Long Term Athlete Development Plan

Our sport has just completed a Competition Review aimed at promoting optimal athlete progression and participation by fostering the right competition structure at the ideal time in an athlete’s development as described in Football Canada’s Long-Term Athlete Development plan. 

Competition Review Document  

In 2016 Football Canada began a review of how football is taught, played and presented as it applied to Long Term Athlete Development (LTAD).  The concept of LTAD is to present best practices for ensuring enjoyment of participation in sports for as long as the participant wants.  The general concepts of LTAD were adopted by Football Canada in 2010 but then it was charged with taking a big picture look at how the game is presented from grass roots to the national level.  The results are enacted below:

FOOTBALL CANADA’S LTAD ROLL-OUT:  Football Canada’s LTAD Competition Review which listed nine points for tackle and non-contact football to adapt to in 2022 has been reviewed by the LTAD 2.0 Committee and the following recommendations have been passed along to the Football Canada Board of directors:

1. a) All Strategies slated to take effect in 2022 have been pushed back to 2023 due to the COVID-19 Pandemic causing too many challenges for leagues and teams to properly adapt to these strategies when in survival mode.

1. b) For Strategy 1A regarding standardization of two year age gaps the wording has been changed to reflect the existence of high school football and PSO’s right to adapt to their own situations. It will read as follows:

The updates to the strategies can be found here: December 2021 Strategy Update

Football Canada is updating the Competition Review.