On Sunday, we meet Rochdale in the second round of the Women's FA Cup. Thankfully, the weather has been a bit kinder to us since Christmas and we have gotten some sessions in, including an extended 10v10 scrimmage on Wednesday looking at different players in different spots.
Ultimately, game preparation is, I think, pretty much the same anywhere. The coaching staff pours over any material they have on the opposition (I have been reviewing video of our prior meeting with Rochdale) and fitting together the best lineup to maximize the positive qualities of our players and take advantage of the opposition's weaknesses. Training tonight will be sharpening up players to get them prepared for the match. We have a large enough squad and a large enough staff that we can work on multiple topics. So while not every player is getting an individual session, they are being placed in a group to optimize their needs: finishing, group defending, range of passing.
I am certainly looking forward to the match, and I think the squad is keyed up and believing in themselves.
Nice article on Preston North End on Shekicks.com this week, and the Gaffer had some nice things to say about me. It's always fun to see your name in print: http://www.shekicks.net/news/view/2238 .
Friday, January 7, 2011
Monday, January 3, 2011
Process v. Results, Analytics and Teaching
On my agenda today is reviewing video of two matches played against our upcoming opponents in the FA Cup this weekend, Rochedale. Match analysis is one of the things I do rather well: I pick up patterns of play, see exploitable weakness, fixable problems, strengths to be reinforced. However, it has got me thinking a little more broadly about analysis, and the application of statistical data in the game, and even more broadly about the process of teaching, and its eventual relationship to results.
It is a general truism in any sport that the team with the best players usually wins. In cases where that doesn't prove true, the "lesser" team is better prepared, better organized, and yes, lucky. However, that luck, on reflection and research, is usually a planned event: the ball was played into an area the team felt they had a slight edge, and the opportunity was not missed.
But then, is then the team that was a little smarter, a little better prepared, a little more cohesive, then not filled with "better players?" The best example from this past year was Germany's thrashing of Argentina in the World Cup. Argentina featured an in-form Higuain, Messi, Tevez, DiMaria, while the closest Germany really had to a glamour player was Ozil. Yet the Germans comprehensively out-worked, out-numbered, out-thought, and out-played the Argentines.
In analysis, and particular statistic analysis, we look for meaningful data -- something that is variable, and thus can be changed, and will improve the likelihood of a positive result. However, such data is hard to find -- shots per game? Well, a forward who scores once per match but is shooting twelve times might be wasting possession, and his team ends up on a lot of 3-1 defeats. Passing efficiency? A midfielder who is completing 95% of their passes probably isn't getting the ball into dangerous areas. Xavi Hernandez is usually in the neighborhood of only 75-80%, however the passes that he fails to complete are generally into dangerous areas; perhaps only once a match does he surrender the ball in his own half. Virtually all data sets that you can gather about football have only conditional meaning: the data is only probative in relation to other data sets.
We teach techniques, insights, applications of the principles of play to make "the best players." Along the way, we tell ourselves the results are not necessarily indicative of developing those players. We have all seen the stellar U12 teams of a big kid up top who gets balls played over the top and bullies the game. Oftimes, the turnover of the squad by U16 is 80% and the big kid is frustrated and "burnt-out" by 15 because he has no strategy other than kick and chase.
And yet -- is there an analytical yardstick that we can see that the behaviours we teach will ultimately result in good play? Of course, at the end of the day, that is measured by goals scored and matches won. Or is the game so complex, with so many variables of position, communication, time and space, and the influence of players qualities that all data is either too general to be useful, or so specific that the data sample is too small to be meaningful?
We all know good play, a good player, and a good team when we see it. Or at least we think we do. Do we? Or is football management all alchemy? We are tossing the ingredients into the pot, and maybe Barcelona 2010 comes out or maybe it's the French national team of 2002.
I think it's more art than science -- that it is alchemy, but then again I have to wonder if maybe the great managers, the Cloughs, Busbys, Fergusons, Shankleys, didn't see discrete, quantifiable, analyzable (if that's a word) moments in the game, qualities in players, and even if they didn't consciously understand, knew from their insight, knowledge, and just sheer brilliance exactly how it would come together to create magic on the pitch.
(and trophies in the cabinetry . . .)
It is a general truism in any sport that the team with the best players usually wins. In cases where that doesn't prove true, the "lesser" team is better prepared, better organized, and yes, lucky. However, that luck, on reflection and research, is usually a planned event: the ball was played into an area the team felt they had a slight edge, and the opportunity was not missed.
