Are UK teams good enough to compete at major tournaments?

[Ash - GI Sportz]

Simple answer.........No.
we have good players in different teams, but not one real outstanding team, just look at the GB Team, has done really well in the nations cup. I have tried getting these players together but no luck.

Twizz, having all the good players in one team wont do much to improve the overall standard - the far superior team would then have no interest to play anywhere in the UK as it would be below them, so none of the other UK players would benefit from their knowledge or ability etc because they would not be there to impart it.

The problem lies in the current structure of elite teams as a group and the foundations below it. Ideally you want a pyramid style system where you have say:
2x CPL level teams
4x SPL1 level teams
8x SPL2 level teams
15+ other race to 4 level teams
and exponentially increasing numbers of teams the further down the ranks you go. This way you are constantly blooding 2-4 replacement players for every spot above them. Yes, sometimes the teams will trade positions in this pyramid over time, but the pyramid remains the same. Not all of these teams have to play Millenniums, but they just have to fill that role in the system.

The problem we have at the moment is that there is a big gap in the middle our 'pyramid' in the UK and its affecting the teams above and below it.
Yes, we have 2 CPL teams - one is surviving mostly on the ability of 10yr pro veterans and the other has recycled almost its entire roster in the last 12 months with mostly SPL2 ranked players (although a lot of these guys had experience at a higher level too).
We only have 1 SPL1 team, and with no disrespect to them they are running a bare bones roster.
Yet between these 3 teams they have won every CPPS event in the past two years, and probably something like 95% of them in the past 4. From here down there is a big knowledge/performance/ability gap down to the SPL2 teams - which although we now are starting to have a healthy number of them, none were able to mount a serious attack on the SPL2 title this year. And the issue with only having one SPL1 team to 'graduate' to means that opportunities are sparse.

These SPL2 teams are slowly gaining experience and will ultimately some of those teams will come to populate that SPL1 void, but then we need to plug the SPL2 gaps they leave behind otherwise we will have the same problem but in a more top-heavy hierarchy.

The real question is then, do we have enough players in the UK who want to be a part of this system, and are we set up correctly in terms of league structure etc to satisfy all these willing role players in the grand scheme of UK competitiveness? The CPPS is doing a great job and I see more teams coming through, but if the top starts to crumble before the gaps are plugged it becomes harder to rebuild the whole system.

Just look at France. accounting for promotions/relegations, going in to 2015 they have:
5x CPL Teams
7x SPL1 Teams
13x SPL2 Teams
Thats a pretty solid pyramid right there.

It has been said on here before, players don't want to travel to train, until that is sorted we will stay where we are

Sounds like top UK ballers don't take the sport as serious as everyone else

The top players do travel and take it seriously. Tigers drove to Paris 1 week before Chantilly to train. Nexus has players spread all across the south and we all trek 3+ hrs to CPPS for practise each time. I dont think travel is the issue - people need to be motivated to travel. If they like what they are getting they will travel anywhere - like @Liam92 and his marathon journeys.

 

[Twizz ECI]

Quick answer Ash as I'm at work but the amount of players that have said to me, 'Can't join Tigers because you train too far away'
As you know I've tried the Club route to bring players up for the last 5 years, and I start with 40 players and end with about 20 after all the cheap gear is given to them.
I've offered free clinics over a number of years, I get about 5 players turn up
You know how much work I put in to try and get new players involved, but it fails everytime, and its players that can't be bothered

 

[Ash - GI Sportz]

Quick answer Ash as I'm at work but the amount of players that have said to me, 'Can't join Tigers because you train too far away'

- not worth your energy in the first place

As you know I've tried the Club route to bring players up for the last 5 years, and I start with 40 players and end with about 20 after all the cheap gear is given to them.

- you dont make good players or buy any kind of loyalty with cheap kit. If anything its a bigger incentive for them to turn you over.

I've offered free clinics over a number of years, I get about 5 players turn up
You know how much work I put in to try and get new players involved, but it fails everytime, and its players that can't be bothered

- totally feel your pain on the clinics and I know how much you put into paintball in general mate. You will always get a certain percentage no matter how hard you try. Just have to focus on the good ones and help them convert their potential.

 

[Kevin Winter]

This is a tricky one!

I'd love to play top flight paintball, but it's simply impossible. I can't take the time from work and I don't have the money. I settle for being as good as I can at the levels I choose to play, but even that is expensive.

