RAYSD Lab

Our vision

The BCU Research for Athlete and Youth Sport Development (RAYSD) Lab aims to collaborate with industry partners, in order to help create evidence-informed organisational structures and more equitable youth sport settings so every young person can achieve their potential.

Research roadmap

Birmingham City University’s Research for Athlete and Youth Sport Development (RAYSD) Lab aims to learn together with partners through living our guiding values and principles.

See our research roadmap

Power our mission

Developing equitable approaches:

Design, implement, and evaluate equitable approaches to create more effective and efficient youth sport settings
Advancing knowledge:

Help better understand the various underpinning mechanisms of athlete development across the lifespan
Working with key partners and informing policy making:

Collaborate and co-create with key partners to facilitate evidence-informed policy making and practical applicability
Being international change makers:

Focus on positively impacting the performance, participation, and personal development of young athletes

Project spotlight

BESTA Project

This project will aim to investigate the most effective ways of integrating diverse talent into the current pathway structures by evaluating the procedures of two mono-ethnic academies working with elite players.

Find out more

FIFA Project

This project will focus on designing, implementing, and evaluating best practice guidelines across the six dimensions of the FIFA Talent Development Scheme’s knowledge framework.

Find out more

Meet the lab lead

Adam's research interests explore organisational structures in youth sport to better understand the athlete development process and create more appropriate settings.

He has generated over £1m in research funding and presented at over 50 international conferences, and is the author of more than 100 scientific articles and book chapters as well as three journal editorials, and two edited books, including the recent release of Talent Identification and Development in Youth Soccer: A Guide for Researchers and Practitioners.

Meet Adam

Meet the RAYSD lab team

Working within RAYSD lab across the BESTA and FIFA research projects are four BCU postgraduate researchers. Find out more about them and their journeys to PhD study here.

Hina Shafi

Hina is using her research to transform talent identification and development for British South Asian women and girls in cricket.

Meet Hina

Omar Green

Omar's PhD aims to make cricket and education more inclusive, reflecting his passion for sport, coaching, and community impact.

Meet Omar

Achuthan Shanmugaratnam

Achuthan is researching global talent identification and development in football with FIFA’s Talent Development scheme programme.

Meet Achuthan

Johann Lux

Johann is exploring how the FIFA Talent Development Scheme can improve talent development ecosystems globally.

Meet Johann

Daniel Jackson (PhD researcher)

Alex McAuley (Deputy Lab lead)

Mark Jeffreys

Kevin Braybrook

Recent highlights

Doncaster, G., Kelly, A. L., McAuley, A. B. T., Cain, A., Partington, M., Nelson, L., & O’Gorman, J. (2024). Relative age effects and the Premier League's Elite Player Performance Plan (EPPP): A comparison of birthdate distributions within and between age groups. Journal of Science in Sport and Exercise.

Morganti, G., Brustio, P. R., Ruscello, B., Apollaro, G., Padua, E., & Kelly, A. L. (2024). Birth advantages in male Italian soccer: How they influence players youth career and their future career status. Sports, 12(4), 103. https://doi.org/10.3390/sports12040103

Kelly, A. L., Coutinho, D., Radnor, J. M., Burke, K., Barrell, D., Jackson, D., & Brustio, P. R. (2024). Disentangling gender and relative age effects in women’s and girls’ rugby union. Journal of Functional Morphology and Kinesiology, 9(2), 61. https://doi.org/10.3390/jfmk9020061

McAuley, A. B. T., Baker, J., Johnston, K., Varley, I., Herbert, A. J., Suraci, B., Hughes, D. C., Tsaprouni, L. G., & Kelly, A L. (2023). Talent inclusion: An ‘imperfect solution’ to genetic testing in sport - Response to commentaries. Current Issues in Sport Science [ePub ahead of print].
•Asimakidis, N. D., Bishop, C. J., Beato, M., Mukandi, I. N., Kelly, A. L., Weldon, A., & Turner, A. N. (2024). A survey into the current fitness testing practices of elite male soccer practitioners: From assessment to communicating results. Frontiers in Physiology, 15, 1376047. https://doi.org/10.3389/fphys.2024.1376047

Coutinho, D., Travassos, B., Santos, S., Figueiredo, P., & Kelly, A. L. (2024). Special Issue “Sports Science in Youth”. Children, 11(2), 202. https://doi.org/10.3390/children11020202
de la Rubia, A., Kelly, A. L., García-González, J., Lorenzo, J., Mon-López, D., & Maroto-Izquierdo, S. (2024). Biological maturity vs. relative age: Independent impact on physical performance in male and female youth handball players. Biology of Sport, 41(3), 3-13. https://doi.org/10.5114/biolsport.2024.132999