But then, is then the team that was a little smarter, a little better prepared, a little more cohesive, then not filled with "better players?" The best example from this past year was Germany's thrashing of Argentina in the World Cup. Argentina featured an in-form Higuain, Messi, Tevez, DiMaria, while the closest Germany really had to a glamour player was Ozil. Yet the Germans comprehensively out-worked, out-numbered, out-thought, and out-played the Argentines.
In analysis, and particular statistic analysis, we look for meaningful data -- something that is variable, and thus can be changed, and will improve the likelihood of a positive result. However, such data is hard to find -- shots per game? Well, a forward who scores once per match but is shooting twelve times might be wasting possession, and his team ends up on a lot of 3-1 defeats. Passing efficiency? A midfielder who is completing 95% of their passes probably isn't getting the ball into dangerous areas. Xavi Hernandez is usually in the neighborhood of only 75-80%, however the passes that he fails to complete are generally into dangerous areas; perhaps only once a match does he surrender the ball in his own half. Virtually all data sets that you can gather about football have only conditional meaning: the data is only probative in relation to other data sets.
We teach techniques, insights, applications of the principles of play to make "the best players." Along the way, we tell ourselves the results are not necessarily indicative of developing those players. We have all seen the stellar U12 teams of a big kid up top who gets balls played over the top and bullies the game. Oftimes, the turnover of the squad by U16 is 80% and the big kid is frustrated and "burnt-out" by 15 because he has no strategy other than kick and chase.
And yet -- is there an analytical yardstick that we can see that the behaviours we teach will ultimately result in good play? Of course, at the end of the day, that is measured by goals scored and matches won. Or is the game so complex, with so many variables of position, communication, time and space, and the influence of players qualities that all data is either too general to be useful, or so specific that the data sample is too small to be meaningful?
We all know good play, a good player, and a good team when we see it. Or at least we think we do. Do we? Or is football management all alchemy? We are tossing the ingredients into the pot, and maybe Barcelona 2010 comes out or maybe it's the French national team of 2002.
I think it's more art than science -- that it is alchemy, but then again I have to wonder if maybe the great managers, the Cloughs, Busbys, Fergusons, Shankleys, didn't see discrete, quantifiable, analyzable (if that's a word) moments in the game, qualities in players, and even if they didn't consciously understand, knew from their insight, knowledge, and just sheer brilliance exactly how it would come together to create magic on the pitch.
(and trophies in the cabinetry . . .)
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Plan B and Courage
The Preston North End Women are still on break, but I'm going to the first team match at Deepdale this afternoon. While anyone in North America could have watched the Arsenal v. Chelsea match last night, so I have no unique insight, I believe there are key mistakes Ancelotti made last night from which we can all learn.
To be clear, Carlo Ancelotti is superb manager whose trophy cabinet includes winner's medals from the EPL, Serie A, Coppa Italia, FA Cup, European Cup and so on. But by his own admission, he was sleep-walking through last night's match, "I'd seen some very good training sessions this week, so I did not expect this. We have to wake up. Until now we've been sleeping. But maybe I have to be the first to wake up."
Chelsea's strategy was simple, tested, and had been successful before. They came out in a 1-4-3-3, sitting deep and narrow, and inviting Arsenal to come at them. Arsenal have been bullied by Chelsea recently, having not beaten Chelsea since November of 2008. However, last night proved different as Arsenal were willing to take the game to Chelsea, and when they lost possession, Arsenal were relentless, co-ordinated, and effective on the press. The following graphic demonstrates just how good the Arsenal press was; it is a comparison of the number and location of interceptions by both teams during the course of the match.
by Guardian Chalkboards
Chelsea was not able to get anything moving forward, and the midfield was completely overwhelmed. In the entire first half, Essien, Lampard, and Mikel completed nine positive passes in the Arsenal third between them, and only two after the sixteenth minute. When Ancelotti chose to use Ramires for Mikel and drop Essien into the holding position, it was clear he had no plan B. It was effectively a like-for-like switch and saw no change in Chelsea's overall shape and organization.
