Sports inside
First Rangnick, now Baumgart: More and more football celebrities are criticizing the fact that results and tables are being abolished in children’s games. Time for a closer look at the ongoing reform.
Steffen Baumgart in his element: With the podcast “Einfach Fußball” With WDR moderator Sven Pistor in front of a live audience, the coach of 1. FC Köln talks humorously and frankly about many topics, including the reform of children’s football. “Nothing at all” he thinks that the G, F and E juniors will no longer have results and tables.
This was followed by a sweeping blow (from min. 26:10): “We are a generation that only goes the soft and shallow path. That can’t be true. It doesn’t matter if a child loses. It has to learn to deal with defeats. I have to learn to have fun in the sport, not just when I score ten goals.”
Children’s football: Festivals instead of club duels
The background: After several years of pilot projects, the state and district associations are gradually changing the children’s league operations. According to a specification of the DFB, the so-called new forms of play are to be introduced across Germany from the 2024/25 season, from the U6 (Bambinis) to the U11 (E-Youth).
The classic league with club duels mostly in 7 against 7 is replaced there by so-called festivals with smaller teams and several fields. The little ones mainly play for four mini goals, with increasing age also increasingly for two youth goals.
The number of players also grows over time, from 2 vs. 2 for the youngest to 5 vs. 5 or 7 vs. 7 in the E youth. In this way, the children should grow into the requirements of large-field football and league operations from the D youth.
Criticism also from Rangnick and Hamann
So far, tables and results have also been available online in many places for the little ones, sometimes with devastating results such as 1:18 or 0:22. The new festivals end without a result, the results of the individual games are not officially recorded.
Baumgart is not the only one who takes issue with this. Austria’s national coach Ralf Rangnick also said that the result, winning, must always be in the foreground. Former national player Dietmar Hamann even said that the children were trained to perform, “the fun will suffer as a result”.
Victory and defeat still exist
These statements give the impression that the outcome of a game will no longer play any role in children’s football. Markus Hirte emphatically contradicts this. The head of talent promotion at the DFB refers to that Champions League-Principle at the game festivals: The winning team rotates one field forward, the losing team one field back. “That provokes even more competition and results”, Shepherd told Sport inside. “It’s very intense.”
Intrinsic motivation is important, i.e. the motivation that comes from within, says Joti Chatzialexiou, the sporting director of the DFB national teams. “Also with regard to the national teams and the professional field, we want to have footballers who are intrinsically motivated to win and not because there is a table.”
Results and wins, but less outside pressure
U15 national coach Christian Wück also emphasizes the natural ambition. “For the kids, it’s always about the result, they always want to win, they always want to play well.“What should be reduced, however, is the pressure from outside. “The important thing is that the coaches, parents and relatives are not about the result.”
In classic game operations, the coaches are tempted to train during the week in such a way that the result is correct at the weekend, argue supporters of the reform. In a 7 vs. 7 game, this means tactical specifications, fixed positions and more play for the more developed children.
New game operations are already mandatory in many places
While the public debate revolves around tables being eliminated, the ongoing reform is much more complex. The DFB has recognized weaknesses in the old game: Rigid team sizes meant that some children got little or no playing time. And in 7v7, the top two on each team take over the game while the others have little action.
Even if Baumgart said in “Einfach Fußball” “No child in the world doesn’t enjoy football”, the DFB found something else: Many children had experienced frustration in the previous game system, too many turned their backs on football at a young age. The new forms of play with smaller teams should therefore increase the fun factor and offer more sense of achievement and development opportunities for all children. Both professional and popular sports should benefit.
Already this season, one year before the nationwide introduction in 2024, many state and district associations are making the game operation mandatory. This leads to resentment in some places, because the organization is often not yet fully developed in detail and is more complex than before.
Because of DFB plans: protest league in Breisgau
In addition, some older teams that have already experienced the classic game operation now have to switch to festivals. Children, coaches and parents can see this as a step backwards. In the Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald district, an alternative e-youth league has even formed outside of the DFB.
The German Football Association is betting that the excitement will subside when the first generation of children has grown up with the system. Chatzialexiou also points out that other countries switched to children’s play operations years ago: Belgium, the Netherlands, Switzerland and England.
national player Musiala: “Much less pressure”
Germany’s national player Jamal Musiala learned to play football there, he only played between the ages of seven and 16 southampton and then for a long time at FC Chelsea. In the BBC Musiala drew a comparison in June 2022: “In Germany there is a league system for under-tens, whereas in England it’s not common up to the under-18s. There’s a lot less pressure and more time to develop, you can play a lot more freely.”
The lack of tables doesn’t seem to have hurt Musiala at least.