Richard Elliott

Foreign players in the English Premier Academy League: ‘Feet-drain’ or ‘feet-exchange’?

The aim of this article is to make sense of the effects of foreign player involvement in English football’s elite youth academy system. Based upon a series of interviews conducted with academy directors, managers, and coaches at Premier League clubs, and senior figures in the Premier League’s Youth Development department, the article argues that the involvement of foreign players should not be viewed negatively where indigenous players are increasingly forced to the margins of the professional game, or where the recruiting of foreign players results in the deskilling of donor nations. By drawing on research located within the area of highly skilled migration, the article argues that the involvement of foreign players can be seen to reflect processes of ‘feet-exchange’ where skills and knowledge circulate to improve overall standards of performance for indigenous and foreign players. The article concludes by arguing that the recruitment of foreign players to English football’s elite youth development system does not appear to act to the detriment of host and donor nations. Rather, by recruiting foreign players to Premier League academies, and by integrating them with indigenous players, a culture is created which enhances the development potential of all players.

“Getting Caught in the Net” Examining the Recruitment of Canadian Players in British Professional Ice Hockey

This article is a study of global athletic labor migration that examines the mechanisms through which some athletic migrant workers are recruited. The article adopts a critical case study which analyses the movement of Canadian workers into Britains Elite Ice Hockey League (EIHL) and synthesizes concepts derived from the sociology of sport and the sociology of highly skilled migration to explain these movements. Using a theoretical framework based on a figurational or process sociological approach, the article shows that the recruitment of migrant workers to EIHL teams need not be facilitated by a formal mediator such as an agent. Instead, informal communicative “friends-of-friends” networks and “bridgehead” contacts more commonly facilitate flows of information to the potential employer and potential migrant employee. Accordingly, mutually beneficial recruitments can be seen to be occurring as the result of human mediation facilitated by a series of informal interdependent networks of social relationships.

New Europe, new chances? The migration of professional footballers to Poland’s Ekstraklasa

The intention of this paper is to offer a preliminary analysis of the migrations of professional footballers to Poland’s top division – the Ekstraklasa. Based upon a series of interviews conducted with migrant players located at an Ekstraklasa club, the paper focuses specifically on the factors that influence the players’ decisions to migrate to that particular league. The paper identifies that whilst the Ekstraklasa might sit outside of Europe’s core football economies, it still offers much as a migration destination for certain sorts of players. Specifically, the paper shows how ‘pull’ factors, such as financial gain and the opportunity to play in Europe’s elite club competitions, are juxtaposed with a number of structural factors that ‘push’ migrants from particular locations and that are contoured by the players’ desires to progress in their careers. The paper concludes by showing that the motivations of the migrants cannot be reduced to any single causal factor, but rather, to be more meaningful, a series of interdependent processes should be seen to be at work.

Brits abroad: a case study analysis of three British footballers migrating to the Hungarian Soproni Liga

The intention of this paper is to analyse the migrations of three British professional footballers who migrated to a club in Hungary’s top division – the Soproni Liga, during the 2009/2010 season. Based upon a series of interviews conducted with the migrants, all of whom had relocated from teams located in the English and Scottish Premier Leagues, the paper traces the players’ migrations from their initial recruitments and motivations, through their lived experiences, to the termination of their contracts and subsequent reflections. The paper identifies that the players’ migrations are contoured by various periods and phases, each of which present their own issues and challenges. The study reveals the transitory and dynamic nature of migration experiences from beginning to end and, therefore, extends knowledge in the area of athletic labour migration.

Football’s Irish exodus: Examining the factors influencing Irish player migration to English professional leagues

The intention of this paper is to examine the range of interdependent processes that influence the decisions of Irish footballers to migrate from teams based in the League of Ireland to English Premier League and Football League clubs. Using data derived from a series of qualitative interviews conducted with a group of Irish players that had relocated to English clubs at different points over a 20-year period, the analysis reveals that the players’ decisions to migrate are predicated upon the interdependency of a number of processes that push the migrants from Ireland and pull them to England. The paper shows how these processes are reflected in a series of migrations where the players are not simply passive social agents but, rather, dynamic interlocutors whose decisions must be framed within the local contexts between which their movements are situated.