Further, I would argue that removing Mikel rather than Lampard showed a lack of courage. Lampard has been sorely missed since his injury, but he brought nothing to the side in the first half. His passing was erratic, movement off the ball poor, and due to Arsenal's pressing, he had no room to move forward on a marauding run. Mikel at least kept Fabregas a little deeper by consistently marking hm goal side, thus forcing Fabregas to move to his own goal for operational space. Also, Mikel's passing efficiency was the best of the Chelsea midfielders, 20 completed of 23 attempted in the first half. Yes, Lampard creates problems when he is at his best, but Arsenal clearly had him solved, and a change in approach was demanded.
The following graphic compares the passing of Lampard to Fabregas in the middle half of the match, when the outcome was decided. It's not entirely a fair comparison as Fabregas is a player of different qualities, however both filled the role of the key attacking player in their respective midfields. Of note is Fabregas completed five passes in the Chelsea penalty area. During the same period, Lampard completed only six passes in the Arsenal half, one of those a drop, and another square.
by Guardian Chalkboards
Ramires proved no more effective or creative in the midfield, and two remaining substitutions were likewise like-for-like, Kakuta for Malouda, moving Kalou to the left and Kakuta playing wide-ish right, and Boswingwa for Ferreira. The only time Chelsea appeared dangerous and capable of closing the 3-1 lead was about the 70th minute when for two or three sequences, Kakuta came underneath Drogba into his favored role as an attacking central player, and Ramires moved slightly higher and wider as he does with Brazil, and Chelsea played a lopsided 4-diamond-2 (or 4-trapezium-2). It appeared to be by happenstance and not design however, as they reverted to type with Kakuta pushing back wider and higher and played a rigid 1-4-3-3 for the remainder of the match that Arsenal had no problems containing.
So what can we learn from all this? I take away two lessons:
1) Even if plan A is remarkably cunning, has worked in the past (and to re-iterate, Chelsea has dominated Arsenal for five matches with roughly the same game plan), and has looked sharp in training, it is important to have a plan B.
2) Don't be afraid to remove your "best player" if he isn't contributing anything to the match. Lampard never looked like providing anything positive in the match, great player though he may be.
As coaches, it is incumbent upon us to "be the first to wake up," to use Ancelotti's phrase, and give our players the best opportunity to succeed. We can't fall in love with something we've seen in training when it's just not happening in the game. Indeed, in training we need to look for qualities in our players and patterns that develop that give us flexibility in our approach, so that when plan A fails we have something to give the players without re-inventing the wheel. Chelsea came up against a well prepared, organized, and inspired Arsenal squad last night, and collectively they simply lacked answers for the questions Arsenal posed.
To be clear, Carlo Ancelotti is superb manager whose trophy cabinet includes winner's medals from the EPL, Serie A, Coppa Italia, FA Cup, European Cup and so on. But by his own admission, he was sleep-walking through last night's match, "I'd seen some very good training sessions this week, so I did not expect this. We have to wake up. Until now we've been sleeping. But maybe I have to be the first to wake up."
Chelsea's strategy was simple, tested, and had been successful before. They came out in a 1-4-3-3, sitting deep and narrow, and inviting Arsenal to come at them. Arsenal have been bullied by Chelsea recently, having not beaten Chelsea since November of 2008. However, last night proved different as Arsenal were willing to take the game to Chelsea, and when they lost possession, Arsenal were relentless, co-ordinated, and effective on the press. The following graphic demonstrates just how good the Arsenal press was; it is a comparison of the number and location of interceptions by both teams during the course of the match.
by Guardian Chalkboards
Chelsea was not able to get anything moving forward, and the midfield was completely overwhelmed. In the entire first half, Essien, Lampard, and Mikel completed nine positive passes in the Arsenal third between them, and only two after the sixteenth minute. When Ancelotti chose to use Ramires for Mikel and drop Essien into the holding position, it was clear he had no plan B. It was effectively a like-for-like switch and saw no change in Chelsea's overall shape and organization.
Further, I would argue that removing Mikel rather than Lampard showed a lack of courage. Lampard has been sorely missed since his injury, but he brought nothing to the side in the first half. His passing was erratic, movement off the ball poor, and due to Arsenal's pressing, he had no room to move forward on a marauding run. Mikel at least kept Fabregas a little deeper by consistently marking hm goal side, thus forcing Fabregas to move to his own goal for operational space. Also, Mikel's passing efficiency was the best of the Chelsea midfielders, 20 completed of 23 attempted in the first half. Yes, Lampard creates problems when he is at his best, but Arsenal clearly had him solved, and a change in approach was demanded.
