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Use VARK To Get The Most Out Of Your Players

Dan Bolas — Sat, 18 Feb 2012 18:12:11 +0000

As a football coach, I work with the whole range of players; from youngsters taking their first steps in the game to ex-academy adults playing semi-professionally. These experiences have taught me that not every individual will respond to everything you try and coach them. Whereas some coaches may palm off these players as ‘difficult’ or ‘bad players’, I have found that if I adapt the way I deliver my session I can engage and ultimately get through to these players.

VARK

Anyone who has been involved in education during the past 10 years will be familiar with the term VARK. This is an acronym for Visual, Auditory, Reading & Writing and Kinaesthetic, four different learning styles that children (and people in general) use. However grassroots volunteers may be unaware of the importance of these different learning styles and the effect their use can have on an individual. Indeed, the effectiveness of a coaching session can be drastically improved by accommodating all of them. Before I go into any more detail, I will point out that there are going to be times when it is impractical to cater to every learning style. It should also be noted that, whilst most individuals have a preferred learning style, nobody learns exclusively in one style. This means that someone who is a Visual learner will still be able to take on board information in an Auditory way, and vice versa. With this said, let’s take a look at the four learning styles, and how they may be used in a coaching environment.

Visual Learning

I am sure most coaches have explained a drill over and over and still had players who “aren’t listening” or “just don’t get it”. In most cases these kids will be visual learners who simply need to see a picture to understand the practice. As a coach, the key with Visual learners is to make use of a variety of coaching props and materials. Tactics boards and white boards are fantastic, as they allow the individual to focus their attention on something physical. This could be in the form of tactics boards, print outs, iPads or videos of your coaching drills. Whilst this may seem slightly unusual, think about your audience. Young people (from the ages of five upwards) will attend schools which use whiteboards, wall displays and projectors to teach basic skills such as reading, writing and counting, making it a technique they will be used to, and respond to.

Auditory Learning

Auditory learners prefer to hear things explained to them. The children that sit attentively during explanations and who tend to recall your Q and A answers later in a session are usually predominantly auditory learners. Sometimes these players aren’t looking directly at you when you talk but they are concentrating on your words. Auditory learners also like to have information given to them in a structured, almost linear fashion, in which progression and development comes in a natural order. These players might also prefer to verbalise their points as opposed to showing them to you. As a coach, accommodating Auditory learners is a case of making sure what you are saying to them is clear and well organised. Delivering a session by explaining the set up, structure and rules will make understanding for Auditory learners much easier, and allowing them to run back the session to you verbally will help them consolidate their own understanding. When dealing with Auditory learners, think about the language and terminology you are using. Asking a seven year old to “push out” is much less effective than asking them to “move forwards”. Using a hundred words to explain something you could have done using ten only confuses players.

Read – Write Learning

Read – Write learners prefer to deal in text as opposed to other means of information, and this includes answering questions by writing as opposed to verbally or by doing. They work well using key words or lists, and learn by silently reading to themselves to take in information. As a coach Read-Write learners are very difficult to provide content for as, ultimately, football is a physical activity that requires practical involvement. Having the ability to recall the name of a move or trick is not as beneficial as being able to perform the trick, and therefore Read-Write learners will usually have to adapt to one of the other learning styles when it comes to being coached. However providing challenges on written cards, referring players to websites that can help consolidate their learning, and providing whiteboards and flipcharts with key information at training will engage Read – Write learners. This is something that can be built upon more and more as tactics are introduced in their early teens.

Kinaesthetic Learning

Kinaesthetic learners, by their very nature, learn by doing. They like to solve problems for themselves, take a hands on approach and would rather learn through trial and error than be told what is right and what is wrong. A characteristic of some Kinaesthetic learners is that they talk slowly and, when asked a question, will take longer to provide a definitive verbal answer. Indeed, a prevalence of kinaesthetic learners in the elite game may account for the monosyllabic responses many footballers provide in post-match interviews. As a coach, getting Kinaesthetic learners with a ball at their feet as soon as possible is the key. Ask questions in which the answer is a physical action is also an ideal way of engaging this kind of learner; for example, “how can you get past that defender?” or “can you show me a way of performing a trick using both feet?” Dedicating aspects of a practice to simply letting players have a go and working things out for themselves is also key when dealing with Kinaesthetic learners. This also allows you to see which players is not picking up certain techniques or methods. If you have a young child, or have ever seen one in their home environment, many of the skills they learn will be developed through Kinaesthetic learning. Verbally explaining how to walk or showing a diagram isn’t going to help a one year old to stand up and put one foot in front of the other. They have to crawl, stumble and toddle about until they eventually pick it up. Because bad habits can be established by constantly using incorrect technique, it’s important for coaches to identify poor technique early. But it’s also crucial that coaches give young players chances to work things out for themselves and gradually shape their technique.