New Europe, old games? Making sense of Anglo-Polish media coverage of England versus Poland football matches

Attention is primarily given to a comparative qualitative discourse analysis of British/English and Polish media coverage of England versus Poland football matches as part of the qualification rounds for the mens World Cup football tournament that were to be held in Germany in June 2006. The media discourse surrounding these matches was characterised by nostalgia, an ethnic assertiveness / defensiveness and a wilful stereotyping of opponents that can be understood as part of an active construction of ‘fantasy group charisma’ based on both the ‘invention of traditions’ and, at a deeper level, the habitus codes that underpin the ‘national character’ of European nations. The medias representations of identity politics can be understood from the vantage point of not solely ‘imagined communities’ and ‘invented traditions’ but also national habitus codes.

Finding the back of the net: Networks and migrant recruitment in Norwegian football:

The intention of this paper is to analyse the role that networks play in enabling the recruitment of a group of male migrant professional footballers employed by clubs based in Norway’s top professional football league – the Tippeligaen. Based upon a series of semi-structured interviews conducted with migrants and recruiters, and synthesising concepts derived from the sociology of sport and the broader study of migration, the analysis identifies that the recruitment of migrant workers to Tippeligaen clubs reflects a mix of both formal and informal processes. Whilst agents operate as key actors in the mobilisation of foreign labour, the analysis shows how recruitments in this particular athletic context are also dependent on processes of human mediation facilitated by a series of informal interdependent networks of relationships.

Poles apart: foreign players, Polish football and Euro 2012

The 14th running of the UEFA European Championships represented a watershed moment for football, and sport more broadly, in Eastern Europe. Whilst the competition itself might have been restricted to Europe’s elite national teams, world football’s gaze was drawn towards the joint hosts, Poland and the Ukraine, for the duration of the tournament. At this juncture, therefore, this paper seeks to consider the ‘place’ of football in Eastern Europe, and in this case, Poland specifically, by conducting an analysis of the economic value of Poland’s top division – the Ekstraklasa, and by examining the factors that influence foreign players’ decisions to migrate to that particular league. The paper identifies that whilst the Ekstraklasa might sit outside of Europe’s core football economies, it still offers much as a migration destination for certain sorts of players. However, the paper also shows that whilst the 2012 UEFA European Championships provided significant exposure for Poland in the football context, it is less clear if hosting the event will have a lasting effect on the development of Poland’s top league and its desirability to foreign players.

Reinventing the Past: Youth and National Team Development in England and Germany

Der englische und deutsche Fusball teilten kurzlich noch eine Reihe bedeutsamer Charakteristika auf nationaler und internationaler Ebene. Die erkennbaren Gemeinsamkeiten bezogen sich vor allem auf die in beiden Landern zunehmende, weitgreifende Kommerzialisierung, welche in beiden Fallen die bis dahin zentralen Werte des Spiels zu einem ahnlichen Zeitpunkt veranderte. Ziel des Beitrags ist es, diese Gemeinsamkeiten zu untersuchen, um darauf aufbauend eine komparative Analyse des professionellen Fusballs in Deutschland und England anzubieten. Dabei fokussiert der Beitrag insbesondere die Frage nach der Rolle auslandischer Spieler und die der Entwicklung der Jugendarbeit bzw. der Nationalmannschaften. Es wird gezeigt, dass das englische und deutsche System zwar einer Reihe vergleichbarer Marktkrafte in den 1990er und 2000er Jahren ausgesetzt waren, diese in den letzten 10 Jahren jedoch zu sehr unterschiedlichen Antworten auf Fragen nach dem Ausbau der nationalen Ligen, der Einbeziehung auslandischer Spieler und der Entwicklung der Jugendarbeit bzw. der Nationalmannschaften gefuhrt haben. Der Artikel zeigt schlieslich, warum der deutsche Fusball auf der Grundlage verschiedener struktureller Veranderungen gegenwartig als modellhaft angesehen wird, wahrend die Zukunft des englischen Fusballs, zumindest auf internationaler Ebene, als eher unsicher gilt.