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(IQ Entertainment/Sylvan Lake Minor Football)
Safe Contact

Sylvan Lake Minor Football video highlights player safety improvements

Oct 30, 2019 | 7:45 PM

Sylvan Lake Minor Football Association (SLMFA) launched a new recruitment video this week aimed at highlighting recent improvements to tackling safety in the game of football.

Produced locally in conjunction with Sylvan Lake-based IQ Entertainment, the video demonstrates improvements in tackling through Football Canada’s Safe Contact program, promoting the game to new families.

Michael Williams of IQ Entertainment is also vice president of the Sylvan Lake Minor Football Association and says the objective of the video is to provide a level of comfort for both parents and kids considering enrolment in football.

“A lot of it came from some of the negative publicity that’s been happening around the sport over the last few years, as it pertains particularly to concussions,” explains Williams. “Anything 10 years ago and prior to that, coaches, management, the game itself, part of the emphasis was on using the head as a tackling instrument, particularly the helmet. So it was the game itself and the way it was coached and taught that was causing these concussion issues, but once it came to light that this was a real problem, the game itself has changed.”

Williams says mandates from Football Canada have since offered better training for coaches and instruction for athletes for several years now.

“The challenge is that the data that’s being referenced isn’t up-to-speed, it’s still being referenced from studies prior to 2012, 2011, in those eras, before the changes had been put into place,” says Williams.

As a result, Williams says youth football programs right across Canada have seen declining enrolments, including in central Alberta.

“When we went to look as an association on what some of the other communities were doing to try to counteract this negative publicity and bring a focus back to, ‘wait, the game has changed’, what happened was, we didn’t find any,” exclaims Williams. “There was really no content out there whatsoever in terms of education, and focus at a youth or minor level on how the game has changed. So we decided to go down this road and produce this video to tell our story about how just in Sylvan Lake, that we had done it.”

Williams say their hope now is to be able to share the video and raise awareness on what SLMFA has done, and inspire other youth football programs to perhaps do the same.

“We’re not losing any of the fun or excitement, or quality of the game itself,” adds Williams. “Hard work, dedication, teamwork, physical fitness, these are all core benefits to the sport. Learning to work as part of a team is extremely important to the success of your individual team, because if one person doesn’t take ownership of their responsibilities on the field, everything can fall apart.”

Williams estimates 140 kids registered to play football in Sylvan Lake this season, taking part in either the Atom division for ages eight to 10, Pee Wee for ages 11-13, Bantam for 14 and 15-year-olds, and the high school program for those in Grades 10, 11 and 12.

“They’ve been steady and increasing in our Bantam and high school program,” admits Williams. “Where the challenges come in, is the Atom and the Pee Wee program. So due to declining enrolment, a lot of the rural communities this year went from 12-man to nine-man football, including Sylvan Lake and it’s worked out fine, but the goal is to get back to standard 12-man football.”

Williams says his main message to prospective young football players and their parents, is that SLMFA, along with other youth football programs in Canada, continue to take steps in improving player safety in the game of football and encourage kids who may have left the game, to come back and give it a try again.