VARK in Practice

As a coach, take a look back at your last session and think about how you delivered the information to the participants. If you have a session coming up in the next few days, think about how you may incorporate one or two new techniques in to cater for all learning styles. If possible, try and identify the predominant learning styles of one of your better players, and one of your weaker ones. See if by changing the way that you deliver information to that weaker player, you see a change in how they perform in training. You will be surprised by how often a simple change in the style information is delivered changes the resulting actions. How do you accommodate different learning styles in your coaching sessions? Let us know in the comments below...

Joe Hart Talks Specialisation and Goalkeeper Coaching

Pavl Williams — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 12:29:31 +0000

England and Manchester City Goalkeeper Joe Hart recently sat down with Better Football Editor Pavl Williams to talk about growing up as a Goalkeeper, the training 'keepers enjoy and how outfield players treat their stopper teammates. Pavl Williams : "How much specialist goalkeeper training did you receive growing up?" Joe Hart : "At my first Sunday league club I got a little bit. Luckily the guy who ran the team was a goalkeeper so he took that part quite seriously, but there's only so much specific goalkeeper training you can do. "When I was involved at Shrewsbury Town I had [goalie training] once a week but other than that we just played football and played for the love of it rather than trying to be the best." PW : "So did you know early on that you wanted to specialise as a goalkeeper?" JH : "No not at all, I played everywhere! "When you're a kid you just want to play football whether you're in goal or you're outfield. I just played for the love of it with no pressure, no nothing, and just tried to enjoy the game wherever I played." PW : "When did you specialise and really concentrate solely on playing in goal?" JH : "I think it was around 14 [years old]. I was always playing but when I was 14 I got involved with my local club at Shrewsbury Town and I was in goal from then on. But even then I still played outfield until I was 16 for my school. "You know what it's like, when you're young you play for ten different teams so you can mix it up!" PW : "Which practices do you particularly enjoy as a goalkeeper?" JH : "I enjoy it all. As a pro we're lucky enough to have the best coaches and best players around so everything is a challenge day in and day out. "Obviously goalkeeper training can be a bit repetitive and can get a bit boring but at the same time if you you're always trying to get better you've got to constantly be working on different things." PW : "So do goalkeepers have to have a different mindset to outfield players on the training field? Is your routine more structured than theirs?" JH : "Haha yea! There's no understanding, you know [outfield players] don't really understand what we do! "I think we know more or less what they're trying to do but there's no love for the goalies. "We don't care though, we know what we're there to do and what our job is and we just have to get on with it. The differences are a big part of football and part of the fun of it." PW : "Do you hate any practice where strikers line up and bombard your goal with shots as much as all grassroots goalies do?" JH : "Yes! When it's just totally unorganised and you're just getting peppered is the worst thing! "I can be a bit childish but I've just walked out of those ones in the past. The gloves come off! I'm not interested in that one little bit!" Better Football spoke to Joe Hart at the opening of a clubhouse in Manchester that was part-funded by The Football Foundation. Visit http://www.footballfoundation.org.uk for more information about their vital investment in grassroots football facilities.

Emma Norén / WikiMedia Commons Licenced under Creative Commons 3.0. Some rights reserved.

The Talent Code with Daniel Coyle

Pavl Williams — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 21:44:20 +0000

Daniel Coyle is the author of the bestselling 'The Talent Code : Greatness Isn't Born It's Grown', 'Lance Armstrong's War' and 'Hardball:A Season In The Projects'. The Talent Code describes the traits common to the development of elite performance across a wide range of fields. From studying the environments in which some of the worlds best sportsmen, athletes, musicians, artists and mathematicians developed their skills Dan saw that talent is almost always the product of a certain type of coaching, a certain type of environment and a certain type of motivation. In this podcast interview I discussed each of these areas and how they relate to coaching soccer with Dan and Ross Tucker PhD (from the tremendous http://sportsscientists.com). Some of the most pertinent points are also written below but I'd highly recommend giving the whole interview (around 30 mins) a listen. Download MP3

