Background: Talent identification and development (TID) programs aim to identify players with the greatest potential for long-term success. Previous research suggests that the assessment of sport-specific technical skills is valuable for discriminating between more and less skilled individuals and/or for predicting future performance. Objective: This review aims to provide an overview on both the instruments used to assess sport-specific technical skills and their discriminatory, explanatory and/or predictive findings in the context of TID. Methods: Electronic searches were conducted in PubMed, Web of Knowledge, SPORTDiscus, SURF and Scopus (January 1990-October 2019). Search terms covered the areas of sport, technical skills assessment, performance, skill level and youth. In the end, 59 relevant studies were identified and evaluated. Results: The results highlight the widespread and important role of technical skills in TID; almost all studies (93%) reported discriminatory, explanatory and/or predictive benefits for the assessment of sport-specific technical skills. Analyzing and categorizing the number of assessment methods applied in the studies (n = 69) according to their method type (`technique-related` or `outcome-related` variables) and method set-up (`experimental` or `competition` data acquisition environment) indicated a clear tendency towards `outcome-related` (73%) and `experimental` (75%) assessment methods. We also found a strong overrepresentation of studies assessing cross-sectional data (75%) in soccer (53%) in male samples (74% of studies reporting subjects` sex) from European countries (64%). Conclusions: On the one hand, our findings demonstrate the great capability of sport-specific technical skills assessments to discriminate different performance levels and predict future performance in TID activities. On the other hand, this review highlights the focus on `outcome-related` and `experimental` methods in specific populations and, consequently, the limited knowledge in other areas. Here, the application of `technique-related` and `competition` methods appears promising for adding new knowledge, especially in the light of technological advances.
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