Introduction

Whether or not to use league standings and playoffs (LSPO) in children and youth sports has been a recurring topic for fiery debates. In order to stimulate long-term sports development, enjoyment and continued participation, the Swedish Football Association decided that from 2017 the use of LSPO will be abolished until the year the children turn 13. 

Method

In order to study the effect of the use or non-use of LSPO on the participation rate, register data from a specific children's and youth football context (school class football) were analyzed. This context has the advantage that the conditions have in general been constant several decades until 2017, when keeping official scores, league standings and playoffs were removed for all age groups (7-12 years; Preschool- Grade 5) with the exception for the oldest group (13 years; 6th grade). This makes it possible to study the phenomenon over time in a natural environment and compare groups with each other while at the same time taking reasonable control of confounding factors without intervening or manipulating the groups. 

School class football is a phenomenon run by a voluntarily sport club where approximately 3000-3500 children and youths participate annually. In school class football it is the single class that makes up the team and competes against other classes from different schools in the municipality. It is optional for classes to sign up and it is also up to the individual child to participate. The schools are not responsible for their participating classes. Rather, the teams are coached by volunteering parents. School class football is subject to competitive engineering (CE) as rules are modified in several ways (e.g., playing on smaller fields, using smaller goals and footballs, girls and boys playing together, always at least two boys and two girls on the pitch). 

Results

Results shows that the participation rate before the removal of LSPO (2015-2017) increased slightly (<1%; from n= 3044 to 3063; n = 19), while a clear increase (20%; from n = 3063 to 3689) could be noted after the removal of LSPO (2017-2021). The increase was particularly noticeable among the girls after the removal of the LSPO (41%; from n = 1102 to 1550). While the increase among the boys was only modest (9%; from n= 1961 to 2139) and in correspondence with the municipality population increase (7 %) in this age group.

Discussion

The results indicate that the removal of league standings and playoffs increases the participation of groups of individuals who are usually not considered as competent as other participants. One of the reasons for this may be that a more caring and mastery oriented climate is created where coaches, athletes and parents to a greater extent care that everyone thrives and have fun instead of focusing on winning matches and getting to the playoff.