ArticleFrontiers in sports and active living2026
Influence of the relative age effect and maturity status on competitive playing time in an elite football academy.
Article in Frontiers in sports and active living, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Introduction: The Relative Age Effect (RAE) could influence talent identification and playing opportunities in youth football. The aim of this study was to examine the influence of RAE and maturity status on competitive playing time in an elite football academy. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted looking at 172 cases of male youth football players (U12-U15). Although data were collected over two seasons (2023-2024 and 2024-2025), the analyses did not include between-season comparisons. Accumulated competitive minutes played across the season were analyzed using a linear mixed-effects model, and associations between the categorical variables were examined using the chi-square test. Results: The findings showed that none of the primary effects were statistically significant. The results suggest a trend in the expected direction; however, the effect was not statistically significant for status, ( Discussion: These findings suggest that both RAE and maturity status influence playing opportunities in elite youth football, highlighting the need for development-oriented competition structures.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.