The following graphic compares the passing of Lampard to Fabregas in the middle half of the match, when the outcome was decided. It's not entirely a fair comparison as Fabregas is a player of different qualities, however both filled the role of the key attacking player in their respective midfields. Of note is Fabregas completed five passes in the Chelsea penalty area. During the same period, Lampard completed only six passes in the Arsenal half, one of those a drop, and another square.
by Guardian Chalkboards
Ramires proved no more effective or creative in the midfield, and two remaining substitutions were likewise like-for-like, Kakuta for Malouda, moving Kalou to the left and Kakuta playing wide-ish right, and Boswingwa for Ferreira. The only time Chelsea appeared dangerous and capable of closing the 3-1 lead was about the 70th minute when for two or three sequences, Kakuta came underneath Drogba into his favored role as an attacking central player, and Ramires moved slightly higher and wider as he does with Brazil, and Chelsea played a lopsided 4-diamond-2 (or 4-trapezium-2). It appeared to be by happenstance and not design however, as they reverted to type with Kakuta pushing back wider and higher and played a rigid 1-4-3-3 for the remainder of the match that Arsenal had no problems containing.
So what can we learn from all this? I take away two lessons:
1) Even if plan A is remarkably cunning, has worked in the past (and to re-iterate, Chelsea has dominated Arsenal for five matches with roughly the same game plan), and has looked sharp in training, it is important to have a plan B.
2) Don't be afraid to remove your "best player" if he isn't contributing anything to the match. Lampard never looked like providing anything positive in the match, great player though he may be.
As coaches, it is incumbent upon us to "be the first to wake up," to use Ancelotti's phrase, and give our players the best opportunity to succeed. We can't fall in love with something we've seen in training when it's just not happening in the game. Indeed, in training we need to look for qualities in our players and patterns that develop that give us flexibility in our approach, so that when plan A fails we have something to give the players without re-inventing the wheel. Chelsea came up against a well prepared, organized, and inspired Arsenal squad last night, and collectively they simply lacked answers for the questions Arsenal posed.
Saturday, December 25, 2010
White Christmas
It's a white Christmas in Preston, as you can see looking out the window. The weather forecast looks positive, however. Tomorrow we are heading about freezing, and there is no freeze forecast for ten days. We'll see if we get enough thaw to train outside before our FA Cup match on 9 January.In the meantime, I hope everyone enjoys their holiday, and are safe and warm.
Cheers,
Harry
Friday, December 24, 2010
Manager-Director-Coach-Assistant-Trainer
So what's in a name?
Not much, really: when we talk about a manager in England, it's very different than when we talk about a manager in the US. A trainer means something completely different in college than it does in a youth club. However, how we organize our roles, both within an organization, and organizing ourselves for the different roles we play can be a big determinate in how effective we are.
It may seem a little odd to American ears when a manager is talked about "being active on the training ground." What else would the manager do? Well, actually, quite a lot. The English structure of coaching a squad is much more analogous to the college football model in the US than how most of us manage our college teams or youth clubs. The manager sets the agenda, but the coaching staff generally conducts the training. In American college football, the traditional role of the head coach, epitomized by Bear Bryant, was to watch the practice, and decide who was or was not ready for the weekend game. (Preston's first team training ground has a scaffolding tower reminiscent of the Bear's tower over-looking the Alabama practice fields, though admittedly much smaller than the Bear's.) A professional football manager usually does much the same, and is managing a coaching staff that does the bulk of the daily work of preparing the team to the manager's specifications.
The key role of the manager, in terms of training, is defining the problems to be addressed – what can we improve on the most in the shortest amount of time that will have the greatest impact on our play? Having a bit of distance from the daily tempo of training can be a big help in seeing what the “big picture” items are. I can't imagine there are many among us who haven't at some point in our careers done three, four, five training sessions in a row on basically the same topic because “the players just aren't getting it.” Well, perhaps that is as much as they will get right now, and our time would be better used moving on to something else. Or, perhaps if we had the manager's eyes up on the tower watching, he could tell us where the breakdown is.