For example, I don't play CPPS! It's a couple of hours drive each way and a trip up to play it would cost me at least £150 to travel up and play. Chuck in at least one training day and the general costs of kit and so on and I'd be spending well over £200 a month. As a teacher, I don't earn the money to do it, and there's always the risk of having to pull out of a tourni if there is a crisis at work, or Ofsted suddenly announce a visit. So, I choose to take a couple of pro-clinics through the winter (cheers Twizz!), a few training sessions through the season and to play a local series rather than a national one.

Bottom line is, I want disposable income and a career more than I want to play top level, and my job prevents it.

For most people, they don't want it enough. Someone with the drive and determination to play top flight paintball is a rare breed, especially coupled with a job and life situation that allows them to do it. I think the UK scene is perhaps too small to generate enough of these people at the same time to fufil more than a few teams. Especially as most of the top flight 'balling requires them to travel to Europe to do so.

 

[Ash - GI Sportz]

This is a tricky one!

I'd love to play top flight paintball, but it's simply impossible. I can't take the time from work and I don't have the money. I settle for being as good as I can at the levels I choose to play, but even that is expensive.

For example, I don't play CPPS! It's a couple of hours drive each way and a trip up to play it would cost me at least £150 to travel up and play. Chuck in at least one training day and the general costs of kit and so on and I'd be spending well over £200 a month. As a teacher, I don't earn the money to do it, and there's always the risk of having to pull out of a tourni if there is a crisis at work, or Ofsted suddenly announce a visit. So, I choose to take a couple of pro-clinics through the winter (cheers Twizz!), a few training sessions through the season and to play a local series rather than a national one.

Bottom line is, I want disposable income and a career more than I want to play top level, and my job prevents it.

For most people, they don't want it enough. Someone with the drive and determination to play top flight paintball is a rare breed, especially coupled with a job and life situation that allows them to do it. I think the UK scene is perhaps too small to generate enough of these people at the same time to fufil more than a few teams. Especially as most of the top flight 'balling requires them to travel to Europe to do so.

Kevin this puts you in the 60+% of players/teams that are not able to really devote the time & resources to commit to being on a top level team. Thats totally fine & no one should give you a hard time about that. Enjoy paintball, play with your friends and dont feel pressured to be any different!

 

[kway44]

Enjoy paintball, play with your friends and dont feel pressured to be any different!

Well said mate! Just want to see a UK team smash it up in the world cup one day.

 

[hipjaw]

The paintball clinic is an interesting point. I think there are a lot of things that Pros can teach the aspiring mid-top level teams, however most of the turnout are the new-mid level / recreational players. I think this is, as you say, down to problems with ego. Whilst I'm always up for scrimming against a better team - you only learn when you lose - it takes a lot to pay another team that you compete against to teach you a thing or two. Whilst at the same time, pro level competitors are kinda wasted on the new-mid level players that they provide training for. Literally the only useful thing you can teach a new player is how to make use of training time effectively. I haven't played at the pro level but I can (and have) given players I've met at the training field the tools they need to get better - it's then up to that person to put the hours in until they have the skills in place to compete. I've seen a player that was new to tournaments 2 years ago who I, to a degree, put under my wing, however he made the choice to put even more time than I have into training since then, and now he even looks better than me behind a gun. What he needs now is experience and regular feedback. Now he's the type of player, like myself, who can start the long journey to learn the subtle nuances that transcend the competitive player to a professional standard.

We know how to do running and gunning drills, work on our lanes and progress from good snapshooters to good gunfighters, but it's the refining that comes hard. But then if I were to suggest to my teammates "hey shall we pay those guys we were scrapping with on the field last weekend to train us?" I imagine I would get laughed out the door. What I do wish is that we were able to say yes to go to the Paul Richards clinic. I imagine that was very rewarding and could have benefitted us as a mid-low standard Elite team.

 

[shoaibaktar]

To play at the pro level in this country ,you must first play 5 CPPS weekends ,(turn up just Sunday and prepare to be smashed) .This will lead you into the 4 Millenium events .The weekend in between is used for final tweeking .So that's 9 event weekends. Realistically field will be released 2 weekends previous and 1 will be a practice.So from CPPS1 through to Mills Paris ,you will be balling for most weekends except the Campaign to Paris gap. Most pro players fund a large part of all of this and more and more so ,as sponsors tend nowadays to back the Euro events but not a lot else. Most GB teams cannot stretch to US pros ,who have played on most non US CPL teams and topSPL1 teams . If you watch the Tigers training vids on You Tube against Entity ,Nexus ,GI Defiance .They pour paint time and effort into breakout drills ,regularly shooting 20+ boxes each a session .Tigers won SPL ,Nexus 4th in CPL GI won SPL2. These efforts are not permanently sustainable ,but are the benchmark if you want to succeed .Eventually the money runs out,witness Art ,Vicious and probably Aftershock . The reality is a team will form,improve,tilt at titles with varying success and fold .The few will sustain their effort .But as Ash correctly picked up on if the pyramid of teams crumbles faster than it reforms the pinnacle will be at a lower level and make the permanent teams recruits further from the standard required.Also when a team that is used to walking through the prelims and playing for a podium spot meets a team that is punching at it's full capacity or over ,there is a huge psychological barrier for the lower team to overcome.winning is a habit that once learned stands a team in good stead for the fight .That comes at a big price ,it's not called "the Grind" for nothing. GB paintball needs more players to throw down and try out ,to aspire to "play pro" and fill the ranks of the coming teams .Only when this happens will our top teams take that next step.

