RICHMOND, Va. (August 3, 2026) - The ECNL's Center for Athlete Health and Performance has published research regarding relative age effects in youth soccer, along with recommendations for coaches, clubs and leagues on how to recognize traits that create relative age effect, and how to mitigate the impact of relative age effect on individual and team development over time. 

This study and its recommendations, researched in partnership between Dr. Matthew Andrew, Senior Lecturer in Sport and Exercise Psychology at Manchester Metropolitan University in Manchester, England, and Dr. Drew Watson, ECNL's Chief Medical Advisor and Director of the ECNL Center for Athlete Health and Performance, is the sixth installment from the Center of Athlete Health and Performance since its launch in March 2025. 

Relative Age Effect (RAE) is a description of the overrepresentation of individuals born earlier in a selection window relative to the distribution of live births. More simply, RAE is the reality that players who are born in the beginning of an age group cutoff are more likely to be selected for participation in programming, likely due to the greater physical maturity associated with being born earlier, on average. RAEs are prevalent in youth soccer in the United States, and can distort talent pathways by rewarding and promoting temporarily older, more physically mature players early in the developmental pathway, potentially disproportionately disadvantaging younger born or later maturing players. Unrecognized and unmanaged, RAE can lead to players born later in the age group window being under-developed or even leaving the sport.

"Relative age effects have been observed in many youth sports settings worldwide and have important implications for how young athletes are identified, selected, developed, and retained within youth sports," Watson said. "With this research, we want to raise awareness of how RAEs operate in youth soccer, and better support coaches, clubs, families, and players to understand the ways these unseen effects can affect participation, attrition, talent identification, and player development." 

These biases can lead to long-term developmental drawbacks for clubs, leagues and even countries by potentially increasing dropout among later developing players, or undermining technical, tactical and psychological development in early developing players who are able to rely on physicality to succeed. Unmanaged, RAE can ultimately reduce the numbers and diversity in the talent pool long-term, at the highest levels of performance. Recognizing the prevalence and consequences of RAE in youth soccer represents a crucial opportunity to help clubs and coaches optimize developmental pathways that incorporate individualized guidance on maturation, selection timing, environment design, and how to support both early and late developers equitably.

Mitigating RAEs in youth soccer requires a thoughtful, context-specific strategy rather than a

blanket policy change. While no single strategy can fully eliminate RAEs, clubs can intentionally work to undermine the negative impacts through development-focused education and approaches for coaches and parents, to ensure all players receive meaningful opportunities.

Some recommendations include:

• Don't conflate age or early physical maturity with talent or long-term potential - they are not correlated. 

• Consider biological maturity alongside chronological age when designing developmental pathways. 

• Avoid early positional assignments based primarily on physical characteristics. 

• Ensure early maturing players are sufficiently challenged technically and tactically to reduce the importance of, and their reliance on, physical characteristics. 

• Provide physically and technically appropriate environments for late maturing players to promote long-term engagement and development.

• Engage coaches, players, and families in shared decision-making to build developmental pathways that align with an individual player's physical and psychologic maturity.

"Crucially, switching from birth year to school year or vice versa will not eliminate RAEs in youth soccer," Watson said. "The effects are structural and arise purely from how age groupings are designed. Changing cut-off dates will not eliminate RAEs, but simply shift the benefit to those now closest to the start of the new boundary. When aiming to limit RAEs, clubs need to focus on developmental education and training, focusing much more heavily on tactics and skills rather than physical attributes." 

"Relative age effects are not a flaw in the system, but rather a natural consequence of how youth sport is structured," Andrew added. "The opportunity for clubs is to recognize these patterns and make more informed, development-focused decisions. We hope this work is useful for clubs, coaches, players, and families in supporting long-term player development."

The ECNL Center for Athlete Health and Performance launched in March 2025 to identify, develop and share best practices in long-term youth athlete health, development and performance. The ECNL Center for Athlete Health and Performance provides compilations of the most applicable research from around the world on topics relevant to youth athletes, as well as evidence derived from research projects within the ECNL conducted in collaboration with Dr. Watson's Human Performance Laboratory at the University of Wisconsin.

The CAHP will continue to conduct research, disseminate evidence, and offer recommendations on a wide range of high-yield topics relevant to youth athletes, coaches, and families, including mental health, injury and illness risk and prevention, load management, pediatric exercise physiology, sport nutrition, and more. 

For more information regarding the ECNL Center for Athlete Health and Performance, click here. 

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About the ECNL:

The ECNL is the nation's leading youth soccer development platform for America's top soccer players. The ECNL mission to provide the best youth sports experience in the world drives constant innovations in competitions and experiences for players, parents, families, coaches, referees, and partners. The ECNL has questioned convention and challenged the status quo of youth sport since 2009, pushing boundaries and striving for unmatched excellence. Together with its clubs and club leaders, the ECNL creates unforgettable memories and supports the development of youth players into college stars, professionals, world champions, and leaders.

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