Physical profiling of national talent pathway age-group and senior national basketball players from England.

BACKGROUND The aim of this study was to conduct physical profiling within national talent pathway age-group and senior national male and female England basketball players.

METHODS In total 235 players (male, 124; female, 111) from squads U14, U15, U16, U18, and senior featured. The testing battery featured; anthropometrics, countermovement jump (CMJ), 10-m sprint, modified 5-0-5 change of direction test.

RESULTS There were no differences in CMJ (P=0.659) between female groups (29.9-33.0 cm). CMJ was significantly different across male groups (P<0.001), senior players having a greater jump height (45.3 cm) than U14, U15 and U16 (P<0.05). There were no differences in 10-m sprint time for female (1.95-2.01 s) (P=0.469) and male groups (1.74-1.83 s) (P=0.055). There were significant differences within both female and male groups for 5-0-5L and 5-0-5R (P<0.001) with U14 and U15 females being slower (+0.12 to +0.20 s) and male performance showing a linear improvement with group age, U14 being slower than all other groups (+0.07 to +0.27 s). Significant correlations existed for both sexes between CMJ and 10-m (males; -0.582, females; -0.699) and between CMJ and both 5-0-5L (males: -0.397, females: -0.375) and 5-0-5R (males: -0.454, females: -0.370) (P<0.001).

CONCLUSIONS The study's data and findings can be used to inform practice and guide the long-term strategy regarding physical development of talented young basketball players particularly within the national talent pathway in England.