Well, a good bit of England is paralyzed with cold and snow right now, and though we have it relatively good here in Preston, the pitches are frozen and we were unable to train on Wednesday. I'm looking forward to the first session with the squad tomorrow evening.
We had a staff meeting on Tuesday and got to know each other a bit and philosophy/system of play. I think we are all comfortable with each other, and feel that my voice, while different, will be coherent with the type of football we are trying to play. One note right away: there is certainly more of a willingness to use circuit training here. I think we Americans are a little hesitant because of the emphasis in coaching education on the focused topic session plan, moving from the basic to the complex. We are going to use small-sided circuit training where we are doing two or three related activities, but not building upon each other, as the players will be doing them in a different order. (That is, with three groups, one group will do activity A->B->C, whereas one will do B->C->A, and one C->A->B.) Then we will move onto phase and functional play. The working theory is that each activity will be organized around the same prevailing theme, and will take advantage of each coach's different style and emphasis. Thus, the players are exposed to a variety of different solutions and suggestions in the small-sided activities, and have a greater creative palette to solve the problems of the full-sided game.
I'm excited.
Hopefully the weather will warm enough that the weekend's cup fixture will not be postponed, and I'll get to see the squad in action. It's beautiful sunshine at the moment, and while cold, at least the sun is warming up the ground a bit.
As for just the basics of getting by, I have food in cupboard now, and had a good pie for lunch, so I'm settling in.
