Youth in Sport Committee
Objectives & Mission
- Protect young athletes within a system built largely around adult professionals
- Set legal standards for the recruitment, contracting and transfer of minors in sport
- Guard against overtraining, exploitation and premature professionalisation
- Ensure education is not sacrificed to an early sporting career
- Support families and young athletes who are unaware of their legal rights
- Press federations to build youth protection into their rules
Areas of Activity
- Reviewing academy, recruitment and transfer contracts involving minors
- Drafting guidelines on safe training loads and age-appropriate competition
- Advising families and young athletes on contracts, agents and career decisions
- Working with education bodies to protect schooling alongside athletic development
- Monitoring cases of exploitation or unsafe practice in youth sport
- Producing guidance for federations on youth-specific safeguarding and welfare rules
Committee Overview
Youth in Sport
Much of sports law is written with adult professionals in mind, which leaves gaps when the athlete is fourteen. The Committee works on closing them: how academies recruit, how agents approach families, and what protection exists when a fifteen-year-old signs an agreement they do not fully understand.
The concern extends well beyond elite academies. Overtraining, early specialisation, and the loss of education to a sporting career that may not materialise are legal and welfare questions as much as coaching ones. The Committee works with families, federations and education bodies to ensure that young athletes are treated as young people first.
