Patcham United FC

On Saturday 29^th January, Adam Kipling and Steve Phythian facilitated the most recent of the Patcham United Coaching Community sessions.

There were 8 coaches in attendance overall, including 4 coaches who hadn’t been able to attend the previous session in November 2010.

Steve’s introduction again emphasised that these sessions were not intended to replace FA coaching courses but more that they had been instigated to provide an opportunity for Patcham’s coaches to get together and to provide each other with support.

The main crux of the session was to provide some ideas around the actual organisation and planning of coaching sessions rather than being specifically about the technical content of a session.

Steve introduced the STEPS principle (see attached document) which provides a series of considerations when planning a session. Consideration should be around Size/Shape of area used, Task/Time – type of and time spent on a task to challenge players, using different types of Equipment, introducing more or fewer Players (People) in order to create problems to be solved and to ensure that the Safety of the session is properly managed.

Outside, Steve asked the players to set out a grid using a total of 16 marker cones to create a “Magic Rectangle” (see attached document) This is a structure that can be used to progress a group from warm up, through technical to skill practice and small sided game with the need to move ONLY (if necessary) 4 marker cones. This means more practice time utilised in play and less boredom for the players whilst the coach re-organises the set up.

The structure can be adapted for any age group and can be used either in open space or adapted for use in a small gym or church hall, for instance.

Whilst the “Magic Rectangle” is one structure, the principle is to try to plan your session to move smoothly from one activity to the other whilst maximising practice time by setting out your structure so that it needs little or no re-organisation.

Adam then worked on a practical session including a warm up and small sided game during which we used a small American Football (different type of Equipment) to play a form of handball in order to work on players’ understanding of space, movement and combination play. The practice then progressed to having a football so that players can now appreciate the same challenges in the game but with the added technical difficulty of propelling the ball only with the feet (Task).

We finished up with a cup of tea and a biscuit (be rude not to!) and an offer to address any specific requests for next time.

Please contact Adam or Steve via e-mail if you would like a session or discussion on any particular topic. If we haven’t any experience of whatever it is, we’ll research it for you.

Watch out for updates on the next session.

Please add any comments or thoughts below.

STEPS Principle

The Magic Rectangle by Bert-Jan Heijmans – Dutch coach

Attached below is an article about Team Talks I downloaded from Coaching Edge, the magazine of SportsCoach UK.

I hope you find it interesting

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At Horsdean last Saturday, 27th November a total of 11 coaches gathered to exchange ideas and thoughts on this first session aimed at sharing ideas for the benefit of Patcham United as a whole.

Adam Kipling had prepared an easy introduction to make everyone feel comfortable and we had a chat and some tea and biscuits before heading out to the field with balls bibs and cones.

Adam explained that we wanted to share experiencees and ideas rather than be seen to try to dictate an approach as to how coaches worked with their teams.

Adam outlined that this was not intended to replace FA courses, the contents of which are first class but, acknowledging the cost implications and the fact that that not everyone has the available time, Adam said he hoped these sessions would help us all to better serve Patcham United FC.

We had a brief introduction to the FAs Long Term Player Development “Four Corner” Model and outlined how that fitted in with practice / training sessions as well as games. We talked about the importance of players making decisions.

Outside we went through:

• Practical warm up using a ball
• Technical to skill practice
• Small Sided Game using the same ‘theme’ contained in the warm up and skill practice
• It was suggested how to find “challenges” for players
• The benefits of catching, and highlighting, players doing something well rather than necessarily correcting errors
• Encouraging players to use their ”Other” foot as well as their ”favourite” foot
• Finally, the benefits of players enjoying playing some form of game (which the coaches enjoyed too) and maximising use of available time was highlighted.

Those present seemed to enjoy the session and Adam and I plan to hold another one soon. If you have any topics you would like us to investigate, let either or both Adam and I know and we can include it in our next session.

If you attended last Saturday and found it of benefit, please feel free to share your thoughts below.

New set of notes on the Youth Award Module 3 course have been added to the Youth Awards post below – check it out or, if this is the first time you have been on, check out the whole set.

In the attached article John Allpress, FA National Player Development Coach (7-16,) investigates the idea of ‘creating’ match instincts through the use of game related practice.

In effect this is not just about letting players at practice “have a game” but is about taking a constructive approach to creating practices that replicate a specific ‘problem’ that arises in a game and giving the players lots of ‘goes’ at solving it.

The coach supports (scaffolds) the understanding and increasing knowledge of the player by asking open and probing questions to test imagination, appreciation of perhaps more than one solution and what the player thinks. If the player is unsure, then the coach can provide clues (initially) and only if all avenues have been explored should an ‘answer’ (one option, maybe) need to be provided by the coach. You’ll be surprised at how much even young players know and, even if they don’t know, how much they can work out if they are given thinking time and are encouraged by the coach and the “games” they set up.

“In football, the same thing never happens twice – but SIMILAR things happen LOTS of times” –  (Can’t recall who said that – maybe National Coach Paul Holder)

Hope you enjoy this article taken from FACA Live which you can get access to if you are a member of the FA Coaches Association

Match Instinct