Reaching the Peak
by Robert Parrwww.SoccerROM.comAs an instructor for dozens of coaching courses each year, I frequently ask the following question of other coaches in my clinics: "When do soccer players reach their peak potential?" As you might expect, I receive a wide range of answers, but find that most youth coaches believe that players reach their potential during their teenage years. The implication, of course, is that coaches believe they should emphasize selections (tryouts, recruiting, and "cuts") and team results (wins and trophies) at these ages, since the "peak potential" for individual improvement and growth has come and gone.To understand when players really do reach their peak potential, I did an analysis of the rosters for the teams that finished in the top four places at the 2006 FIFA Men's World Cup (Italy, France, Germany, and Portugal). The World Cup represents the most important championship in soccer at any level, and thus is not a tournament for which nations select players based upon their "potential for the future". Countries that have any ambition to win the World Cup will only take those players who they feel are playing at the top of the game today. By the time you narrow the list of players in the analysis to just those who advance to the semifinals, you have truly identified the players who are performing at the peak of the game.Since each team was permitted a roster of 23 players in this competition, there were 92 players included in this sample set. I pulled the roster and birthdate data from FIFA's tournament archives (http://www.fifa.com/worldcup/archive/), and calculated the age of each player as of the first day of the tournament (June 9, 2006).From this analysis, we see that the players reaching the final rounds of play in the World Cup averaged just over 28 years of age. Individual players on these rosters varied widely in age, from a low of 20.6 to a high of 37.0. However, the average age of all four teams was fairly consistent, with third-place Germany the youngest at 26.8 and runners-up France the oldest at 29.1 years.To determine if this pattern holds for the women's game, I performed a similar analysis for the top four finishers in the 2007 FIFA Women's World Cup (Germany, Brazil, USA, and Norway). Again, I pulled the data from the FIFA tournament archives (http://www.fifa.com/womensworldcup/), and calculated each player's age as of the start of the tournament (September 10, 2007). Each team was permitted a roster of 21 players in this competition, yielding a sample set of 84 players.Here, we find that the players reaching the final rounds of play in the Women's World Cup averaged just over 26 years of age--a full two years younger than their male counterparts. Again, individual players varied widely in age, from a low of 19.2 to a high of 36.1. The average age of all four semifinalists was tightly grouped, with fourth-place Norway the youngest at 25.4 and third-place USA the oldest at 27.2 years.The following graph shows the age distributions for both the men and women. Here, you can clearly see the peak in numbers occurs for the women at an earlier age than for the men. In addition, you can also see a secondary peak at later ages for both distributions (around age 30 for the women, and age 32 for the men).To understand the source of these secondary peaks, I reorganized the data to see how player ages varied by position. As shown in the following graph, it appears that the age of peak performance does not vary widely for field players in the Men's World Cup, with very little difference seen among defenders, midfielders, and forwards. However, goalkeepers clearly reach their prime somewhat later than their field player counterparts, with a gap of more than 3 years indicated.Interestingly, this gap becomes even greater when you limit the sample to just those players who actually played during the competition. Goalkeepers from these teams who appeared in at least one game during the World Cup averaged 33.4 years of age--an increase of more than 5 years over the average for field players. With only three substitutions permitted per match, coaches will rarely replace their starting goalkeeper during a tournament, which means that backup keepers (especially the third-string keeper on each team) are more likely to be included on the roster with an eye to the future than for players in the other positions.Repeating the position-by-position analysis for the women yields similar results. In this case, the age gap for goalkeepers on the roster is not as pronounced as for the men, but the keepers are still a full year older than their field player counterparts on average. More significantly, the average age of goalkeepers who actually played during the Women's World Cup increases to 30.8--more than 4 years older than the other field players.Taken as a whole, the analysis clearly shows that (on average) male players reach their peak potential as field players around the age of 28, and female field players reach their peak potential around the age of 26. For both genders, goalkeepers appear to require an additional 4 to 5 years before they reach their peak potential.As coaches, what can we learn from these numbers? The most important conclusion is that player development must be understood as a long-term process. This process clearly extends well beyond the youth game, as a boy turning 18 still has a full decade ahead of him before he reaches his peak potential as a soccer player.Secondly, these numbers indicate that a focus on results at the expense of player development is inappropriate at all levels of youth soccer. Even at the collegiate level, where the prevailing view is that coaches should be measured primarily on the basis of wins and losses, we should question the perception that players aged 18-22 are "too old" for a development-centered approach to coaching. Instead, we should view the period of development from ages 18-28 with every bit as much importance as the period from 8-18!Finally, I would suggest that the average age of players in the Women's World Cup is likely to increase somewhat over the next decade. Globally, the women's game is still in its infancy compared with the men, and many nations have yet to embrace women's soccer in any meaningful way. Thus, as opportunities for women to play professionally and internationally increase and spread throughout the world, we will likely see their developmental track move closer to that of the men's.
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