One of the finest football books of recent years is Simon Hughes’ Secret Diary of a Liverpool Scout. It tells the story of Geoff Twentyman who was Liverpool’s Chief Scout between 1967 and 1985, an era that was marked by the club’s unprecedented success built largely on an exceptional ability to identify talent. What marks this book out is how it was written. Rather than being based on the recollections of Twentyman himself (sadly, he passed away way before work on this book had started) it uses the meticulous notes that he used to take during every one of his scouting trips. This was an extension of the practise within Liverpool’s fabled boot room of noting down different aspects of their work from training, recovery and tactical approaches in varying situations. These dossiers eventually became the reference point whenever the club was faced with similar situations allowing them the luxury to judge whether to take a similar approach or not. Bill Shankly took over at Liverpool in 1959 and the boot room was established shortly afterwards. It is testament of how visionary that group of people was that the practices that they adopted are still as effective today as they were more than fifty years back. Essentially: every coach should be journaling regularly, documenting decisions taken and the reasoning behind them. Never Trust Your Memory To appreciate why that is there is the need to move away from sport and into the realm of psychology. People act in the manner that they do because over the years their behaviour has been shaped by their own experiences. The problem, though, is that those experiences and memories might not include all the details; they might be inherently biased. There will be occasions when a positive result influences one’s recall of a choice or vice-versa. Imagine if someone were to ask you to think back to a time when you missed the train and describe your experience. The odds are that you will recall a negative experience. This will also contaminate any future thoughts that you have and, if that same person were to ask you to imagine how you would feel the next time you missed the train then the likelihood is that you would predict a bad reaction.
All this is not conjecture but precisely what Dr Carey Morewedge and his colleagues from Harvard University found in 2005. During their study they asked a set of people to recall the last experience of missing the train, another to recall their worst experience and another to think back three past experience. Their findings showed that those who had been given free reign to think of one experience made the most negative prediction. Further studies strengthened this theory that people tend to make overly positive or negative predictions if they were to rely exclusively on their memory: they fall prey to their memory bias. This, clearly, has a number of implications in a football environment. Let’s say that your team was thinking of bringing over a new player who has a particular character trait that might cause issues in the harmony of your squad. If you’ve just come from a good season then you might be swayed into thinking that this too will work out well and that you’ll manage to integrate that player. That might well turn out to be the case but, regardless, that decision was not made on the right basis. Awareness is key to overcome any bias. In such a circumstance, if a manager has records of previous transfers and thoughts before they were completed then he might notice instances that might be similar to his current situation. Reading them and thinking of how they turned out would probably allow them to make a better informed decision. It makes it harder to justify a certain decision when you have a divergent piece of evidence in front of you. Accurate And Honest Feedback Michael J. Mauboussin is an unikely source to find inspiration for football coaches. He has no history with the game (as far as is public knowledge at least); he is instead the managing director and head of Global Financial Strategies at Credit Suisse and an adjunct professor of finance at the Columbia Business School.
He has, however, also authored a number of books that look into decision making. And it is the research that he has put into the latter that is influential In an interview with The Motley Fool, he said, “when you’ve got a decision-making journal, it gives you accurate and honest feedback of what you were thinking at that time. And so there can be situations, by the way, you buy a stock and it goes up, but it goes up for reasons very different than what you thought was going to happen. And having that feedback in a way to almost check yourself periodically is extremely valuable. So that’s, I think, a very inexpensive; it’s actually not super time consuming, but a very, very valuable way of giving yourself essential feedback because our minds won’t do it normally.” There might not be many parallels between those investing in stock markets and people who work in football but both have one feature in common: there are strong emotions in play which might lead one to make terrible moves unless they are fully conscious and aware of what they’re doing. That is why Mauboussin argues over the importance of noting decisions. It is a philosophy based on a discussion with Daniel Kahneman, one of the most brilliant men of our lifetime and who gave birth to the new science of behavioural economics. In particular, Kahneman’s work helped to bring to light a number of biases that influence people’s actions.
“Many years ago when I first met Danny Kahneman…when I pose him the question, what is a single thing an investor can do to improve his or her performance, he said almost without hesitation, go down to a local drugstore and buy a very cheap notebook and start keeping track of your decisions.” Mauboussin said in that same interview. “And the specific idea is whenever you’re making a consequential decision, something going in or out of the portfolio, just take a moment to think, write down what you expect to happen, why you expect it to happen and then actually, and this is optional, but probably a great idea, is write down how you feel about the situation, both physically and even emotionally. Just, how do you feel? I feel tired. I feel good, or this stock is really draining me. Whatever you think.” “The key to doing this is that it prevents something called hindsight bias, which is no matter what happens in the world. We tend to look back on our decision-making process, and we tilt it in a way that looks more favourable to us, right? So we have a bias to explain what has happened.” Do It Yourself While football is a simple game, the decisions made by those who coach or run a club are often extremely complex. Often managers’ reactions during games are quasi-instinctive and heavily influenced not by rational thought but by past actions. Unraveling why a decision was taken can be just as complex.
