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University of Warwick institutional repository: http://go.warwick.ac.uk/wrap A Thesis Submitted for the Degree of PhD at the University of Warwick http://go.warwick.ac.uk/wrap/36183 This thesis is made available online and is protected by original copyright. Please scroll down to view the document itself. Please refer to the repository record for this item for information to help you to cite it. Our policy information is available from the repository home page. CHASING THE 'BIG-TIME' Football Apprenticeship in the 1990s Andrew Parker, B.Ed. M.A. THESIS SUBMITTED FOR THE DEGREE OF PhD UNIVERSITY OF WARWICK DEPARTMENT OF SOCIOLOGY. AUGUST, 1996. CONTENTS Page No List of Tables and Illustrations i Acknowledgements ii Declaration iii Abstract iv Abbreviations V Introduction 1 Chapter 1 Apprenticeship, Football and The New Vocationalism 9 Chapter 2 Football Club Culture: Images of Occupational Socialization 33 Chapter 3 Football for a Living: Authoritarianism, 'Seriousness' and Work-Place Pressure 71 Chapter 4 'Togetherness', Favouritism and Institutional Relations 98 Chapter 5 Getting an Education: Imperative Investment or 'Just a Day-Off'? 131 Chapter 6 Outside Work: Leisure-Time, Boredom and Social Relations 164 Chapter 7 Masculinity and Football Culture 198 Chapter 8 Aspirations, Expectations and Reality: 'Taken-On' or 'Bombed-Out' 234 Conclusions Football YT, Colby Town and Vocational Policy. 265 Appendix A Staying On-Side on the Inside: Researching Youth Training in Professional Football 277 Appendix B Colby Town Hostel Rules 309 Appendix C Football Youth Trainee Contract 310 Appendix D Where Are They Now?: Colby Trainee Post-YT Destinations 314 Bibliography 321 List of Tables and Illustrations Page No Figure 2.1 Colby Town YT dressing-room layout and typical trainee locations during 1993/94 season. 38 Figure 2.2 Colby Town reserve team dressing room layout and typical trainee locations during 1993/94 season. 9 Figure 2.3 Colby Town internal club layout. 41 Figure 2.4 Hierarchical club structure at Colby Town during 1993/94 season. 47 Table 5.1 Trainee scholastic GCSE achievements and chosen college courses for the 1993/94 academic year. 139 Figure 6.1 General plan and habitation layout of Colby Town main hostel building during 1993/94 season. 169 Figure 6.2 General plan and habitation layout of Colby Town annexed hostel unit during 1993/94 season. 170 Figure 6.3 Sociogram of trainee social friendship groups for the 1993/94 season. 190 Acknowledgements Research of this nature is always a collective venture. I wish to record my grateful thanks to those who have contributed to the completion of this study. I want to thank the ESRC for the financial support which made this work possible. I owe a special thanks to the staff, players and Youth Trainees of Colby Town F.C. for their help and co-operation. I trust they will, regard this as a fair representation of their everyday lives. I am also indebted to a number of people from whose experience I have benefited greatly during the course of the research period. I wish to thank my supervisor, Prof. R.G. Burgess, who originally stimulated my pursuit of this project and who has continued to offer encouragement, advice and support throughout. Tony Mason, Mairtin Mac an Ghaill, Janet Foster, Mike Neary, David Collinson, John Williams and Phil Mizen have all helped out from time to time, providing constructive comments on draft chapters and/or offering reassurances and assistance along the way. Gordon Coleman too, deserves a specific mention for his foresight and motivational drive without which access to Colby Town F.C. would not have been granted. Finally, I want to thank my wife Paula - for her rationality and resilience, her love and support, her prayers and understanding, her patience and tolerance - and for just being there. Needless to say, none of these people are to be held responsible for the inadequacies found herein. These are, of course, entirely my own. — 11 — Declaration A selection of the material contained within this thesis has appeared elsewhere in published form (see Parker, 1995, 1996a). Abstract This qualitative study of Youth Training (YT) is centred specifically around the experiences of trainee professional footballers. Presenting a case-study analysis of one professional English Football League club, it utilizes those methods of sociological enquiry traditionally associated with ethnography (i.e. participant observation, unstructured interviews, and documentary analysis) in order to explore the day-to-day lives of the individuals concerned. The study depicts the way in which YT recruits are socialized into professional football club culture and how their career expectations and aspirations are subsequently shaped by the