[St Charles Owl]

I'm not sure it should come as a surprise to anyone. For starters the sports you mention are fairly exclusive and/or expensive sports in the first place, I am sure it costs a lot of money for any kid to be into sailing, shooting or rowing if its not provided at the school you attend. And lets not forget that the schools that still have sports programs and the facilities to match tend to be the better funded ones, either through tuition fees, state money or their money raising efforts/abilities. But even all that would not stop these sports being "exclusive", even if a 10 year old kid shows ability and desire for a particular sport, if he/she is ever to reach the required level that these grants are given out, they would need to join a club or a travelling team or some higher level training set up to be able to push on to these heights, and that again costs money for the parents. Unfortunately these sort of expenses for these non-professional sports are not high up the list of most working class families!! If their kid shows any ability then the parents are likely to push them towards sports that are easy to access, cost far less to participate and have the potential to earn money doing them in some form of professional capacity, hence the working class nature of football with regards to academies.

Take Andy Murray, he would not be where he is now without his parents having the ability to fund him during his childhood and in the end to move him abroad to enable him to play more. That opportunity is simply not viable for most working families.