Club Treasurer talks to Sam Neter about how funding has influenced the development of basketball in England
Prominent British Basketball site Hoopsfix.com, recently sat down with Jeff Skinner, Club Treasurer and Storm coach, to talk about his recent masters dissertation (link to the 94 page document here) onon basketball funding in England and its impact on the sport’s development.
In the 1 hour 20 minute podcast, Jeff speaks to Sam about the following topics:-
- His background and local club, the Aztecs in Berkshire
- How the opportunity to do a masters in the history of sport came about
- Why he chose to focus on basketball and how he came upon the final topic of funding’s impact on the sport’s development
- How shocked he was to find out just how many people play basketball in England
- The most interesting things he discovered whilst doing his research
- What has helped and restricted basketball’s growth over the years
- How basketball compares to other sports with regards to funding
- Why basketball has struggled to be able to get public funding
- The administration’s governance failures over the years
- The attraction of basketball to commercial sponsors back in the day
- The Outdoor Basketball Initiative that tipped off in 1995 and impact it had
- Why being able to more accurately measure participation helps basketball’s cause
- Not having people in high ranking leadership/government positions hurting the sport
- Why increasing Basketball England’s membership fee might be one of the easiest ways to raise more money
- The importance of television
- The inception of the BBL as a breakaway league from the NBL
- The NTL TV deal for the BBL and its potential to change the game before going bust
- Why the sport needs to sort out its political in-fighting
- Why he believes being represented as Great Britain is the correct choice moving forward and how important National Team success is
- Why more money needs to be put into participation as opposed to elite sport/potential medal success, along with changing the definition of success
- The organisations that were helpful with his research, and the ones who weren’t
- And much, much more!
Note: This article was originally posted on 18th January 2019 at Hoopsfix.com. The podcast episode is available on iTunes here.
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