The Talent Code, 10,000 hours and Developing Footballers

Pavl Williams: The Talent Code is included in a collection of books which perpetuate the '10,000 hour rule' but actually isn't the book about quality of practice not quantity? Daniel Coyle: It's about finding the common principles of excellence. The reason hotbeds of talent succeed is not because they're magical or because there's something special in the drinking water; they succeed because their everyday life, the boring, repetitive, substance of their day to day lives is aligned with the way people actually learn. So they practice repetition. They have these very dense - what I would call - reachful practices. In the States you see soccer practice with fourteen kids in a line and the kid at the front kicks the ball and then goes to the back of the line. Well count the reaches…one. Now let's take those same kids and let's put them in a game or 2v2 and design something clever (it's about creating a space) to make it a game. You've taken the number of reaches from one per second to ten per second. You're ten times more effective.

Principle #1 : Reach As Much As Possible

So this idea that you can glance at a practice field and say, "that is a waste of time; that is an effective practice" is an important first step in aligning your culture and aligning your practices to the way people learn. PW: Deliberate practice is often interpreted as narrow focus, static and repetitive. Can you design 'deliberate practice' for a game as dynamic as soccer? DC: It's very difficult. When you see good coaches doing it, effective practice is slightly different for each individual. The edge of your ability is a little different today than it was a month ago and it's different from the guy next to you. So the good coaches that I've seen are coaches who find a way to individualise that coaching. Very little good coaching goes on if a single person is speaking to a group. Communicating through language is extraordinarily difficult, so the pattern I see amongst these great coaches is there's some series of games, some series of drills with lots of fluid motion and the coach sidles up to one kid. [The coach] gets their attention, he gets their full attention, for five seconds and delivers a message; and it's usually an image. It's usually something very memorable and tactile. It's not "kick the ball more softly", it's "let it kiss your foot", that phrase "kiss" it's an image. So they deliver that message and the kid takes that and the kid puts it to use right away. It's not a lecture they see at night, it's during the process. PW: There's a balancing act between letting kids make mistakes and solve problems for themselves and wanting to set good habits early and make sure kids are repeating good technique. Where do you draw the line? DC: You obviously don't want someone thrashing, having zero percent success, and you obviously don't want them to have ninety percent success. You want them fifty to eighty percent success. The less the coach says the better. Ultimately what teaches the game? The game teaches the game. A coach's job is to make themselves obsolete. If you can design a practice space that your team can do without you then you've done your job. But finding that area of struggle, establishing the expectations that, "hey we are going to struggle" - and some coaches make their teams sign contacts to make that clear - "you are going to fail" as a part of creating the culture for success. PW: We talk about myelin pathways being pretty specific so do you think skills are transferable from one narrow field to another? DC: You bet! You could make an argument that the best skills are transferable. One way to look at this is, there's an Australian study which looked at their Olympic athletes and whether early-specialisation was a good idea or not. The study found that for most people it's not and that the people who succeeded were the ones who had this very broad-based athletic background. Anecdotally, what did Kobe Bryant do as a kid? He played soccer in Italy. What did Roger Federer do as a kid? He played soccer until he was thirteen pretty intensely. What did Steve Nash (the basketball player) do as a kid? He played a lot of soccer. Vision, balance, control, all this stuff is super-transferable. If you ask an athlete to pick a pattern out or choose who to pass to, that skill is present in lacrosse, hockey, soccer etc. So in this age, the message that seems to be most applicable is don't specialise early for God's sake. Or we have these clumsy 'specialised' older athletes. PW: That's an interesting point because Premier League academies are looking to recruit players, and dictate what they do, at younger and younger age groups. I wonder whether some kids are missing out on developing broader play skills. DC: Well kids don't play in the street any more, anywhere. So we have situations where a guy I met in Philadelphia the other day has set-up this fantastic room full of foam balance beams and teeter-totters to compensate for the type of outdoor play we had as kids. It's a funny problem to have. PW: We've already talked about deliberate practice and broadly transferable skills, but we're not saying that you can take any kid and make them an elite performer by giving them thousands of hours of deliberate practice? DC: If anybody's saying that they're crazy right? That doesn't jive with real life. Sports is played in the physical world and genes give you certain physical advantages. My argument is not that genes are unimportant. It's that we undervalue practice: the practice has the magic. You can design practice and make it game-like and purposeful and connect it to the goals you want to achieve, and the whole study of practice design is under studied and under appreciated. The idea is that you can create really useful, full, dense, reachful practices by being clever about the way you use space and cones and goals. PW: One of your most interesting points is that ideas should be shared between fields of learning. Were there any left-field ideas you've picked up from your research which might be applied to the teaching of soccer? DC: I think the celebration of repetition. Perhaps this plays too much in to the hands of this 10,000 hours Orwellian imposition that's going on, but what did Beckham do to become a great free-kick guy? He got obsessed. It's a similar story with everybody who has got good at that, they became obsessed too. Because of that obsession they worship at the alter of repetition. One of the things that is very clear in music but which we don't see in soccer is this: if you're in music and you don't practice between now and your next lesson your teacher can tell! There's an expectation in that culture and an amount of disapproval if you don't practice in the week between your lessons. I don't think that happens in sports. At least in my country you finish baseball practice and you put down your glove and you pick it up again on the way out to next week's practice. There isn't this expectation of "home is where the repetition can really happen". It has to do with the passivity of the kid in our culture…kid's are just toted around in cars, spill out and are expected to go get better. Which is just completely crazy.

