Project period: 2013-2018

Project leader: Stig Arve Sæther and Nils Petter Aspvik

In recent years, Norwegian top-level clubs have gained an increased focus on the development of self-produced players. As part of this venture, many clubs have created their own football academy, for the club's youngest players. These academies can be considered as an important development arena for young players in the club and furthermore and mostly in the club’s geographical region. How important are these academies as a developing arena for both the players and the clubs? With the project Football Academies, we want to gain insight into the players' development on this arena, from the youngest children to the adolescent player, making the transaction to top-level football. The basic approach of the project through a long-term perspective is to focus on topics such as; training load, stress, perfectionism, coach-athlete relationship, thoughts about the future etc. Furthermore, the project also highlights how the organizational structure of the academy affects the talent development process.

Recent Publications

• Sæther, S.A. (2018) Stress among Talents in a Football Academy. Sport Mont Journal, 16, 2, 3-
• Nerland, E. & Sæther, S. A. (2016) Norwegian football academy players – Players self-assessed competence, Perfectionism, Goal orientations and Motivational climate. Sport Mont Journal, 2, 7-11.

• Sæther, S. A.,, Aspvik, N.P., & Høigaard, R. (2017) Norwegian football academy players – players’ characteristics, stress and coach-athlete relationship. The Open Sports Sciences Journal, 10, 141-150.