It makes sense: the manager's remit with a professional club is to insure results, which may include avoiding relegation, gaining promotion, winning silverware. A coach, on the other hand, is to improve the individual players and the cohesion of the unit to raise the level of play of the squad as a whole. In other words, the coach gives the manager the tools to his job, while the manager keeps a "big picture" view and defines the coaches' tasks within the organization: what players need work on specific skills or decision making processes, what units within the team need to improve, and, of course, what "improvement" means. The manager then directs the staff who does the bulk of the training. If the manager wants to play indirect, possession football with a five man midfield, clearly training sessions working with a four man midfield playing direct, over-the-top balls to the forwards are not merely useless, but actually detrimental. Sometimes the manager will make a coaching point, lead an exercise, or conduct an entire training session. Or he might not be at training at all, but instead evaluating a prospective player or scouting an opponent.
One person can, of course, both manage and coach, but I think it's helpful to think of the roles as separate. By clearly defining our roles, we can focus on doing one job at a time, and doing it well. For those of us who have coached at small colleges, we oftimes find ourselves doing everything, from laundry to recruiting to coaching, and everything in between. An organization needs to have an overarching vision, an organizing force to achieve that vision, and then technical expertise to actually achieve it. Even if it is one person filling all of the roles, just to keep your sanity you need to be able to compartmentalize. One day, I'm setting the vision; in the morning, I'm determining the strategy and organization of the squad; in the evening, I'm doing the actual training. Blurring the lines muddles your thinking, and you start discussing philosophy of teaching in a training session, rather than actually teaching in the session.
I think a clear separation of roles has an application in youth coaching as well. In my experience, many clubs are in desperate need of a director of coaching -- someone who can set the vision for the club, create a coherent curriculum for player development, and engender a common club culture so the club is something more than an accretion of teams who wear the same shirt. However, once a DOC is hired, individual coaches often resist any influence on their team, and even view help as an encroachment on their authority. The coach, in short, doesn't want to be managed, and I think sometimes that is a failure to define the roles of director and coach and how they are separate, even if one person fills both roles, such as a head coach working without a DOC. Without club direction, the head coach of a team, whether he realizes it or not, is creating the developmental curriculum, defining the vision, and creating the culture that each player (and parent) recognize as "the club." Simply recognizing the differences in roles can make the arrival of the DOC seem like a relief -- finally the head coach can do away with the visionary hat, and focus on managing and training the team.
Likewise, as youth coaches we often make poor use of our assistants, preferring to manage and coach simultaneously and making poor use of the resource of a second coach. Sometimes it's a result of our assistant not having the necessary skill to run a session, but I think a lot of the time it is a failure of ego: we don't want to surrender control; and sometimes it's a failure of our own skill: we can't really define the problem we want the assistant to address in the session. Separating the role of manager and coach,even if one person has both of those roles and only separates them in their own thinking, helps to give a focus to the head coach/manager so that problems can be adequately defined and addressed.
Another way I have seen some youth clubs in the US divide the tasks of managing and coaching, and one that I think makes a lot of sense in the American game, is the distinction between coach and trainer. I've seen it the most where parent coaches function as the head coach, but a more experienced technician (oftimes a coach contracted from a third party service such as Midwest or Challenger) conducts one or more of the weekly training sessions. The head coaches of the various teams tell the trainers where the squads did well or did poorly, and the trainers then devise and run the sessions. The head coach has the opportunity to watch his squad at work without the emotion of a competitive match and can make some judgments about playing time and position. Also, hopefully, the head coach can learn something from the trainer about the game. It is, in some ways, upside down from the English model, where the manager is usually the senior partner in terms of experience (many coaches in professional clubs are, ultimately, aspiring managers) but I still think its something that can make sense for a lot of clubs. It maximizes coaching expertise and increases involvement of the club in the growth and development of each player.
So what's in a name? Maybe not much, but there is a lot to the roles those labels signify. I think that by clearly defining what each role in an organization is and does, we improve our teaching effectiveness, and maintain a bit more sanity. So what if you are it all by yourself --visionary, manager, technician, and laundry man, bus driver, and cook? Well, sitting down and clearly distinguishing each one of those roles can help do each job better. Don't try and cook while you're driving the bus -- you won't do either well. Likewise, don't try and devise a developmental philosophy while you're teaching midfield transition --again, you'll frustrate yourself doing neither well. The English distribution of labor won't necessarily make sense in the US -- we have different resources and needs, but a clear structure of the distribution of labor is a helpful tool to get the most of the resources we have and insure that our needs are addresed.
