pitch2podium

Football's Olympic Talent Transfer Programme

Pitch2Podium is a new and exciting programme created by UK Sport, the English Institute of Sport (EIS) and our partners within the football authorities (Football Association, Professional Footballers’ Association, Premier League and Premier League Learning, The Football League, and League Football Education).

The aim of the programme is to provide young footballers who have been unsuccessful in securing a professional football contract, with a second chance opportunity to succeed in a new Olympic sport.

Over the past few years the young players will have acquired some excellent skills, abilities and athletic qualities from their time in football. With elite coaching and the right support package, many of these attributes could be successfully switched to targeted Olympic sports, where they could achieve Olympic success in 2012.

There are already several high profile cases of athletes successfully transferring from one sport to another, with specific football examples including:

Darren Campbell: Having played for Plymouth Argyle, returned to athletics in 1995 going on to win Olympic, World and European Championship medals;

Andy Turner: Britain’s top sprint hurdler and European bronze medallist in 2006, was previously at Notts County as a youth player;

Audley Harrison: Olympic gold medallist, started his career with Watford, and moved into boxing due to injury.

The Olympic sports that are likely to benefit from this project are cycling, hockey, athletics, canoeing, bob skeleton and modern pentathlon.

Applications for Pitch2Podium are now closed. However, if you are a player and have received an invitation to attend an Olympic Talent Assessment Event click here to register your interest.