Principle #2 : Ignite a Fire For Improving

PW: The US has a culture which idolises the Coach and is a very coach-led system. Does that present difficulties in a sport like soccer which depends so much on players making decisions and reacting to dynamic scenarios? DC: It can cut both ways. The reverence for the coach and the coach's authority means you can change a culture very quickly. The problem with the 'myth of the coach' is they make the players passive. You see it especially in basketball where you see these preening roosters on the sidelines with their suits, when really a good coach should do what John Wooden did, which is during games fold arms and legs and watch the game. Your players play the game so you need to create a team of learners. The problem is that at the level a lot of these coaches operate at - and I see this a lot in american soccer too - they can mould a team. They don't need to create a team of learners. They can be the 'big s**t' in their neighbourhood and that's all that matters. They bring home the State Championship every year and they know how to do that but it doesn't create elite players, especially in soccer. PW: In England there are around ten thousand boys in Academy football but only two or three of these players will have a fulfilling career at the highest international level, plus even amongst the kids who stay in the system through to 17 or 18 years old around two-thirds drop out of football all together by the age of 22. So there's clearly something happening in that space that isn't working effectively? DC: It's the worst possible thing that could happen to kids to have that golden halo put round their head at a young age. It's like shining a light on the orchids you want to grow and causing them to shrivel up under the heat. This 10,000 hour idea encourages parents to specialise early and it's crazy. So it's our job to develop a language which goes beyond this idea of just 10,000 hours.

If you'd like to read more about 'The Talent Code' (and I'd highly recommend you do) then you can order the book from Amazon, visit Daniel Coyle's blog and follow Dan on Twitter. Ross Tucker PhD is a contributor to the superb Science of Sport Blog and is also on Twitter.

Daniel Coyle and Ross Tucker were keynote speakers at UKSEM 2011

The Secret To Improving Players? Less Is More!

Simon Lansley — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 12:08:55 +0000

Quality and not quantity is the secret of successful coaching, according to Raymond Verheijen. The 39-year-old, Assistant Manager to Wales boss Gary Speed, believes it is vital that clubs at all levels understand players improve "because of better training, and not because of more training". "Less is more," says Verheijen. "If you do the same exercise more frequently in a week, that's more of the same. What you really need is better training, which means within the exercise you have higher demands. "For example, first you do a certain exercise on a certain pitch size, and then you make the pitch size smaller, and then smaller. The same exercise but less space, less time, increasing the demands, and that is how you improve players." [caption id="attachment_2189" align="aligncenter" width="640" caption="Raymond Verheijen Talks Periodisation With Coaches"][/caption] Verheijen insists football is a game of intensity, not endurance, and that more coaches should recognise this when preparing their players for the season, or even just the week ahead. Over-training can lead to fatigue, which affects a player's 'speed of action' and increases the likelihood of injury. Players should always be fresh, as well as fit. The controversial Dutch coach recently linked up with long-time cohort Guus Hiddink again to launch the UK Football Academy, which aims to share best practice among elite and grassroots-level coaches. Verheijen explained that Hiddink sees the UKFA and its Dutch version as a way of giving something back to the game, which is why coaches at all levels are welcome to attend. He said: "Too often it seems you have to work at the highest level before you can meet the best people. "We say, if you want to go to the highest level, you can meet the best people. We believe this will help more people grow and get to the highest level, and ultimately at that highest level you will get better people. [caption id="attachment_2190" align="aligncenter" width="640" caption="UKFA Coaches Raymond Verheijen and Guus Hiddink"][/caption] "When I spoke to Guus Hiddink in 2008 about this idea, first of all he was thinking about his legacy and giving something back to the game, in a way that a lot of people can benefit from it. He said he didn't just want to give something back to the elite in football, I want to give this to as many people as possible in football. "That was how he described it and so we agreed to develop a coach academy, in which we bring the best experts from all over the world to the Dutch Football Academy, the UK Football Academy, or wherever. Let's make it accessible not only for the top people, but for everyone." The UKFA is currently holding a mentorship on 'Periodisation in Football' at Molineux, and next February will stage its first national symposium at the Emirates Stadium. Verheijen, Hiddink, Speed and Sam Allardyce will be keynote speakers, with sessions specifically set aside for grassroots and amateur coaches. Delegate places for the UKFA's 'Meet the Elite' symposium are priced at £145 + VAT. For further information or to book places, visit www.ukfootballacademy.net