Writing is a way of facilitating that process. The simple act of forcing yourself to put thoughts into words actually helps in giving them clarity and shape. The journal that a coach maintains does not have to be a work of art. To all extent and purposes it can be illegible to anyone but the person who wrote it. There is no need for any jargon or deep, insightful thoughts. Don’t feel under pressure to write something that is great, just write you’re your thoughts. What there should be a modicum of organisation (so that when you want to look back to a particular decision you can find it with ease) along with clear, direct writing that avoids any vague thoughts. Initially it might feel like an unnatural act, it can feel like pretentious rubbish. Push past that resistance and eventually, after a few weeks you will come to appreciate just how important a tool this can be for a coach. After all, if it was good enough for the likes of Bill Shankly and Bob Paisley, it should be good enough for the rest of us. Enjoyed this? Want more? Sign up to Blueprint for Football Extra and as a free bonus you'll get a copy of our exclusive e-book Blueprint According To...Volume 3 that features interviews with six football coaches on how they go about their building their knowledge.
When Ajax lifted the Champions League trophy in 1995 it was hardly a surprise. Their previous successes in the competition marked them out as European royalty even though over twenty years had passed since they had last triumphed in the competition. What’s more, it was perfectly natural for a club coming from a weaker league to win. In the ten years prior to Ajax’s success there had been winners coming from Romania (Steaua Bucharest), Portugal (Porto), Holland (PSV Eindhoven) and Yugoslavia (Red Star Belgrade). Such successes had become somewhat commonplace. What made Ajax’s victory all the more remarkable is that it came with a team built around individuals who had progressed through the club’s youth system. Six out of the starting eleven had been at the club since they were children whilst the scorer of the wining goal – second half substitute Patrick Kluivert – was also an academy graduate. Twelve months later Ajax were back in the final but this time missed out in a penalty shootout with Juventus. It was to be one of the final hurrahs of the smaller clubs. Since then the Champions League has practically always been the domain of Spanish, German, English and Italian clubs. Only once – 2004 with Porto - has it gone to teams not from one of those four countries and that was a freak year where the other finalist was also from a non-elite country (AS Monaco).
Indeed, if you were to exclude that 2003-2004 edition, there hasn’t even been a finalist that wasn’t from one of the top four countries. That is a situation which is unlikely to change. Football has moved on and the free market forces in which the game operates has driven competition out. Three European leagues in particular dominate earnings – England, Spain and Germany – and they can attract the best players. More significantly they can strip others of their best talent making it all the more difficult from anyone outside this elite to break in. Money, however, explains only part of it. Spanish and Italian clubs were, historically, much more financially powerful than others and always tended to attract the most exciting of players. Yet they never dominated the European Cup in such a manner. Indeed the defining change for European football came in December of 1995 – the same year in which Ajax had claimed their title – and happened far away from any football pitch. The leading figure in this revolution was an unknown Belgian footballer who had brought a case in front of the European Court of Justice. That is when the Bosman ruling was passed. Ajax were one of the first to suffer from this ruling and also one of the clubs to suffer most severely. Within months the core of their young side was ripped out as three of their brightest talents – Patrick Kluivert, Clarence Seedorf and Edgar Davids – all moved to Italy on a free. They were the kind of players on whom Ajax would otherwise have expected to found a dynasty and had they stayed then the likelihood is that they would have won even more European titles.
Even if they had been sold they would have earned Ajax enough money to effectively rebuild their team. After all these were players who would go on to be among the best of their generation. Instead, they got nothing. In time, clubs learned to adapt yet that meant a certain degree of self-immolation. Players were given longer contracts which meant a bigger commitment for clubs who were not necessarily always in a position to afford it. The risk was that these players wouldn’t turn out to be as good as had been hoped and end up being a drain on the club’s resources. Yet that was a risk that clubs became used to. So much that now as soon as a players starts showing signs of fulfilling his potential then he’s immediately handed a new and better contract. As soon as that doesn’t get signed or a players starts getting closer to the end of his contract then the alarm bells start ringing. Often the end result is the same with the player getting sold at a fraction of his market value. Some money is better than no money. Everyone knows that, including the players, their agents and the clubs who are interested in them. This makes it almost impossible for a club to slowly build a squad that is good enough to challenge. Unless someone ultra-rich comes in – as is happening with Paris St German – then it is virtually impossible to build. Even a relatively big club like Borussia Dortmund is struggling. In 2013 they reached the Champions League final yet saw their biggest domestic rival take away two of their best talents – Mario Gotze and Robert Lewandowski - for what is a pittance. Although Dortmund have invested wisely it is still getting increasingly more difficult for them to challenge both domestically and continentally. From one extreme the pendulum of power has shifted to another. Where once clubs used to be in a dominant position now it is the players who are in control. This is the legacy of the Bosman ruling.
