These are the 5 challenges of talent development in esports in the Netherlands
Seminar esports: talent development
The insights in this article come from the May 26, 2023 online seminar esports on talent development. This is part of the seminar series on performance in esports, organized by the Kenniscentrum Sport & Bewegen in cooperation with Next Level Esports. The reason for this series is the Knowledge Agenda on esports: performance enhancement. The Knowledge Agenda provides a starting point for research on performance improvement in esports and includes the most relevant questions from Dutch esports coaches and staff members.
Gone are the days when gamers could storm to the top of esports from home and without professional guidance. More and more attention is being paid to nutrition, collaboration and mental and physical health. Several talent development programs for ambitious gamers have been created for esports players since 2020. In this article, the program coordinators of the programs of BrabantSport Esports Talent Hub, H20 Esports Campus and Esports Talentcenter Gelderland share the five main challenges and opportunities.
1. Lack of national (e)sports (pyramid)
The biggest challenge for talent development in esports is the lack of a national esports pyramid, believes Matthijs Mol, coordinator of BrabantSport Esports Talent Hub. "In traditional sports, there is a clear sports pyramid, where a player progresses from the bottom of the pyramid to the top. This clear structure is still limited in esports. I think this is a crucial factor for the structural flow of esports players."
Donny Stumpel, coordinator of Esports Talentcenter Gelderland, describes what he thinks a pyramid should look like: "At the top you have top-esports, in the middle talent development and at the bottom the width-esports. We are in the middle part, talent development, and have to build the bridge to top-esports. Through a school tour we try to get the width-esports athletes into the talent development program, but to the top is still difficult."
Dirk Tuip, coordinator of H20 Esports Campus, sees opportunities for the pyramid alongside challenges: "We have with Go!Gaming a basic infrastructure that you don't have in other countries, namely six esports and gaming facilities in different cities such as Utrecht, Nijmegen and Eindhoven, made possible by H20 and Pathé. This gives everyone a chance to train together not only online but also physically at different regional locations. This makes it easier to facilitate regional talent and competition." Mol explains what it takes to set up such a pyramid. "You need a point of contact that stands above it, represents interests and coordinates in certain areas like a federation in the traditional sports world."
2. Finding talent
Mol sees finding the right talents as a big challenge: "In esports, the broadcasting structure is often invisible because a lot of it happens online. This makes it difficult to find esports talent." Currently, teams and talent development centers often rely on players who sign up themselves or search within the social circle of players already signed up. Then the players must meet a number of quality requirements to get into the program. Stumpel: "We select players based on four aspects: skill in the game, motivation, age and location. Because of this, some of the interested players also drop out." Partly because of the lack of a pyramid and the online culture, identifying esports talent is still difficult for the centers.
3. The uncertain career path of an esporter
When talent does get discovered, the career path for esports players is often uncertain. This also has to do with the esports pyramid, Tuip says: "It is now often unclear how a player who has gained some experience in smaller tournaments or matches, who plays a little higher up the ladder and gets excited about this, can advance to semi-professional level." Mol adds: "In esports, you can be among the world's top players out of nowhere and also fall away just as quickly."
One explanation for this includes the instability of esports games and league structures. Owners of the games, when popularity declines, can unilaterally decide whether to keep the league funded. That means an esporter can be unemployed overnight and have to switch to another game, which requires different skills. Stumpel uses traditional sports to illustrate his point: "Compare it to a professional tennis player who suddenly has to play professional padel within a few months."
4. Lack of social support for an esports career
In addition to uncertainty, coordinators regularly see a lack of social support from a talent's environment, says Stumpel: "Parents and coaches are still often unaware of what their child is doing in esports and how much time is needed for further talent development. The lack of support is common among players, which seems to affect their development." Science also sees social support as an important motivator for (sports) talents[1]. Just when you realize that talents in other sports spend an average of 28.5 hours per week on their sport[2] this support seems indispensable.
5. Need for coaches with knowledge of the game, pedagogy and didactics
For a good training program, it is obviously important to have good coaching. Mol: "Currently, there are few coaches who have both game-specific knowledge of the games and experience or training in coaching." Stumpel explains, "We are dealing with first-generation, self-educated esports coaches, who have sufficient gaming experience, but often do not yet have sufficient knowledge of the didactic and pedagogical aspect of coaching."
At H20, like the other centers, they use a lot of knowledge from traditional top sports. Founder Dirk Tuip: "We work together with Talent Academy Group who have a lot of experience in performing in traditional top sports. There is specific attention to mental resilience and injury prevention in which we use knowledge from sports." With this, all centers indicate the need for coaches with the right mix of knowledge about how to coach and what to coach.
Structure, coaching and support
How can talent development among esports players be secured, professionalized and encouraged? In summary, according to the coordinators, a clear, industry-supported esports pyramid would be one of the solutions to better locate talent and provide a structured career path. It seems to remain in the middle who will take on this role. There is also a need for well-trained coaches with gaming, pedagogical and didactic knowledge, which presents opportunities for educational institutions. To create more support for careers in esports, the role of the talent's social environment seems to be an important factor. Research and knowledge institutions can help create appropriate information that talent programs can share with parents.
