Coaching and Youth Sport Development

We believe in understanding people and what they need to thrive in sport and in life. In this project, Sierra Kung examines athlete development through the eyes of young Māori and Pasifika rugby league players.

Professional sports are heavily dominated by the power structures and culture of the Western world, focusing on the success of the individual. But the world is not all the same. What people believe and value differs across cultures. Despite these differences, Māori and Pasifika athletes are expected to integrate into a system not typically designed for them. The main objective of Sierra’s  work was to redefine athlete development in a way that recognises and values cultural diversity.

In her work, Sierra sat down with a group of U20 and U18 Māori and Pasifika rugby league players for a kōrero. She was particularly interested in the determinants of healthy psychosocial development and targeted her questions, accordingly. What Sierra found highlighted the importance of the relationships young players hold with family, significant others and whānau mentors. Relationships anchored by trust and that emanate an unspoken energy are particularly important to help young Māori and Pasifika players navigate the mental and emotional challenges of high-performance sport. When viewed from a Western perspective, this relational foundation is missing. This project highlights the need for people working in sport to understand what individuals from diverse cultures and belief systems need to thrive.

We believe in coaching environments that prioritise close and open relationships and are based on acceptance and empathy. This project examined the commonly held belief that sport is a competitive enterprise for only the skilled and talented and instead can be an inclusive, fun activity for building strong communities.

The notion of 'sport-for-all' challenges traditional thinking about the role of sport as primarily a competitive enterprise. Using humanistic coaching principles as our lens, we partnered with the Huge Green Foundation and the Marist Brothers in the Philippines  to examine the potential of sport to facilitate social good. In particular, how sport can engage young people at risk and build positive community relationships.

Led by Associate Professor Simon Walters, researchers sat down with participants from a school, a… and a… to  examine their beliefs about sport, including:

1. The potential of sport to connect human beings
2. Delivering games-based activities to children
3. Using sport to enhance feelings of self-esteem and confidence

What Simon and his team learned from their conversations suggest there is potential for people’s long-held beliefs about sport to be challenged and this change in thinking can transcend social environments and individuals, including those who perceive sport is not for them. At the school, for example, such transformation was visible when boys adopted a more inclusive model of sport.

In the Philippines (just like NZ) sport seems to be an outcome-focused enterprise driven by a win-at-all-costs attitude. This project highlighted an opportunity for this to change and why it is so important.

We believe sport has the power to can change the world. In this project, we highlight the positive effects sport competition can have on young people from Māori and Pasifika communities when delivered with a strong social focus.

"Ehara taku toa i te toa takitahi, engari he toa takitini" - Success is not the work of an individual, but the work of many.

Traditionally, sport research has focused on the performance and health-related benefits of participation – what one can gain personally from taking part. But more recently, the social benefits of sport have been examined, with particular emphasis on the wellbeing of participants.

Led by Associate Professor Kirsten Spencer, this project examined what sport can do when trust, reciprocity, inclusiveness, and cohesion are at the forefront of its design. More specifically, research investigated the efficacy of six community sport projects in Auckland - known as the Community Touched (CT) projects. Each project is organised and supported by Touch NZ but delivered by local stakeholders interested in helping their communities (including the police, marae, community groups and sports clubs).

We believe in an even playing field for aspiring young athletes. In this project, we evaluate Drug Free Sport New Zealand’s efforts to keep sport in this country and around the world clean.

What athletes believe and how they behave is a result of the education they receive. Led by Dr Tony Oldham, this project provides ongoing evaluation of Drug Free Sport New Zealand’s anti-doping programme. It aims to keep DFSNZ at the forefront of global education for keeping drugs out of sport by providing athletes with the information and tools they need to stay clean. In its first stage, the project developed an evaluation tool for compliance reporting of the DFSNZ education programme. Data is nearly collected and findings are imminent. A second stage of research is planned to review the current education offerings and support for positive change. Stay up to date with the findings of this research by clicking here .

Publications from this research

• PhD: Factors Influencing Supplement Use and Doping Among Adolescent Athletes in New Zealand.

What is talent? And how should we select it In youth sport? In this project, we evaluated the relationship between biological maturation and performance in cricket with interesting implications for selection processes, talent development and player enjoyment.

For years we’ve treated every 13-year-old the same. But new research shows that because kids develop at different rates, some young athletes get an unfair advantage when it comes to making teams and . In this project, we partnered with NZ Cricket and Auckland Cricket to investigate how biological age (compared to chronological age) affects the game today and in the future. Set in a 3-day regional development camp, the study measured the biological maturity status, physical abilities and cricket performance of 57 under-14 boys. It also gathered the experiences of both players and coaches after a series of bio-banded games.

“It’s a lot of fun because we learn a lot of stuff […] playing with people the same size as us. Because when you play with the bigger people like you get intimidated… so when you play with your own size you don’t feel like that and you just play naturally.”

The findings were clear:

1. Coaches and players enjoyed the bio-banded games with the biggest benefits appearing to go to the least mature players
2. More mature players had a strength advantage that gives them certain batting advantages and likely allows them to throw faster and further.
3. An underrepresentation of late maturing players was identified in the group

Bio-banding is an a potential tool to address the following problems underpinned by coaching, selection and game biases:

1. Specialisation of young people into positions based on physical attributes rather than skill.
2. Differences in skill development based on maturation. In cricket, early maturers are more likely to develop and demonstrate skills supported by power (throwing further, hitting the ball harder, hitting the ball in the V, bowling fast), whereas late-maturers are more likely to develop and demonstrate skills supported by finesse (spin bowling, batting around the wicket).
3. Short-term costs for late-maturers who may not be able to ‘compete’ as effectively against more physically mature peers.
4. Long-term costs to early-maturers who may be devoid of some skill sets, having been over reliant on physical attributes in their development.

Publications from this research

• Walters S, Renshaw I, Whatman C, Zoellner A, Harrison C, Spencer K, Millar S, Pithey R (2022). Maturity status, relative age and bio-banding in youth cricket. New Zealand Journal of Sports Medicine 48(2):66-75