Festival Principles

• During football festivals- waiting time for each team between games should be kept to a minimum - otherwise players lose interest.
• Parents do not want to spend a whole day at a pitch and watch their son/daughter only play 2 or 3 games in 3 hours then get knocked out.
• Knock out Festivals do NOT promote development, “round robin” formats are preferred and also avoid penalty shoot out heartbreak.
• All teams in a festival should play an equal number of games given all teams have paid the same registration fee.
• Festival duration for a given age group should be no more than 2 hours - enough time to keep parents interested and enthused.
• Festivals should take place on Astro turf, given schools have spent time organising players/parents and to have a rained off festival is a huge disappointment for all concerned (due to waterlog pitch).
• League tables, results should be available REAL TIME during the festival and importantly accessible by everyone on their smart phone