Are all countries showing declining numbers in sports?

[mastermulti]

Here is a table from Rou Morgan showing declining number of Australians competing in various sports this century, despite a 26% population growth. Interesting to hear what is happening in other places.
Fortunately Track and Field aren't doing too badly.
"Just one in five Australians now regularly play competitive sports, down from 27 percent in 2001, the latest sports participation data from Roy Morgan Research shows.
Whether one-on-one or team vs team, the number of Australians (aged 14+) who regularly play competitive sport has declined consistently since 2001. Roy Morgan monitors the participation trends in over 60 sports, fitness activities and outdoor leisure pursuits. Over the past 15 years, more Australians are walking for exercise, jogging, cycling, gymming and yoga-ing—but fewer are playing most of the 27 sports shown below that can actually be won or lost (with or without breaking a sweat).

 

[jacknyc]

Despite huge increases in population, I believe participation in sports, worldwide, is declining.

 

[mastermulti]

the decline is mentioned as in "competitive sports". Yet badminton, rowing, soccer and archery have had large increases.
SO more Australians are walking for exercise, jogging, cycling, gymming and yoga-ing. I think as we get busier it's harder to commit to specific times for team training and competition. Whereas these things can be fitted into a busy schedule.
Added to that is that we're ceasing to be team players and club joiners, certainly city folk. That's a reason it's difficult to get volunteers at big events. Most of the ones I mix with on my competition weeks are my age, many soon to be falling off the twig unfortunately.
Squash, tennis, 10 pin bowling, and even rugby union seem to be in terminal decline

 

[NWsoccerfan]

Sports today can be a huge time sink for kids. It’s not like the old days where you had summers off and only played a sport during the season. They are year round now and the travel and cost can be absurd. You couple this with the boom in video games and social media and I think less and less kids are interested in sports. There are other factors too like the head injuries for example. Or when you had idiots like Kapernick kneeling for the national anthem, it no doubt turned some kids away from football.

 

[white is right]

I know the death spiral billiards is in is across the board in richer countries and that is due to cost for the billiard hall and the factors that NW talked about with social media and video games. I can't tell you how many billiard halls have been turned into fast food restaurants.

Also as NW mentioned competitive sports isn't like it was a generation or two ago as many sports have been turning out robots as prospects and prospects tend to peak earlier because they are competitively coached from much younger ages with summer camps, sports training institutes/schools popping up every where.

Interestingly track and field has more participants that 15 years earlier I would think in North America it has less as the profile of the sport is lower than it was during the early 2000's. The Balco scandal, sponsors ignoring the sport has hurt the profile of the oldest competitive sport in North America,

 

[Don Wassall]

One of the hallmarks of a multiracial society is a decline in trust and social engagement and an increase in alienation and isolation. In the U.S., just about everything that involves social engagement has declined, from clubs based on ethnicity to clubs based on hobbies, and to organized sports as well. The rise of video games and the internet has also encouraged more solitary ways of living.

The well-known book Bowling Alone outlined these trends when it was published in 2000 and they've only become more pronounced since.

 

[mastermulti]

there certainly appears to be a multipliciity of reasons - and it seems we're all heading down that path. Strange times indeed!
I don't know about anywhere else, but I was reading yesterday that hitchhiking is an offence in nearly every Australian state now. I mean, in the 1970s that's how my mates and I often got around. The same with hoardes of young people.
They couch it in terms of "standing on or too near a road" being the offence (doh, so how do we stick that thumb up) but it's safety nannies pushing it really.
I motorcycle tour, sometimes with mates but just as often alone - and camp beside rivers and walk the mountains.
I often get asked "aren't you afraid" by city folk ..... we don't have guns, bears, lions/tigers etc (we do have venomous snakes and spiders and sharks so I exercise some caution).
I encourage my 8 year old grand-daughter in her love of tree climbing - I'm sure from some of the looks we get that some people think it's an insane activity. Life for young people (with their screens) is just so different from my splendid time of natural environment discovery in the 1960s. And there's no going back.

What is it with this constant fear? It's no way to live life.
Rant over.