5, 26 and 38 Most reports state that the effect is greatest in the years surrounding puberty; these distributions are consistent with other reports. Solutions have been proposed, but none have seemed to gain any significant support by the soccer clubs. Changing the cutoff date, yearly rotation of cutoff dates, or changing the age grouping boundaries (e.g., from 12 to 9, 15, or 21 months)39, 40 and 41 have been criticized because each adds a layer of complexity with the frequent re-structuring based on age group.2 Others have suggested a quota system that restricts the number

of Selleckchem AZD2281 players born early in the birth year on each team,42 grouping on height and weight,16 and 43 or simply delaying audition-based competition until after puberty on the assumption that players do not reach their performance peak until their late 20′s making identification of elite players in their early teen years unnecessary.2 A simple solution BMS-777607 chemical structure that might prove to be logistically difficult is to group players in 6-month intervals, but the potential increase in the

number of teams, support, and field space may, for some, make this an unlikely solution. When discussing solutions, most papers emphasize raising the awareness of coaches about the existence of the RAE. Coaches may well be aware of the RAE, but as Helsen et al.44 tells us, 10 years of awareness (in Europe) has achieved little. Perhaps if coaches were alerted to the lack of evidence that shows having a team of early maturers wins more than teams made up of later maturers, the selection process else might become more about the player’s skills, tactical awareness, and performance and less about their size. One interesting note about size is that when two players collide and a foul is called, referees have a bias against the taller player,45 making it possible that in

the attempt to select a better (i.e., bigger, early maturing) team, the coach has a team that could well have more fouls called against them. While that referee bias is known, what affect that bias might have on outcome remains to be determined. If the overall goal of youth sport is to help every player develop and become the best player possible, then an RAE would not exist, but its persistent presence shows that the selection process is either flawed or selecting coaches are using other parameters than skill, tactics, and fitness to select players. If the best solution is awareness of the problem, showing coaches that selecting players based on maturation within a particular birth year has no impact on seasonal outcome might be sufficient to convince coaches to focus more on each player’s soccer performance and less on each player’s size.