AFL cleverly use Auskick enrolments to justify the amount of $ tipped in by the Fed to AFL. This data is definitely skewed by that questionable behaviour and IMO should be discounted. once a kid is tagged by Auskick they are then deemed as a participant, even though they may have only been involved for a 5 minute session.

BA are their own enemies here as they have done such a poor job of collecting data. No one should be able to play on ay court without their data being captured. That is what soccer and netball do and they reap the benefits with Fed $. Every player should be registered on a national database for a nominal fee.

So if AFL use Auskick participants in their numbers, surely BA use Aussie Hoops participants in theirs?

OK. BJF. The above data is not the sports data. It is survey data by ABS direct to parents. I used AFL as an example as I would be pretty certain a parent would not differentiate between doing Auskick and playing AFL when asked "what organised sport does your child do?"

Very little of Fed Gov funding is tied to participation figures. BA got 500k for 3 years in participation funding a couple of years back. At the time AFL got 750 for their version of touch footy on which they had NO data. Football got less than BA from memory. Gymnastics got a mint at the time but have comparatively small participation.

Vart. My understanding is that BA do not include Aussie Hoops data in their participation figures. Neither do Rugby League.

All of the above data will have some element of come 'n try numbers in it - AFL would be most skewed considering how massive Auskick is.

Would be interesting to see the data for the next age group up and how drastic the drop-off is.

From my anecdotal observation it seems there is a huge drop out rate after about U14s...

different set of data Mick, completely different.

Every sport has drop-off after 14-15 years.

The importance of this data is that Basketball is growing in real terms in this age group as well as maintaining its share of the market.

Of the top five here, Swimming, AFL and Netball have all declined since 2009.

Yeah I was going to mention that, but I noticed (again just from my own observations), that kids were leaving basketball FOR other sports, not the other way around...

I think you will find most parents make their kids take swimming lessons each week (I did), to learn how to swim and make sure they don't drown when around water. This is more of a safety decision given the Aussie lifestyle.

This generally only lasts to they are about 10 years old and very few of these continue "swimming as a sport" after they are competent swimmers.

If you are messing around socially at a pool, I wouldnt consider that swimming as a sport, although they are still "participating" in swimming, which could make figures misleading.

Remember one of the most participated "sports" for adults is fishing, as most people would have tried it at some point. This doesn't mean they enter fishing competitions or even do it regularly.

Kids around 15 leave sports for a number of reasons, they get jobs, girlfriends, lose passion, don't get recognised by coaches or the club they are in. In any sport you need commitment and be prepared to work damn hard. Homework also a factor as kids getting ready for uni. By u /23 there's a handful left - most are by now only playing social sports for fitness and fun, not the pressure and politics, that's the reality folks!!!

There isn't the same money in Basketball as there is in AFL.

Why have to earn a living and then play pro ball in the NBL when you can earn $300,000 in the AFL, just by playing sport.....
The money just is not there.
And the pathway is a bigger barrier in Basketball.

Peter - we also put all of our kids through swimming lessons at the local pools until they were about 11-12. But there is also surf lifesaving, whcih is quite popular in coastal areas. I suspect the ABS survey form would not distinguish that from pool-based swimming. That would help to boost swimming's numbers.

HO - the survey covers participation in out-of-school-hours sporting activities, so the school based swimming is excluded (but depends on the respondents' interpretations, of course). As a parent, I wouldn't have included the week of school-based swimming and aquatic activities that our kids do each year, if filling in this survey. Nor would I include participation in special interest sporting programs (like volleyball, netball, gymnastics) that operate in some schools.

I hear ya anonymous. I quit bball in under 16s cause I wasnt physically gifted but I was very skilful. Footy was a better choice for me cause the coaches saw my skills not my height. One day theyll wake up when theres noone good left to play point guards

I don't think kids quit a sport to play another, as they get older and school commitments increase, social commitments increase.
life gets busier the older you get, then they must decrease the number of sports they participate in.
This in itself greatly inflates the figures we call drop off rates.
As for footy,18 positions vs 5 positions is always going to be a more attractive option.
Just because kids don't play district anymore that also doesn't mean they quit basketball, there are many social competitions around Australia, I wonder if these are in any statistics for basketball?
I haven't heard of any social football or swimming comps for instance, but there could be?
I