HEIGHT AND WEIGHT AS DETERMINANTS OF PLAYING POSITIONS IN NIGERIA PROFESSIONAL LEAGUE FOOTBALL PLAYERS IN NORTH CENTRAL NIGERIA

Abstract

This study assessed height and weight as determinants of playing position among elite football players in North Central Zone, Nigeria. The study adopted a cross-sectional ex post-facto research design. The sample of the study was 138 elite football players who were selected from six clubs in the Nigeria Professional League, in North Central Nigeria, using purposive sampling procedure. Participants’ anthropometric measures (height and weight) were measured in accordance with the international standards for anthropometric assessment of the International Society for the Advancement of Kinanthropometry (ISAK). Performance of players was assessed based on the position of the team on the league table. The teams that were in the top ten of the league table were considered to have good performance and were assigned 2. Teams who were from eleven to twenty were considered to have poor performance and were assigned 1. Simple percentages were used to analyse and describe the playing positions of the players. Mean and standard deviation were used to analyse the height and weight of the players. Partial correlation analysis was done to determine if relationship exists between anthropometric measures (height and weight) of players and their playing positions at 0.05 alpha level. All the analyses were conducted using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS, v 21). The result of the study indicated that height and weight are not significant determinant of goalkeeping ( r(15) = .291, N =18, p = .258.), defence (r(39) = .010, N =42, p = .952), midfield (r(39) = .136, N =42, p = .395.) and attack ( r(33) = .143, N =36, p = .413) among football players in North Central Zone of Nigeria. It was recommended among others that coaches should marry anthropometric measures with other parameters in choosing their players for optimum performance.