Show Some Respect with Chris Kirkham

Pavl Williams — Sat, 15 Oct 2011 10:43:23 +0000

Chris Kirkham is the author of 'Show Some Respect - The Sound and the Fury of Junior Football'. In this brief interview we discuss the problems witnessed at grassroots football games across the country every weekend and what might be done to address the issue. We also review The FA Respect campaign and how the challenges facing grassroots coaches are presented in the media, online and in the real-world of Saturday or Sunday morning junior football. Have a listen using the player above or download the MP3 file

1-on-1 Coaching with Tim Wareing

Pavl Williams — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 10:18:16 +0000

In this podcast we are talking to UEFA A Licence Coach and Author Tim Wareing - who has just released his second book "1-on-1 Coaching" - about technique development, the importance of age-appropriate coaching and what he learnt from study visits to Barcelona, Ajax, Eindhoven and Braga. Topic covered in this interview include: [unordered_list style="tick"]

Toddler Soccer
Age-Appropriate Coaching
10,000 Hours Theory
Technical Skills Development
1-on-1 Coaching
European Study Visits (to Barcelona, Ajax, PSV Eindhoven and Braga)
Grassroots Development

[/unordered_list] Have a listen in the player above or download the mp3 file here. Let me know your thoughts in the comments below and if you have any questions for Tim I will pass them on and post his response. Coach Tim's latest book '1-on-1 Coaching' is available now in paperback and ebook formats and is well-worth a read if you are keen to develop better technical football players. Head over to http://CoachTim.org/book for a free sample chapter and to view a 1-on-1 Coaching session in action. [button size="l" color="red"]Download a sample chapter[/button]

Player Friendly Development with Tosh Farrell

Pavl Williams — Tue, 07 Jun 2011 01:01:57 +0000

Tosh Farrell is a youth coaching specialist who worked with Wayne Rooney whilst Head of International Development at Everton and who now supports tens of thousands of coaches in the North-Eastern United States. Tosh's sessions are world-renowned for his use of language, manner and ability to connect with the kids he coaches and in this podcast interview we discuss the importance of being a player-friendly coach and how we might develop better football players through a more child-centric development system. Listen using the player on this page or download the MP3 podcast here. For me, the key 'take home' messages were: Become Player Friendly - get to know the kid and understand how they learn. Take an interest in them as a person (their family, their other interests) and not just whether they're going to become a good player for you. Match Expectations - let players do what they thought they were going to be doing. Give them a ball each and let them dribble, shoot and play with their friends. This is the only way to get them to buy in to the work you may need to do later in their development. Coaches are the biggest thieves around - and it's okay to 'pinch' practices, as long as you understand how to repackage them and make them work for the players you are coaching. Build Rapport - ask questions, let the kids decide on some practices. Give out nicknames and use their names when praising. Let kids know you're seeing them succeed and they'll work 10% harder for you. Focus On All Your Players - making a very poor player into a poor player is still good coaching. Don't ignore the players who are already doing things well, and don't neglect the players who maybe aren't as good. Coaching 'Teams' Sacrifices Individual's Development - we don't need to focus on team passing and formations until individual technique and skill has been instilled. When coaching U6-U10s rarely move beyond 2v2 and ensure lots of touches on the ball and lots of pass or dribble decisions. Always Finish With Shooting - this is what kids want to be doing but coaches often start at furthest point from this (such as playing out from the back). You will keep player enthusiastic when they can always see the chance to score at the end of the move. Don't Coach Young Players, Coax Them - some players need to learn how to be coached so when working with young players offer incentives to improve in your practices but let the game be the teacher. Keep Practices Fresh - with young players use 3,4 or 5 different practices in a session. You can retain focus with more variations on a theme than sticking to a single drill for too long. Coaches Are Last People To Take Blame - when a team wins it's great coaching but when they lose it's crap players! Be honest and reflect on each session's positives and how it would have been improved. We Go Too Sexy On Formations - coaches make formations too complex because of the winning mentality. At U12-U16 game time is about understanding their roles and responsibilities on the pitch, not the specifics of a 4-2-3-1 formation. Rotate Players To Aid Development - your team's Centre-Forward can learn a lot by playing Centre-Back against your opponent's CF. Midfielders can benefit from playing in Defence as they recognise space and danger-areas. Give players opportunities to learn in all different positions. 8v8/9v9 Should Aid Transition To 11v11 - have a long-term vision and set-up your team to play the way you'd like in the larger game. If you play 3 in midfield at 8v8 your players will stay narrow for 2-3 years. When you move to 4 in midfield you want width so instruct the opposite. Use the 8v8/9v9 game to teach players principles which will help them in 11v11. League Football Should Be About Development - and there's more room for rules changes and variation than the current system allows. Develop A Process That Leads To Positive Outcomes - follow a programme and have the confidence to stick to it if is best for development. There's no need to react to the outcome of games. Be a long-term (developmental) coach, not a short-term (results-based) coach. What key point did you take away from the interview? Please share in the comments below:

‘Your Kids Your Say’ with Gareth Southgate & Nick Levett

Pavl Williams — Tue, 17 May 2011 18:36:37 +0000

It's an exciting time to work in grassroots football. Coming off the back of The Future Game conference The FA have begun taking their message to the masses in an attempt to engage the football community in a debate about "What Is Best For Our Young Footballers?". Some of the answers, say The FA's Nick Levett are: a) Support for Smaller-Sided Games at U8/U9 and U11/U12 b) Less Focus on Competition and League Tables c) Strategies to Combat Age-Relative Effect (or Birth Bias) Listen to the podcast using the player at the top of this page and if you find the discussion interesting, don't forget to subscribe to our podcast in iTunes using the buttons at the bottom of this post. Alternatively you can download the MP3 file here. --- UPDATE 1 --- Club Website have a very detailed description of all The FA's grassroots proposals and I'd encourage you to head over there and give them a read (opens in new tab). --- UPDATE 2 --- Because the sound quality is quite poor throughout the Gareth Southgate interview here's a transcript of the conversation: Firstly I asked how he came to take the grand title 'Head of Elite Development' and find his role within The FA:

Trevor approached me before Christmas, looking to bring someone in on the back of the Youth Development Review. He wanted someone who had played for England, with managerial experience and who had their Pro Licence. So that quite limited the pool of people who could be involved. And Trevor, having met me over the years, knew where my interests lie ethically. So for me, having a massive interest in developing young people and also English football, it was a great opportunity. Really my role is guided by the recommendations of the Youth Development Review, so on this side of things – helping to develop coach education, working with the Premier League on the EPPP (Elite Player Performance Pathway) and also working with the junior international teams. To begin with, monitoring how we prepare for tournaments and for matches, and to help make recommendations and follow things through and put them into place as part of that Youth Development Review.

To gauge Gareth's thoughts on the current state of English football I asked what he felt had changed since he was a young player?

I started with under-12s football when I was nine, playing 11 v 11. My son is seven now and he has been playing at a Charter Standard club for two years, so the amount of skill development which is going on; the change of emphasis in coaching; the greater knowledge we seem to have about how kids learn; and taking that further forward, the desire to produce players with better technical quality and generally across the country - it’s probably a generational thing - but a better awareness and understanding of what is going on across the world. When I was a lad growing up, the Cup final was the only match that was on; we know see European football every weekend. I think people are rightly raising the question now, why aren’t we technically playing the same way as the Spanish, Portuguese or Italians – whoever it might be. I think there’s a generation of fathers saying that this is what they want for their kids. We had done a lot of work anyway but I think last year’s World Cup highlighted it, and deep down people know there needs to be a longer-term plan in place anyway. What happened last summer just maybe has moved things along more quickly.