Not much, really: when we talk about a manager in England, it's very different than when we talk about a manager in the US. A trainer means something completely different in college than it does in a youth club. However, how we organize our roles, both within an organization, and organizing ourselves for the different roles we play can be a big determinate in how effective we are.
It may seem a little odd to American ears when a manager is talked about "being active on the training ground." What else would the manager do? Well, actually, quite a lot. The English structure of coaching a squad is much more analogous to the college football model in the US than how most of us manage our college teams or youth clubs. The manager sets the agenda, but the coaching staff generally conducts the training. In American college football, the traditional role of the head coach, epitomized by Bear Bryant, was to watch the practice, and decide who was or was not ready for the weekend game. (Preston's first team training ground has a scaffolding tower reminiscent of the Bear's tower over-looking the Alabama practice fields, though admittedly much smaller than the Bear's.) A professional football manager usually does much the same, and is managing a coaching staff that does the bulk of the daily work of preparing the team to the manager's specifications.
The key role of the manager, in terms of training, is defining the problems to be addressed – what can we improve on the most in the shortest amount of time that will have the greatest impact on our play? Having a bit of distance from the daily tempo of training can be a big help in seeing what the “big picture” items are. I can't imagine there are many among us who haven't at some point in our careers done three, four, five training sessions in a row on basically the same topic because “the players just aren't getting it.” Well, perhaps that is as much as they will get right now, and our time would be better used moving on to something else. Or, perhaps if we had the manager's eyes up on the tower watching, he could tell us where the breakdown is.
It makes sense: the manager's remit with a professional club is to insure results, which may include avoiding relegation, gaining promotion, winning silverware. A coach, on the other hand, is to improve the individual players and the cohesion of the unit to raise the level of play of the squad as a whole. In other words, the coach gives the manager the tools to his job, while the manager keeps a "big picture" view and defines the coaches' tasks within the organization: what players need work on specific skills or decision making processes, what units within the team need to improve, and, of course, what "improvement" means. The manager then directs the staff who does the bulk of the training. If the manager wants to play indirect, possession football with a five man midfield, clearly training sessions working with a four man midfield playing direct, over-the-top balls to the forwards are not merely useless, but actually detrimental. Sometimes the manager will make a coaching point, lead an exercise, or conduct an entire training session. Or he might not be at training at all, but instead evaluating a prospective player or scouting an opponent.
One person can, of course, both manage and coach, but I think it's helpful to think of the roles as separate. By clearly defining our roles, we can focus on doing one job at a time, and doing it well. For those of us who have coached at small colleges, we oftimes find ourselves doing everything, from laundry to recruiting to coaching, and everything in between. An organization needs to have an overarching vision, an organizing force to achieve that vision, and then technical expertise to actually achieve it. Even if it is one person filling all of the roles, just to keep your sanity you need to be able to compartmentalize. One day, I'm setting the vision; in the morning, I'm determining the strategy and organization of the squad; in the evening, I'm doing the actual training. Blurring the lines muddles your thinking, and you start discussing philosophy of teaching in a training session, rather than actually teaching in the session.
I think a clear separation of roles has an application in youth coaching as well. In my experience, many clubs are in desperate need of a director of coaching -- someone who can set the vision for the club, create a coherent curriculum for player development, and engender a common club culture so the club is something more than an accretion of teams who wear the same shirt. However, once a DOC is hired, individual coaches often resist any influence on their team, and even view help as an encroachment on their authority. The coach, in short, doesn't want to be managed, and I think sometimes that is a failure to define the roles of director and coach and how they are separate, even if one person fills both roles, such as a head coach working without a DOC. Without club direction, the head coach of a team, whether he realizes it or not, is creating the developmental curriculum, defining the vision, and creating the culture that each player (and parent) recognize as "the club." Simply recognizing the differences in roles can make the arrival of the DOC seem like a relief -- finally the head coach can do away with the visionary hat, and focus on managing and training the team.
Likewise, as youth coaches we often make poor use of our assistants, preferring to manage and coach simultaneously and making poor use of the resource of a second coach. Sometimes it's a result of our assistant not having the necessary skill to run a session, but I think a lot of the time it is a failure of ego: we don't want to surrender control; and sometimes it's a failure of our own skill: we can't really define the problem we want the assistant to address in the session. Separating the role of manager and coach,even if one person has both of those roles and only separates them in their own thinking, helps to give a focus to the head coach/manager so that problems can be adequately defined and addressed.
