title: An Examination of Talent Identification and Development Systems within Jordanian Football
Creators: name: Altwassi, Sadam Saleh
Publisher: name: Edinburgh Napier University
Year: 2023

description: In recent times, the sports sector across the globe has attracted economic interests both from the public and the private sector. For instance, it was estimated that over $14 billion was spent in hosting the FIFA 2018 World Cup in Russia. Also, by some estimates, the World Cup 2022 is going to cost Qatar approximately £138 billion (US$220 billion). In order to remain competitive on the international stage, the processes and support mechanisms within our talent development environments (TDEs) must be effective in order to maintain a consistent stream of talent, capable of success at the highest level. It is possible to take advantage of sports to advance social and economic wellbeing of the people.

Unfortunately, the structure and evidence base for talent development (TD) processes within countries in the Middle East, such as Jordan is weak and lacking in evidence-based guidance for policy and practice. The lack of evidence-based practice in Jordan is unsurprising as there is no research investigating the process of effective talent development systems to date. Jordan is an emerging nation and one of twenty-two countries that speak Arabic. Jordan was selected as the focus of this PhD because it is small, emerging nation with growing number of sport clubs and academies but anecdotally has a lack of effective talent development program. Over recent years, the Government has started to take more interest in developing and resourcing efforts to find international sport success, particularly in football, as such research in to how this may best be done is timely. Since there has been very little work carried out within a Jordanian context, this thesis aims to take a broad examination of the nature of talent identification and development processes within the Jordanian football context and identify how the Jordanian football development system can be improved.

To address these objectives, a mixed methods thesis consisting of four studies were carried out. First, the Talent Development Environment Questionnaire (TDEQ), a tool already used to evaluate strengths and weaknesses of talent development environments across the world was translated and validated in Arabic. Second, the Arabic TDEQ was used to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the football in both male and females in the Jordanian context. These first two studies developed and utilised an evidence-based tool to measure important strengths and weaknesses for generic features of effective talent development practice. The confirmatory and exploratory factor analysis from study one showed evidence for psychometrically sound Arabic TDEQ-3, which included 26 items with 3 factors. These factors were included: Individualized Long-term Development Focus (12 items), Goal Settings and Coherent Support (7 Items) and Holistic Quality Preparation (7 Items). The results from study two revealed that Individualised Long Term Development Focus (mean 4.79; SD 0.86) and Goal Setting and Coherent Support (mean 4.75; 0.90) were the strongest features of the environment, with Holistic Quality Preparation the lowest scoring factor (mean 3.72; SD 1.19). Overall females scored lower than males across all three factors, with a relatively larger reduction for Holistic Quality Preparation. While mean scores for Individualised Long Term Development Focus and Goal Setting and Coherent Support were in the region of 'agree a little bit to agree‘ for both males and females, for Holistic Quality Preparation females leaned towards 'disagree a little bit‘ for their experiences of this type of support, highlighting this as a real need for focus.

However, research has identified the need to understand sport specific and context specific features of talent development environments in some depth to ensure that the nuances of effective practice can be gleaned. As such study 3 qualitatively investigated effective talent development practice in Jordanian football from an elite player perspective. Study 4 subsequently qualitatively investigated effective talent development practice in Jordanian football from an elite football coach and administrator perspective. These four studies provided a broad, in depth and triangulated perspective on the specific nature of TID in Jordanian football, utilising the perspectives of hundreds of youth players, six elite players and eight elite coaches and administrators.

The data revealed a number of challenges to effective TID in Jordan including, lack of policy implementation, corruption, poverty, and family resistance, as well as poor infrastructure for sports development. Furthermore, luck played a large role in successful development, especially due to the ad hoc nature of access to coaching and supportive people in the community. Interestingly, the extremely challenging circumstances faced by players attempting to develop their sporting potentials acted as a mechanism to develop their mental resilience and independence, which facilitated success. Furthermore, findings suggest that widespread cultural practice through early years (e.g. Talent Development for Young Players) developed a general physicality among Jordanian children, which could serve as bedrock of TID, if the other talent development environments were put right.