 

[Ash - GI Sportz]

To play at the pro level in this country ,you must first play 5 CPPS weekends ,(turn up just Sunday and prepare to be smashed) .This will lead you into the 4 Millenium events .The weekend in between is used for final tweeking .So that's 9 event weekends. Realistically field will be released 2 weekends previous and 1 will be a practice.So from CPPS1 through to Mills Paris ,you will be balling for most weekends except the Campaign to Paris gap. Most pro players fund a large part of all of this and more and more so ,as sponsors tend nowadays to back the Euro events but not a lot else. Most GB teams cannot stretch to US pros ,who have played on most non US CPL teams and topSPL1 teams . If you watch the Tigers training vids on You Tube against Entity ,Nexus ,GI Defiance .They pour paint time and effort into breakout drills ,regularly shooting 20+ boxes each a session .Tigers won SPL ,Nexus 4th in CPL GI won SPL2. These efforts are not permanently sustainable ,but are the benchmark if you want to succeed .Eventually the money runs out,witness Art ,Vicious and probably Aftershock . The reality is a team will form,improve,tilt at titles with varying success and fold .The few will sustain their effort .But as Ash correctly picked up on if the pyramid of teams crumbles faster than it reforms the pinnacle will be at a lower level and make the permanent teams recruits further from the standard required.Also when a team that is used to walking through the prelims and playing for a podium spot meets a team that is punching at it's full capacity or over ,there is a huge psychological barrier for the lower team to overcome.winning is a habit that once learned stands a team in good stead for the fight .That comes at a big price ,it's not called "the Grind" for nothing. GB paintball needs more players to throw down and try out ,to aspire to "play pro" and fill the ranks of the coming teams .Only when this happens will our top teams take that next step.

Shoiab - while what you say is true about 9 event weekends, complimented with a similar amount of practise, this is not where these players have to start out. Going from 0 to 100 like that will only accelerate the rate at which players LEAVE the sport. There needs to be a clear path of graduation through the ranks, with increasing levels of frequency, intensity and quality as you progress.

 

[Ash - GI Sportz]

The paintball clinic is an interesting point. I think there are a lot of things that Pros can teach the aspiring mid-top level teams, however most of the turnout are the new-mid level / recreational players. I think this is, as you say, down to problems with ego. Whilst I'm always up for scrimming against a better team - you only learn when you lose - it takes a lot to pay another team that you compete against to teach you a thing or two. Whilst at the same time, pro level competitors are kinda wasted on the new-mid level players that they provide training for. Literally the only useful thing you can teach a new player is how to make use of training time effectively. I haven't played at the pro level but I can (and have) given players I've met at the training field the tools they need to get better - it's then up to that person to put the hours in until they have the skills in place to compete. I've seen a player that was new to tournaments 2 years ago who I, to a degree, put under my wing, however he made the choice to put even more time than I have into training since then, and now he even looks better than me behind a gun. What he needs now is experience and regular feedback. Now he's the type of player, like myself, who can start the long journey to learn the subtle nuances that transcend the competitive player to a professional standard.

We know how to do running and gunning drills, work on our lanes and progress from good snapshooters to good gunfighters, but it's the refining that comes hard. But then if I were to suggest to my teammates "hey shall we pay those guys we were scrapping with on the field last weekend to train us?" I imagine I would get laughed out the door. What I do wish is that we were able to say yes to go to the Paul Richards clinic. I imagine that was very rewarding and could have benefitted us as a mid-low standard Elite team.

Its obviously preferable in that situation to take someone from outside the loop - having a US Player or Coach come in removes any issue in sharing secrets with the competition and so-forth. But its not an easily accessible option for all. And I think you'll find most of the players at the Ryan Greenspan and Paul Richards clinics this summer again were not in the category I'm addressing.

(Just before I get jumped on for accuracy, I am certain Lucky 15s DID partake in the Paul Richards clinic and their 2nd half of the season took a huge upturn as a
result - kinda proves my original point)