Chapter 3 – Data Analysis

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email: info@uomfutsal.org

In order for the study to be more authentic, we wanted to get a general idea of what current and former athletes believe the current situation really is. In order to do so, a questionnaire was constructed of ten questions, to which a total of 127 respondents participated in. This questionnaire was distributed publicly within a time span of seven days. Every respondent and response gathered for the purpose of this study is anonymous and no member of the UM Futsal team has access to such data nor such data exists.

In the first question, respondents were asked a question pertaining their gender to which out of 127 responses, 64% were male, 35% female and 1% identified as X. This question was included for the sole purpose of comparison between genders at a latter part of the data. The second question pertained age. Out of the same number of respondents 49% were between the ages of 21-26, 40% were 15-20, 9% were between 27-32 and the age brackets of 33-45 and 45+ collected 1% of respondents each. Once again this question was included for the purpose of data comparison.

tel: (+356) 79544434 Interestingly, out of the data collected, all female respondents registered into the 15-20 and 21 email: info@uomfutsal.org -26 age brackets only. This could be for a number of reasons, but pre-dominantly, the ages of 21-26 could be the ages were socially women start to focus on other aspects of life such as a full-time career or starting a family and bearing children. Both of these socio-economic factors could possibly hinder women in sports and could be the reason why their career falls short. On the other hand, male respondents managed to register on all of the age brackets, with 21-26 being the most popular. In the third question, respondents were asked to name the sport that they practice or used to practice. To no surprise, the most popular answer, with 28, was Football since it is also the most popular sport on the island. In second place, with 9, was Futsal and third with 7 was Basketball. However, there were a variety of sporting disciplines with; Athletics, Badminton, Ballet, Bowling, Boxing, Crossfit, Dance, Pool, Gymnastics, Handball, Judo, Kickboxing, Netball, Rugby, Snooker, Swimming, Table Tennis, Tennis, Volleyball, Waterpolo and Weightlifting, all managing to register results.

In the fourth question, respondents were asked for the times tel: (+356) 79544434 per week which they email: info@uomfutsal.org practice or used to practice their respective sport. To which, 47.2% said three times plus, 25.2% said two times per week, 22.8% said three times per week, and 4.7% said one time per week. When comparing this data between male and females, 48 out of 82 overall male respondents, stated that they practice their sport more than three times per week, whilst the most chosen category amongst females was that of two times per week, with 21 respondents out of 44 overall. Interestingly, amongst men, this figure decreases significantly as soon as the age bracket of 27-32 is reached. From the data collected, one can notice that as age is increasing, the number of times per week that sport is being practiced is decreasing. Next, respondents were asked about whether they have ever planned to taking their respective sport to a professional level. Surprisingly, the majority, 55.9%, answered no. However, this can be explained by the following question’s results. When asked about the probability of playing Sports on a professional level in Malta, a staggering 70.1% stated that they believe it is very improbable of making it professionally. Unfortunately, only 7.1% of respondents believe that it is probable or even realistic.

tel: (+356) 79544434

email: info@uomfutsal.org

As a step further, reasoning was required in the following question. Most responses seemed to agree that this problem is due to a mixture of lack of opportunities, lack of funding and social perception. Some responses state; “The sports sector is not given that much importance in regards to income.’’ Or, “Level of most sports is low compared to

other countries" , tel: (+356) 79544434meaning there's less money in local sport. "Outstanding athletes have to email: info@uomfutsal.org leave the country to have a chance to be successful which is a tough decision to take at a young age (which is the best time for a chance of having a successful career in sports).” This respondent sums up this criteria perfectly when stating “You cannot earn a living with an athlete’s wage in the current time. Football is the most popular sport and yet most Football athletes in Malta work a full time job apart from their part time job in Football. The rest of the Sports categories such as Basketball, Rugby, Tennis etc. are not popular enough in Malta to have a wage let alone a decent one.’’

Speaking on the unfortunate perception of Sports a particular respondent claimed;

“In Malta we don’t take sports seriously. Sports is considered as a hobby rather than a profession, especially when it comes to schools and family support. Within schools, sports is not given much importance as it is not considered as an academic subject.When it comes to typical stereotypical Maltese families, it is often discouraged to pursue sports as a source of income. In general, Malta does not give enough opportunities for people to pursue sports as a profession.’’

Another complimenting statement to the former said; “Not enough importance is given to sports in Malta, Apart from the fact that young athletes are pushed towards education rather than making a living competing in sports related events.’’

Another respondent stated that “It is a very risky ambition as you would probably have to prioritize sports to the detriment of studies. Furthermore there are not much opportunities plus you must be of a high athletic level to be able to succeed.” Most answers seemed to support the claim that many view sports as being a detriment to education as the next couple of questions of the questionnaire will show.

tel: (+356) 79544434 When respondents were asked to choose the most important out of Education, Full-Time Employment and Sports, 57.5% said Education, 35.4% said Full email: info@uomfutsal.org -Time Employment and only 7.1% answered Sports.

Finally, when asked “Do you think that Education and the need to earn a living, play a role in the lack of professional athletes in Malta ?” , 91.3% of respondents said yes.

This is further amplified by the data collected in regards to the tel: (+356) 79544434 following question: "In email: info@uomfutsal.org Malta, Athletes quit their respective Sports and Disciplines at an early age, in order to pursue other sectors of life." 92.1% of respondents agree with the above statement which represents the majority of the cohort participating in this study. This means that only 7.9% of respondents believe that athletes quit their respective sport not due to educational reasons or to pursue another professional working career.