The line graphs compare youngsters’ sports expenses paid by parents in the UK and British youth’s preference in three different sports over the period from 2008 and 2014.
It is clear that the more money parents spend on their kids’ sports, the higher the number of children engaging in three sports. In addition, football consistently remained the most popular sport among the three, while swimming obviously lost popularity to be the least favourite over the 6-year period.
In 2008, British parents paid 20 pounds for children’s sports expenses per month. Six years later, significantly more payment was spent by parents for their youngsters to play sports, standing at above 30 pounds per month, which was higher than that in 2008.
At the beginning, the number of children participating in football, swimming and athletics was 9 million, 2 million and 1 million respectively. Over the period, swimming witnessed a gradual rise in popularity, double the figure in 2008. Unlike swimming, the figure for football decreased minimally in the next 2 years, while the number of athletics partakers levelled off at below 1 million in the same timeframe. A slight increase was seen in football’s popularity, reaching approximately 9 million children by 2014. There was a significant rise in the number of athletics players, followed by a modest decline, ending around 5 million.