I asked Gareth why we still seem to be lagging behind other European countries when it comes to developing technical players:

It’s no different from when I was playing for England. At the very youngest age there wasn’t as much emphasis on skill development; we had all of the great English traits – team spirit, great work ethic, a never-say-die attitude. But the emphasis in our coaching has never totally been around skills and technical ability. There are many reasons for that – inherent thinking of our coaches, we can’t ignore the fact that our climate gives us a disadvantage… but to try to overcome that we have also got to look at facilities, and can we get funding for more artificial surfaces. Should we be more creative and play kids’ football through the summer? The plans we are talking about are not my ideas because they were put forward before I came into this job – but I couldn’t agree more with them having played at the highest level and seeing the difficulties there. And as a father, having watched two years of football – not just my son’s age-group but other ages too. Seeing the difficulties caused sometimes by parents, seeing the difficulties faced (by grassroots coaches) across the board. So it’s very easy to come and speak about something you care passionately about.

Continuing along the funding path, I then asked Gareth whether professional clubs should be investing more money in their local communities?

I think we have to be careful that we are fully aware of what each club does, because from some clubs there is enormous investment going into that. It would be easy to generalise and we have got to be careful not to do that. The work that I have seen which is going into the classification of the academies tells me that the top clubs are investing enormous amounts. There will always be the accusation that clubs don’t do enough in their own communities, but I think there are a lot of community programmes going on and there’s never enough money to go around. We have such a huge base of kids and adults playing football that the distribution of the money is always a difficult subject. But the more we can raise awareness of what is being done, the more we can get Government support, try to influence sport in schools, there are so many areas where can help move things forward – because we are a nation that likes football. And whilst my role covers helping to develop elite players, my interest is as much about the enjoyment of kids, the health benefits of sport, and the benefits generally of being involved in team sport. I want my kids to play football to experience being part of a team and what that means, as much as I might have any notion of him developing into a decent player. It’s about personal development as well as about developing individual players who might one day go and play at the highest level.

As a well-regarded TV pundit, I was interested to hear Gareth's opinions on the role the media plays in shaping our country's footballing culture:

Inevitably the media play a role in passing on the message, but it’s for influential people within the game to give out the right messages, to communicate what we are trying to do clearly. It’s easy for people to have a preconceived idea about what The FA do, what the Premier League do, what UEFA do. One of things I have noticed since coming into The FA is that it’s a far younger organisation on the inside than people would believe, and a more forward-thinking. People within it have got a little bit more time to go and research – they go and talk to kids, talk to coaches. Sometimes in the professional game when you need results, there isn’t that time to go and educate yourself or to improve. As an organisation, we (the FA) have to get better at communicating. It’s easy to criticise the FA because it’s such a vast organisation, but I firmly believe there’s lots of good ideas and we have got to make sure we put those good ideas into play, because we are the custodians of the game for the whole country.

I concluded the interview by asking Gareth what has made the biggest impact on him during the roadshow events so far?

A common theme so far has been the problems that parents create. We have a pretty good set-up but you still hear things which are not helping children develop, not helping their self-confidence, their ability to learn; and we must help get that message across. I’m talking about having a pre-season meeting where you get all the parents together and explain the philosophy of the club. I’ve been to parts of the country where they have asked parents to leave if their approach is wrong. Everyone immediately assumes I mean their approach to referees – more importantly it’s their approach to their own children. I’m not surprised that has been a common theme, but I’m concerned by it and it’s something we have got to focus on.

Gareth Southgate on the importance of communicating The FA's ideas.

I think one of the fair criticisms of the FA in the past is that people have not been consulted enough about what’s going on. I don’t think it would be right for us to sit down at Wembley, make a load of decisions, implement them, and not explain them to people. I think the more we do that, the fewer misconceptions there will be. I think when we talk about not having league tables, for example, everybody thinks ‘non-competitive sport – that’s disastrous’. Before as a parent I would have been concerned, but we’re not just talking about throwing beanbags into a hoop here, and no winners and losers. There is a difference, kids want to win – put a ball down and kids want to win that game. Where it puts them in the league, they don’t know. We do, as parents, because we are trained to think that way. People in every part of the country will have great ideas and we have to be taking those ideas on board, and explaining the vision – explaining that it’s not just something we have dreamed up, it’s something which is based on a lot of research, not just here but across Europe. If you are going to lead anything, you have got to bring people with you. Not everybody is going to agree with everything, we will get times when some people will be slightly unhappy with something, but if you look back at when Mini Soccer was introduced – well, I think everybody would agree now that has been a great thing. The process of how we got there people might disagree with, and so it’s important people get the opportunity to say how they feel. But once they see the reason, a lot of it is just commonsense. I honestly think there is a mood for change, and that’s countrywide – not just pockets – and the word is spreading quickly. I’m on Twitter and when you put messages out, there’s a lot of reaction from coaches or Dads, and the same messages keep coming back – we got to 11 v 11 too early, we’ve got to control parents, we’ve got to develop coaches – we’ve just got to get on and do it, but not before we’ve heard.

