Football is complex because it involves physical aspects, technical competence, the ability to understand tactics, and psychological conditions. This study focuses on exploring the psychological characteristics needed by U17 football players in Indonesia and Malaysia to become professional football players in the future. The researcher used a qualitative method with a grounded theory approach to find these psychological characteristics. The researcher conducted interviews, observations, and document analysis to collect data from 25 football coaches in Indonesia and Malaysia who already have a football coaching license and have at least five years of experience as U17 football coaches who were participants in this study. The license and knowledge of the coaches are expected to be valuable sources of information in this study. The data collected were analyzed through several steps, starting from open coding, axial coding, and selective coding, to find themes that emerged from the coach's information. In addition, to facilitate data grouping, the researcher also conducted data analysis with the help of software in qualitative research, namely NVivo 14. This study found five psychological characteristics that can help U17 football players to rise professionally. The first characteristic is the cognitive aspect of the player's intellectual ability, goal setting, imagery, focus, and willingness. Second, affective factors involve self-confidence, happiness, motivation, and self-control. Third, behavioral factors include discipline, attitude, commitment, and respect. Fourth, personality factors include courage, adaptability, and mental toughness. The last factor is the spiritual aspect, which requires players to have ritual and social worship. The psychological element is not the main factor in the success of football players, but it is a determining factor. With the development of scientific collaboration for football, football coaches or stakeholders in Indonesia and Malaysia can use the results of this study as a basis for creating programs for the development of football in both countries. Keywords: individual, psychological characteristics, developmental pathways, football, Indonesia, Malaysia

The current research aims to develop a Path Model for Under-17 Football Players in Indonesia and Malaysia. A qualitative approach toward Grounded theory was used to formulate the research. A total of 25 coaches, 15 from Malaysia and ten from Indonesia, participated in the current research, which was determined through a purposive sampling method. The criteria of the participants were having a coaching license and having a minimum of 5 years of coaching experience. The participants were interviewed to formulate the model for the Under-17 Football Players in Indonesia and Malaysia. The data collected was analyzed with qualitative research software, namely N-Vivo 14. In this study's approach to the evolved grounded theory, open encoding techniques, axial encodings, and selective encodes are used for data analysis. The result indicated that the model proposed in the current research consists of three aspects. The first aspect was the issue and challenges for the athlete's development, which consisted of several factors: the coach's competencies, physical, technique, tactical, and psychological condition. The second aspect was the individual psychological trait consisting of several psychological conditions such as cognitive, affective, attitude, personality, and spirituality. The third aspect was the environment. The psychological condition consists of several aspects, such as the policy supporting the athlete's development, the support from the family, and the support from the coach. Keywords: football development, development path, u17 football players, Indonesia, Malaysia

Grassroots football is the foundation for young children's football development process. It emphasizes several aspects that are necessary for children's psychological well-being, such as excitement, encouragement from coaches, and parental support. In the process of developing grassroots football players, parents have a very big role in the child, not only in providing support for the child but must be in accordance with the child's needs in the path of football development. This research aims to provide information regarding appropriate parental support for grassroots football players according to coaches' views. A qualitative approach toward grounded theory was used to formulate the research with 25 coaches from Indonesia and Malaysia who have a coaching license in football and at least five years of coaching experience. The participants were selected using purposive sampling. The research data was obtained through a semi-structured interview model, field observations, and document analysis, which were analyzed using N-Vivo 14 software. The research results show that parents should have wisdom in supporting players. Parents need to understand that grassroots football is early childhood football development and should avoid becoming obsessed with making their children professional players. They must provide support for the training program provided by the coach, always be positive by giving appreciation to children, monitor their children's eating times and sleeping patterns, update their children's learning at school/learning with coaches, limit and monitor their children's use of gadgets at home, and most importantly, be the primary fans of their children. Collaboration between coaches and parents will positively contribute to increasing achievement in grassroots football, and children who are coached from an early age will continue to pursue their dreams of professional football. Keywords: Grassroots, Football, Parent, Support, Sport Psychology.

This research explores the fundamental aspects coaches teach in several grassroots football academies in Indonesia. Qualitative methods through case study design were employed in the current research, and the data were collected through interviews. Ten coaches from various grassroots football academies in Indonesia were interviewed. They were asked about the fundamental aspects of football taught in their grassroots football academy. In this case, the purposeful sampling method was used to determine the participants. The participants were chosen based on having a coaching license and having a minimum of 5 years of coaching experience. The data collected was analyzed with qualitative research software, namely N-Vivo 14. In this case, three packages of N-Vivo were used, namely word cloud, tree map, and frequency query. The results revealed several words or topics that the participants mainly discussed. Based on the findings, several fundamental aspects of the Indonesian grassroots football academy were mental, discipline, practice, goal, concentration, confidence, motivation, and physical. These are the fundamental aspects taught mainly by the coaches in the grassroots football academy in Indonesia. Keywords: youth athlete; football; essential factor in grassroots football.

Football players should be trained from a young age. However, to continue to develop well, many factors play a role before they become mature. One important factor is personality. This study aims to determine what personality should be possessed by grassroots-level football players in Indonesia. This study uses a qualitative method with grounded theory analysis. The primary data sources for this study are ten grassroots-level football coaches from Indonesia who have trained for five years and have a coaching license. In addition, the results of observations and documents are also additional data sources. At the data analysis stage, the researcher used open coding followed by axial and selective coding to obtain themes in this study. To help facilitate organizing and analyzing data, the researcher used Nvivo version 14. The results of this study indicate that there are five essential personalities for a grassroots-level football athlete to have, namely: Mental toughness, a trait characterized by positive, realistic, calm, and clear thinking even under pressure in a match; adaptive, namely the extent to which an athlete can adapt both in life and in a match; energetic, the extent to which an athlete has great energy to do training and matches; humble is a trait that is not arrogant and selfish in interacting with relations; and brave is a trait of daring to play every match. The results of this study can be a reference for football coaches at the grassroots level in Indonesia to improve the quality of young football players. It is hoped that further research can conduct exploratory research on personality in this study with other variables. Keywords: Personality, grassgroot, football, qualitative, grounded theory

Coach capability is one of the primary keys in sports coaching, especially at the grassroots football level. Coaches are essential in conveying information, motivating, and building positive relationships with young players. This study aims to find out how the capabilities of coaches can help the development of grassroots football players in Indonesia and Malaysia. This research uses a qualitative approach using the Grounded Theory method as the foundation used to formulate the data collection process by meeting with 25 coaches with a coaching license and a minimum of 5 years of experience. Data analysis in the research in this study went through several steps, including open coding, axial coding, and selective coding, to identify emerging themes. In addition, the researcher used NVivo 14, a qualitative analysis program, to assist the researcher in grouping the research data to find the main themes. The results showed that the approach used will be able to help grass players develop into professional players, the expected capabilities of the coach are related to the passion of the coach, trust in the player, patience, and communication of the coach in providing encouragement and motivation and the ability to listen actively to understand the needs and feelings of the player. This study highlights the importance of coach capabilities in shaping the fundamentals of physical, technique, tactics, and sportsmanship values in grassroots football players in Indonesia and Malaysia. In conclusion, the capabilities of coaches can improve the quality of coaching, develop players' potential, and create a positive and inclusive learning environment. Keywords: Environmental, Psychological Characteristic, Grassroots, Football Player, Indonesia, Malaysia