Teenage sprint prodigy Gout Gout has taken the headlines but Australia had an equally promising and even younger prospect at the World Athletics U20 Championships in Lima last year. A Sydney schoolboy was the youngest medallist at the event, just 15 when he leaped a personal best of 7.80m to win the bronze medal in the long jump, beating boys up to three years older than him.
But there is no guarantee Mason McGroder will still be competing in athletics when Brisbane 2032 rolls around. The talented youngster is also in the Sydney Swans Academy and could pursue a career in the AFL.
Athletics Australia has lost more of these talent tug-of-love cases than it has won in the past two decades as rich broadcasting deals give the AFL and NRL unrivalled resources to pursue the nation’s best young athletes.
Among the former junior athletes currently plying their trade in the AFL are Geelong premiership player and All-Australian Mark Blicavs (steeplechase), and the Cats’ reigning best and fairest 22-year-old Max Holmes (400m hurdles, son of Olympic 400m runner Lee Naylor). In the NRL, Brisbane prop Payne Hass held state and national junior shot put records in Little Athletics, and Manly centre Tolu Koula (son of two Tongan Olympic athletes) holds the Sydney GPS 100m sprint record (10.58sec in 2019).
More than 800 male athletes and 550 female athletes are contracted to AFL clubs each year and talent scouts from both football codes regularly trawl the Australian All Schools Athletics Championships. While athletics, and other Olympic sports, have much to offer, they cannot compete with the financial largesse major football codes shower on young athletes.
However, in November, Federal Sports Minister Anika Wells announced a record $385m investment package in Olympic and Paralympic sport over the next 18 months – boosting funding by an average 64% a year – to invest more in development pathways. Athletics Australia called it a “transformative investment”, Hockey Australia said the boost would be “ground-breaking”, and Swimming Australia dubbed the decision a “generational opportunity”.
“The AFL and the NRL are dangling all sorts of incentives, but I think we have a better chance now [of retaining talent],” says Jane Flemming, Athletics Australia president. “The one thing those sports don’t have is the Olympics and if kids have grown up loving the Olympics and know that this Olympics will be here, it makes us more attractive.”
The last time Olympic sports had this much clout was in the lead-up to the Sydney Games in 2000, but the sporting landscape has changed substantially in the intervening years, chiefly in terms of the contest for the best female talent. The AFL, NRL, rugby union and cricket have all created or expanded women’s competitions in the last decade, giving the current generation of female athletes many more options than their predecessors.
This has created a more competitive market for elite female athletes with transportable skills, like rugby sevens star Maddi Levi (who also played AFLW) and 15-year-old WBBL cricketer and Young Matildas goalkeeper Caoimhe Bray, who is following in the footsteps of Ellyse Perry as a dual-sport international.
Sports historian Greg Blood believes Olympic sports are holding their own, as shown by the female dominance of the Australian medal tally at last year’s Paris Olympics (women won 13 of the 18 gold medals).
“The market for these athletes is more competitive but it could be that more women see more opportunity in sport now that they are being identified and encouraged to follow that path, and that makes the pool of athletes bigger,” Blood says. “But the Olympic sports need to have systems in place to support young athletes if they are to retain them.”
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Bond University’s Dr Jane Hunt, who researches women’s sport, agrees but points to ongoing inequalities in the professional team sports that reduce their appeal.
“The young women I have been speaking to are quite savvy and clear-headed and strategic about their options, and they are aware of the challenges and barriers they find both in Olympic and professional teams,” Hunt says. “The Olympics gives them a chance to be on the world stage and at the pinnacle, which is the appeal for those who aspire to be the best of the best. There’s still that lure, especially for a home Olympics.”
Talent identification and development expert Jason Gulbin, who designed the Queensland Academy of Sport’s Youfor2032 program, has experience in this area as a professional and a parent. His 18-year-old son Lachlan, a talented all-rounder, has just been drafted to the AFL with Gold Coast. “His drives were specifically about playing with his mates, coupled with the career and financial incentives,” Gulbin says.
With more resources going into Olympic sports, Gulbin has already observed improved retention of young athletes who may have been lost to non-Olympic sports. “Some people are motivated by money, and the professional sports do have lots of opportunity for employment, but you still need to be drafted and if they don’t select you, you can’t play,” he says. “In individual sports, which most of the Olympic sports are, that’s more in your control.”
Meanwhile, McGroder, now 16, hopes he won’t have to make a choice just yet. “It’s the worst and best decision to have,” he says. “I do love both sports even though they cross over at times, and that makes it hard. If I want to go through the [AFL] draft I will have to make [that decision] in 2026, but if I do great in athletics I will still only be 24 in Brisbane so I would still be young enough to play AFL afterwards.”
For all the sophistication of modern sports recruitment programs, athletes will still follow their own compass. “The decision will come down to which sport I like more,” says McGroder, “and which one I am having more fun with at the time.”