As an added bonus, here's Gareth's speech which opened the 'Your Game Your Say' event:

I’m not a fan of titles but I wanted to talk about my role. Because of the way things went in South Africa, it highlighted lots of issue that many of us across the country felt needed addressing. The Youth Development Review has 25 recommendations, and that covers the development of youth football, coach education – including the development of St George’s Park – some work with the Premier League on the reclassification of their academies, and work with the international junior teams, from under-16s to under-21s. The recommendations of that Review form my role. I think when I initially walked in, lots of the Press thought ‘well, the main area is going to be liaising with professional clubs’. People thought because I had managed, it would be about trying to get Jack Wilshere to play for the under-21s in the summer. My love of football is much more than that. When I was younger I coached PE at a school for while when I was playing. I had involvement with the Football Foundation in terms of being an ambassador for them, so I was very up to speed with the difficulty in getting facilities for junior and senior football. I am also a parent, my son is seven years old, he’s playing at a Charter Standard club. So when I came into the FA and saw the recommendations which were in place, it was something that perhaps I hadn’t thought as clearly about until I actually came in. But I could see the impact of all the things which were being discussed. I love giving young people opportunities, I worked very closely with the academy at Middlesbrough, through my coaching badges coached a lot of the kids who came through, and we had a philosophy that we wanted to give young people a chance. I also work with the Prince’s Trust and this is very much what I believe in. So this role - being able to help young people and working in football – is a dream for me. One of the reasons for the Roadshow, and why I am here, is that I don’t think it is right we stand at Wembley as The FA, and just tell people we are going to make a decision and don’t go out to consult people. The more we can explain some of the ideas which are being recommended, the better. I think there is a desire right across the country – from coaches, Dads and kids - that there is some change. We all see how football is played in other countries on TV, and the questions are being asked again and again, ‘why can’t we develop kids with those skills?’ ‘Why aren’t we as technically gifted as some of the other countries across Europe and in South America?’ There are two parts to what we are trying to do. One, which is part of my role, is to develop elite players who will one day go on and play for our country and make us a success at the highest international level. But just as importantly for me, is that everybody in my son’s team gets the same amount of playing time, that they enjoy their football, that we understand what children want from football, how they learn and how we can effect that as parents, as coaches, as administrators of the game. I’ve been very impressed with the reaction we have had. I understand there will be concerns about certain wording, or certain ideas that are in place – but I think that’s healthy, we should have that debate. Everyone should have an input because we are talking about the future of the country, across all the regions, and our children.

(Full Transcript generously provided by Simon Lansley of ConnectSport) --- UPDATE 3 --- The roadshow is called "Your Kids Your Say" so I don't know why I said "Your Game Your Say" throughout the podcast. Obviously I need to take a more child-centric approach to podcasting!

Pavl Interviewed On Grassroots Footy Coach

Pavl Williams — Tue, 15 Mar 2011 20:49:16 +0000

Head over to Grassroots Footy Coach to read an interview with Better Football editor Pavl Williams:

Most Embarrassing Moment
I was delivering a session which was supposed to demonstrate the advantages of our training style to a group of assembled grassroots coaches. But I was so wrapped up in the explanation to the coaches that I completely forgot to pass in the extra balls which were required. So whilst I pontificated about the extra number of touches players would be getting, they were - as I turned around and realised to my horror - just a huge pack chasing a single ball around the area.

You can read the full interview here →

Practice Makes Perfect – But What Are We Practicing?

Pavl Williams — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 20:43:30 +0000

In my latest article for FourFourTwo Performance I discuss the importance of meeting player's expectations in coaching sessions and the benefits of using small-sided games to achieve this.

As a coach I often ask what is it that children expect when they come to football practice? On a more fundamental level I ask what is it that children think football is? I'm sure for many children football is waiting in a line to kick a ball at an adult. At least that is the impression I get when I see a lot of the practices coaches prepare for their players.

You can read the full article on FourFourTwo Performance here →