Another way I have seen some youth clubs in the US divide the tasks of managing and coaching, and one that I think makes a lot of sense in the American game, is the distinction between coach and trainer. I've seen it the most where parent coaches function as the head coach, but a more experienced technician (oftimes a coach contracted from a third party service such as Midwest or Challenger) conducts one or more of the weekly training sessions. The head coaches of the various teams tell the trainers where the squads did well or did poorly, and the trainers then devise and run the sessions. The head coach has the opportunity to watch his squad at work without the emotion of a competitive match and can make some judgments about playing time and position. Also, hopefully, the head coach can learn something from the trainer about the game. It is, in some ways, upside down from the English model, where the manager is usually the senior partner in terms of experience (many coaches in professional clubs are, ultimately, aspiring managers) but I still think its something that can make sense for a lot of clubs. It maximizes coaching expertise and increases involvement of the club in the growth and development of each player.
So what's in a name? Maybe not much, but there is a lot to the roles those labels signify. I think that by clearly defining what each role in an organization is and does, we improve our teaching effectiveness, and maintain a bit more sanity. So what if you are it all by yourself --visionary, manager, technician, and laundry man, bus driver, and cook? Well, sitting down and clearly distinguishing each one of those roles can help do each job better. Don't try and cook while you're driving the bus -- you won't do either well. Likewise, don't try and devise a developmental philosophy while you're teaching midfield transition --again, you'll frustrate yourself doing neither well. The English distribution of labor won't necessarily make sense in the US -- we have different resources and needs, but a clear structure of the distribution of labor is a helpful tool to get the most of the resources we have and insure that our needs are addresed.
Monday, December 20, 2010
Winter Break
The hardest thing about losing fixtures to postponement is keeping the squad sharp. No matter how motivated and energetic a manager, coaching staff, and playing squad are, week after week of postponements, delays, and no competition, makes for stale training sessions and it can be a struggle to get the focus back when the season does begin.
I think a lot of factors are working in our favor, and it shows in the quality of training this week. First, we do have a strong and motivated squad. Without the baseline commitment from the players, nothing else can happen. The manager and club secretary have been proactive in getting training facilities for us, so while a lot of clubs aren't working at all, we are still working, and though we haven't been able to test ourselves in a match, improving. Finally the timing of myself coming on as First-team Coach and Luke as Assistant Head Coach probably couldn't be better. The players are hearing new voices, all of which are coherent (and it's really neat to be on a staff that really sees the same issues and largely the same solutions) but our presentation is always just a bit different from each member of the coaching staff, and the players are really responding.
We have done a lot of five-a-side competitive play, and the players are really stepping up and playing to win. For the most part, we have been coaching at breaks, just giving a few observations, and maybe making a quick point to an individual player during the session. This past week, we shifted gears a little bit and ran a more structured session on Friday, continuing to work on speed of play and field awareness.
I have noticed that players here tend to be a little more set in the way they want a training session to be run, but they have been willing to trust me as I structure a session a little differently than to what they are accustomed. It brings up an important point in any coaching situation: credibility. It is inherent when teaching that the teacher is placing the student in a situation where her competency is challenged, and in some way, asked to move outside of her comfort zone. There has to be a basis of trust in the relationship between player and coach for that learning experience to occur. The weaknesses of a player are not exposed to belittle them, but rather to improve them. Without trust in the coach's personality, as well as professional credibility that there is something the coach has to teach, players will resist the teaching moment.
Thus far, the Preston North End Women have extended me that trust, and on Friday especially, I could see positive results. As we began playing a multi-goal game, the first mini-game to three took about five minutes. In the stoppage, I pointed out our movement off the ball was not good, and we needed to get that going in order to find balls into the seams. The players took it to heart, and the second mini-game was less than ninety seconds before five goals were scored (3-2 scoreline.) At that point, we could begin teaching the vision, awareness, and game intelligence issues that we wanted to improve. It was rewarding to be able to move to some "higher level" points such as using the ball as a vehicle of communication. It has been awhile since I have had a group of players technically sound and tactically astute enough that I can begin introducing some of the higher level thought process type of points into the session (without forcing it.)
Coming up, we have fitness testing for the Christmas break, then we reconvene to prepare for our FA Cup Second Round tie with Rochedale. Hopefully the snow will thaw over the Christmas break and we will continue to build from our recent training and apply what we've worked on into creative play in the full-size game.