detailed complexities of institutional experience. In turn, it looks at how trainees learn to adapt to their chosen occupational position, and uncovers their attitudes towards such diverse topics as educational attendance, inter-personal relations and masculine construction. Set against the historical development of football apprenticeship within England, the work examines the impact of new vocational policy upon the football industry as a whole and portrays the role of the Professional Footballers' Association (PFA) - and its subsidiary body The Footballers' Further Education and Vocational Training Society (FFE & VTS) - in relation to the implementation of YT provision. To this end, it attempts to determine the extent to which modern-day forms of football traineeship differ from those methods of indenture employed in previous years. At the same time, the study provides insight into the personal and social lives of the trainees in question. Notably issues of class, sexuality and gender are raised in terms of individual experience and interpretation. Furthermore, the influence of club officials is also considered in relation to the pressures, pitfalls and constraints of trainee development. Abbreviations BTEC Business and Technology Education Council C&G City and Guilds of London Institute CIR Commission on Industrial Relations DES Department of Education and Science DfEE Department for Education and Employment ESFA English Schools Football Association ESRC Economic and Social Research Council FA Football Association FE Further Education FIE 8c VTS Footballers' Further Education and Vocational Training Society FL Football League GCSE General Certificate of Secondary Education GNVQ General National Vocational Qualification ISRM Institute of Sports and Recreation Management MSC Manpower Services Commission NCVQ National Council for Vocational Qualifications NVQ National Vocational Qualification PEP Political and Economic Planning PFA Professional Footballers' Association ROSLA Raising of the School Leaving Age RSA Royal Society of Arts Examination Board TEC Training and Enterprise Council YOP Youth Opportunities Programme YT Youth Training YTS Youth Training Scheme Key to ethnographic quotations: Pause in conversation Material edited out [ 1 Explanatory information or actions inserted AP Andrew Parker INTRODUCTION Football is an accepted and celebrated element of popular culture. Its stars have become contemporary heroes. At its simplest it represents a game watched and played by millions. Exactly where its popularity lies is open to debate. What is certain is that whilst a vast literature now surrounds the football industry, insightful and substantive revelations regarding the inner- workings of the 'People's Game' are few and far between (Walvin, 1975). As far as English professional football is concerned, 'insider' accounts of working life have been hindered largely by the insular atmosphere created and perpetuated by those living and working in and around the game (see Walvin, 1975; Tomlinson, 1983; Ward, 1983; Wagg, 1984). Though on occasion the inner sanctums of professional clubs have been breached, the extent to which resulting works have captured the 'realities' of the football world is hard to say [1]. Nevertheless, what these sources do confirm is that, apart from the physical rigours of training and playing, this distinctively working-class occupational domain revolves primarily around a strict diet of authoritarianism, ruthlessness and hyper-masculine work-place practice. This ethnographic study transcends popular portrayals of club life and presents a critical and detailed analysis of Youth Training (YT) within professional football. It sets out to add to existing knowledge of how young people behave and react in relation to issues of training and work by presenting the sub-cultural experiences and verbalized accounts of a group of first and second year football Youth Trainees at one specific English league club. Key questions are addressed. What are trainee experiences of 1 YT in football like? What impact does YT have on their career chances, aspirations, destinations? How are individual identities shaped, structured, influenced, negotiated within the confines of working-class transition? My concern is not just to describe these training experiences, but to apply aspects of sociological theory to them - to everyday circumstance, action and language - to establish some kind of analytical framework through which insight might be gained into what it means to be a professional football Youth Trainee in the 1990s. Empirically based investigations into young people's industrial experiences of new vocational life are nothing new (see for example Cockburn, 1987; Hollands, 1990; Lee, Marsden, Rickman and Duncombe, 1990; Banks et al