Last updated 11:42, Wednesday, 09 July 2008

IT has recently been announced that the “football authorities” are to prevent the publication of league tables in football competitions involving under eight year old players.

Colin Seel: Well done FA

They claim that the compilation of such tables creates too much competitiveness at an age when youngsters should simply be enjoying playing the sport, rather than being put under unnecessary pressure to finish in a higher position than their competitors.

The largest youth football organisation in Cumbria - the Carlisle Glass Youth Football League - has embraced this apparently ‘new’ concept for many years.

As a league which has over 160 teams in age groups ranging from Under-7s to Under-18s, we take our responsibilities for the welfare of the youngsters under our care very seriously.

We have never allowed league tables to be compiled, or published, for any of our divisions from Under-11s downwards.

Additionally, in those age divisions which do have league tables - Under-12s, 14s, 16s and 18s - we don’t use goal difference either.

This is a deliberate attempt to prevent youngsters being humiliated when playing for a team which concedes a lot of goals to opponents keen to improve their own goal difference.

Of course you can’t instruct young players not to score too many goals.

Just watch a bunch of kids warming up in a goal mouth prior to a match. All they want to do is hammer the ball into the goal net!

However we prefer to stress the benefits of taking part in healthy, friendly, safe, sporting activity with the emphasis more on enjoyment rather than winning.

And YES, you can get enjoyment without victory. It just feels better when you achieve both!

Colin N Seel

President Carlisle Glass Youth Football League