I think a lot of factors are working in our favor, and it shows in the quality of training this week. First, we do have a strong and motivated squad. Without the baseline commitment from the players, nothing else can happen. The manager and club secretary have been proactive in getting training facilities for us, so while a lot of clubs aren't working at all, we are still working, and though we haven't been able to test ourselves in a match, improving. Finally the timing of myself coming on as First-team Coach and Luke as Assistant Head Coach probably couldn't be better. The players are hearing new voices, all of which are coherent (and it's really neat to be on a staff that really sees the same issues and largely the same solutions) but our presentation is always just a bit different from each member of the coaching staff, and the players are really responding.
We have done a lot of five-a-side competitive play, and the players are really stepping up and playing to win. For the most part, we have been coaching at breaks, just giving a few observations, and maybe making a quick point to an individual player during the session. This past week, we shifted gears a little bit and ran a more structured session on Friday, continuing to work on speed of play and field awareness.
I have noticed that players here tend to be a little more set in the way they want a training session to be run, but they have been willing to trust me as I structure a session a little differently than to what they are accustomed. It brings up an important point in any coaching situation: credibility. It is inherent when teaching that the teacher is placing the student in a situation where her competency is challenged, and in some way, asked to move outside of her comfort zone. There has to be a basis of trust in the relationship between player and coach for that learning experience to occur. The weaknesses of a player are not exposed to belittle them, but rather to improve them. Without trust in the coach's personality, as well as professional credibility that there is something the coach has to teach, players will resist the teaching moment.
Thus far, the Preston North End Women have extended me that trust, and on Friday especially, I could see positive results. As we began playing a multi-goal game, the first mini-game to three took about five minutes. In the stoppage, I pointed out our movement off the ball was not good, and we needed to get that going in order to find balls into the seams. The players took it to heart, and the second mini-game was less than ninety seconds before five goals were scored (3-2 scoreline.) At that point, we could begin teaching the vision, awareness, and game intelligence issues that we wanted to improve. It was rewarding to be able to move to some "higher level" points such as using the ball as a vehicle of communication. It has been awhile since I have had a group of players technically sound and tactically astute enough that I can begin introducing some of the higher level thought process type of points into the session (without forcing it.)
Coming up, we have fitness testing for the Christmas break, then we reconvene to prepare for our FA Cup Second Round tie with Rochedale. Hopefully the snow will thaw over the Christmas break and we will continue to build from our recent training and apply what we've worked on into creative play in the full-size game.
Sunday, December 19, 2010
OK, That's Real Snow
But I will admit that Friday night that was real snow -- it would have shut down Pittsburgh for a few hours, and even Buffalo would have taken notice. The first flakes fell after I left for training at 520. By the time we were leaving Preston an hour later, it was coming down steady, likely half an inch an hour or so. Leaving the gym in Croxteth at 915, we were faced with about four inches. By the time we caught a taxi in Standish at 4am, there were fourteen inches on the ground.
Taxi in Standish? How's that, you say.
Well, I expect the story of our epic journey will make it to a cinema near you sometime soon. We are negotiating with several studios, and hoping for a starring cast of Bruce Willis, Colin Farrell, and Christian Bale (or maybe David Tennant if he's willing to do an English accent again.) The short version is the M6 was stopped due to a series of wrecks just above the M58 junction about 1030. The car died about 1230, and we couldn't restart it, but were, thankfully, on the hard shoulder. Knowing it would be hours before we moved again, we hiked a half mile to a fellow stranded PNE player. There were then seven of us, more than could fit in the car, so once the players were safe and warm, the three coaches began our trek northward on foot.
The M6 did eventually get moving again, and our players, who were at 1030 when traffic stopped, only about 15 miles from Preston, got home at 4am. We made it to the village of Standish, where we were able to negotiate a taxi to take us the rest of the way, and I was home and dry at 5am.
Here in Preston, there is not as much snow -- only about six inches. Still, with the cold, we are pretty well done until the first of the year. We have drawn Rochedale in the FA Cup, and hopefully the speed of play and awareness that we've developed in the last couple of weeks will be seen when we move outside, and we will go through to the third round, and start a run in the League.
Having spent the last four winters in western PA, I can say definitively, yep, that's a real snowfall. No complaints about cancellations and postponements from me.
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