The hunt is on for sporting talent

Monday 14 August 2017

The Jersey Sport Foundation (JSF) has launched a new programme on the lookout for the island’s best young athletes.

The charitable organisation is currently holding ‘Talent Days’ to identify young people in Jersey with the biggest sporting potential.

The Programme is currently only open for children who are in years eight and nine in 2017, with the possibility of expanding into other age groups in the future.

From this screening process, the JSF will select around 25 promising young people to progress onto the Talent Programme, which focuses on developing physical, mental and lifestyle skills to prepare them for careers in high performance sport.

Pictured: High potential young athletes show off their skills for a chance to progress onto the JSF Talent Programme. (JSF)

This process is currently underway at the foundation’s ‘East Hub’ at FB Fields, but they will be hosting more ‘Talent Days’ in future once their Central and Western hubs are established.

For Head of Services at JSF, John Scriven, the programme presents an opportunity to identify young people who have high potential but may not have had the chance to get involved in sport. As part of an effort to make the programme accessible to children across the island, the JSF have ring-fenced places on the scheme for children from each States school. He told Express: “This programme is about supporting those people who are already fairly specialised and giving them the general skills, but it’s also about finding the rough diamonds. It’s about finding the child that hasn’t taken part in sport yet – they may be a great sprinter, jumper or thrower and they don't know it yet."

“The main constructs of the Talent Programme will be about giving the children appropriate exposure to the skills they wouldn’t necessarily get in their sports education... We're encouraging general skill development, so the pressure of competition is the exact opposite of what we're doing."

Pictured: John Scriven said that the JSF have ring-fenced places on the Talent Programme for pupils at each States school. (JSF)

The programme will offer the young athletes training in everything from calesthenics (strength training) to drugs awareness through anti-doping tutors. There will also be access to mentor visits from athletes who will talk to the children about what it’s like to be competing in high-level performance sports. The Talent Development forms one year's worth of support which will be reviewed annually for continuation. 

Speaking about the importance of the Talent Programme, John said: "Our island is filled with talented children, who may or may not know it yet, but with the right support could be the next Jersey super star. We know that performance sport dreams don’t always follow the same path, so by creating a stage where children can come and test their skills... our sport associations will be accessing higher levels of new talent. The JSF Talent Programme is filling a really important gap in our sport system and making a very real and positive contribution to our island’s future sporting success."