobs at Tesco's to pay for these things, to say nothing of school work and preparing for exams. And many (adults as well) prefer to get their dose of sport by switching to Sky Sports and following their team from the comfort and security of their sofas.
And where is the next generation of coaches, organisers, club secretaries and treasurers going to come from as adults' free time is increasingly being squeezed by work and family commitments resulting in fewer volunteers?
Even in rugby, which should be pumped up from England's world champion status, clubs and teams are folding because fewer and fewer players are unwilling to make the commitment to train once a week and play every Saturday, home and away in a nine month season. In former times wives and girlfriends would put up with their partners being away for hours every weekend. Now many resent it when there's shopping and decorating to be done and extensions to be built.
There are similar trends in football with a decline in 11-a-side league participation but a huge increase in evening 5-a-side leagues where players can get their buzz in an hour blast, rather than travel every other Saturday to a wet and freezing field half way across the county which may take a total of 5 hours.
So given these trends, maybe you are lucky to have 14 junior badminton clubs in Kent!!! Be grateful and hang on to them!!!

[johng]

Rhombus......I have just reread my earlier post, and have to offer an apology. It was not meant to be critical of you and your efforts, but rather simply a request for information, however it was very poorly worded and constructed (like most of my posts actually).

I was simply trying to find out what actions had been undertaken in your area to see how they compare to the efforts being undertaken in Milton Keynes

The Milton Keynes & District Leaque have for a number of years been taking action to reverse the trend in the falling numbers of children playing Badminton. One of the main programmes put into place has been to establish club/school links which has been a great success....I think that last year nearly 200 children played in the local tournament. This year a junior league is being set up

We have also managed to get the local Council to adopt badminton as a focus sport, with the result that there is a large number of schools in the town with there own badminton clubs

Admittedly having Badmintonenglands HQ in the town has helped, however most of these initiatives have come via the local league and MK council.

I am currently looking at ways to set up a similar system in Leighton Buzzard, trying to establish links with our Junior club and the schools in the area, we regularly get 30 kids turning up at the junior sessions, run 3 teams in a local junior league and are over wealmed by kids at the start of each season. So the demand is certainly there, we just need willing parents to help us run it

Perhaps in this area we are lucky, but in the last few years we have seen junior player numbers increase at a tremendous rate, so perhaps all is not lost

[redkingjoe]

1 What's the definition of grassroots?

2 Who are the grassroots?

3 What is meant by "grassroots developments"? does it mean 1)developing more "grassroots", 2) develope the "grassroots" or both?

4 Are there any grassroot development program in UK? any one in the UK is designated to be in charge of carrying out such kind of program?

1 so far, it seems that Q 4 above hasn't got any reply yet...or actually no formal organization rules over the a GRD program in UK...

2 i think there's strong correlation between GRD and elite: a good GRD can produce a lot more enthusiastic players, audience, badminton dads, mums and kids. these various parties will provide support to the sports in diff ways...just to think about kids from badminton family...some badminton dads might even create a website to cultivate a future star...if one of the badminton enthusiastic risen to Tony Blair's position...