Abstract:
The purpose of this study was to compare and contrast health related physical fitness of U-19
female football trainees of both Ethiopian youth sport academy and Turunesh Debaba sport
Training center. Some of the variables used for comparison purpose and for which hypotheses
were developed are flexibility, muscular endurance, muscular strength, body composition and
cardiovascular endurance of the trainees. Standardized equipment and procedures were applied
in the measurement of these variables. The quasi-experimental research design was adopted for
the study. A total of twenty subjects (ten from each sport academy) were selected using simple
random sampling technique. Data collected were analyzed using descriptive and inferential
statistics using SPSS. The descriptive statistics were the mean and standard deviation while the
inferential statistic was the independent sample “t” test employed to test for significant
difference between the mean scores of subjects from the two academies. The level of significance
was set at 0.05 with 18 degree of freedom. Findings of the study revealed that significant
differences were observed only in cardiovascular endurance whereas no significant differences
were observed in flexibility, body composition, muscle strength and muscular endurance.
Finally, it is recommended that the Football Federation has to develop strategies to improve the
decreasing level of physical fitness among Ethiopian youth sport academy by implementing
sound practices of physical activities for trainees. The coach of Ethiopian youth sport academy
is advised to work in collaboration with other coaching staff to enhance declining level of
cardiovascular endurance of the trainees; shall focus on various exercises and alternate in
between different training programs that can improve the trainee’s CVE in proper way and; the
coach has to prepare all the sport persons with high level of cardiovascular endurance to excel
in sports.
