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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Pay to play is also a problem…. From Sir Alex Ferguson in Leading:

"Almost all football players have working-class roots. Understandably, middle-class parents want to make sure their boys go to college or acquire skills which means football never gets as much attention in those households. Around the world, football attracts boys for whom further education is unlikely and who have no choice but to work very hard on acquiring and improving their football skills as the path towards a better life.

For almost all the British players who played for me, football was their ticket out of miserable circumstances.

David Beckham came from a small house in East London and his father worked as a heating engineer.

Paul Scholes grew up in a council house in Langley and Nicky Butt hailed from Gorton - both places where you won't see a Bentley parked in the drive.

Wayne Rooney comes from a hard neighbourhood in Liverpool and gave serious thought to becoming a professional boxer.

Danny Welbeck and Wes Brown both grew up in Longsight, a Manchester neighbourhood known for gang violence.

Bryan Robson's dad was a lorry driver.

Rio Ferdinand grew up in Peckham, one of the poorest areas of London.

The list is endless."[/quote]

two things can be true at once.  While I agree that pay to play is a problem and that adversity breeds a special kind of resiliency, there are also countless examples in sport, in particular, where privilege and parental resource investment (sometimes obsession) foster the conditions for peak performance greatness.  Not perfect examples on all counts but Kobe Bryant, Lindsay Vonn, [b]Trinity Rodman[/b], Chloe Kim, the Williams sisters, Ichiro Suzuki, LaVar Ball.  So many talented kids from harder streets never get the same leg up in life and never make it out.  But yes, pay to play allows so much mediocre talent to overperform, low ceiling, high floor, but never to make a dominant USMNT.    [/quote]

Uh, Trin's dad had almost nothing to do with her growing up, and she and her mom and brother were borderline homeless at points. Admittedly, she probably got a genetic bonus and possibly some name recognition. Privilege and parental resource investment, not so much.[/quote]

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