That should not excuse the practices that clubs used to adopt – such as the one that forced Jean Marc Bosman to start his fight – nor should it blind anyone to the reality that clubs still show no sentimentality towards any player that is no longer considered as needed. Supporters aren’t much better, often calling for a player to be sold as soon as he starts to show any signs of decline or claiming that they should be ‘left to rot’ should any player indicate that perhaps they might want to move to a bigger club. It is only right that players should try to do what is best for their career. That is what most people do in their day-to-day lives; looking for a better job when they realise that they have enough experience or knowledge to do so. What is different, however, is that players don’t work for a corporate institution but rather an entity that towards which thousands devote their thoughts, hopes and passion. The Bosman Ruling stripped that element from the equation. It gave players the liberty to take charge of their career and forced clubs to look at their players as assets to be managed as such; allowing them to accumulate value to be disposed when this hits its peak. It is the Bosman Ruling that helped pave the way for the creation of the current environment where the financially strong are those who hold all the power. There is still the possibility that a smaller club with a particularly intelligent recruitment policy can manage to achieve success – see Leicester last season – but that possibility is becoming increasingly slimmer. The reality is that unless all the stars happen to align there is no way for such a club to slowly progress until it is in a position to force its way into a challenging position. If you enjoyed this article subscribe to Blueprint for Football Extra, an e-mail newsletter where you receive weekly links to other great articles, exclusive content and previews to all our interviews. Join here.
“I like to dream,” a veteran football administrator told me in one of the first interviews that I did. “But I know that if I stretch too much I will hurt myself.” Reverential as I was to wisdom built on years of working in the game, this seemed to me like quite a sensible stance. Only years later, when I had supplemented it with some experience of my own, did I come to see that the sensible option might also be the one that leads to lethargy and insignificance. The human brain is built to identify patterns and react to them accordingly. That is how it was at the beginning of humanity. Eat a particular fruit and you will survive; ignore the rustling of leaves in the forest and a deadly animal will jump on you. Those who were better skilled at identifying and following those patterns survived. They passed their genes on to their children until humanity as a whole was wired to follow those patterns. Our brain is still essentially the same. That is why most of us value the familiar and dislike change. We look for patterns and, when we don’t find them, our brains start to panic because they cannot predict what the outcome will be. It is why we feel discomfort when we’re faced with change. The thing is that our brains were shaped in extreme times where not being cautious could result in death (and a painful one). It still reacts to what isn’t familiar in the same manner. And whilst, sometimes, the sensible option is the best one there are also circumstances where change is beneficial. Football provides plenty of examples of this. When Liverpool opted to replace Graeme Souness in the early nineties they decided to pick Roy Evans in his place. Evans was an excellent coach who tried to innovate in his own right – he opted for a formation with three at the back to capitalise on his team’s attacking talent – but his main qualification for getting the job was his history at the club and as a member of the fabled boot room. If promoting from within had worked in the past why shouldn’t it now? Yet the face of English football was changing. Arsene Wenger was bringing with him dietary regimes that were unheard of at other clubs whilst Chelsea were investing their new-found wealth in foreign players. Liverpool needed to be brave and embrace the change but instead went all conservative. There are many factors that contributed to the club’s decline and it would be grossly unfair (not to mention hugely incorrect) to pin it all on the appointment of Roy Evans. But the appointment was emblematic of a mindset that wasn’t ready to deal with change. This in itself was hardly surprising. For the previous two decades, Liverpool had been the dominant force of English football so they had more to lose than most. It is fairly easy to be brave and experiment when there is little at stake but that is often not the case with the successful. Even if there is an element within those organisations that fully believes in looking at different ideas, it is extremely hard to convince others to get on board. Liverpool had, essentially, forgotten the lessons from their own history because their longevity was fuelled by change and their ability to pull it off at the right moment. Big players left and were replaced by others who didn’t have the same characteristics but, in their own way, shaped the team so that it continued to be successful. Crucially, Liverpool’s managers were always willing to push along this change. They didn’t get sentimental with players: when they felt that someone was getting to a stage where he wasn’t good enough, they were quite ruthless in selling them. However, they always had a plan in place so that when that player left they already had a replacement who pretty much knew what he had to do even if it meant tweaking other areas. And so change came about without impacting the team. It was the same with another of English football’s most successful managers. Sir Alex Ferguson kept on winning partly because he had the vision to foresee changes in the game and prepare for them. It wasn’t simply tactical brilliance that shaped his success but rather his ability to see the bigger picture, identify what was going to be a problem and then prepare so that his side effectively improved. Even Barcelona’s modern success is founded on change: when Pep Guardiola took over he faced down the huge risk of moving on some players who had been huge for the club – the likes of Ronaldinho and Deco – because that is how his side could really develop. What does this all mean for coaches who aren’t at a big Premier League club and are doing this purely for their love of the game? Essentially that change should be embraced. Change can be uncomfortable but if you try to put it off then what you’re doing is undermining your capacity for success. Look out for what might be changing, prepare for it to make the transition as easy as possible and then carry it out. Some words of caution though: change for change’s sake can be just as bad (to continue on the Liverpool case study: Graeme Souness tried to change too much, too soon) so always be aware of why you’re doing all this. And be ready to fail. Not everything will work out smoothly. But it will be the instances where they do that will define you.
Football is traditionally slow in adopting new technologies. Analysts are still looked at with suspicion (at best) by those who believe that the only way to judge a game is by looking at what you can see on the pitch rather than at what the numbers say. It took years for goal line technologies to be introduced even though their benefit – as we’re seeing now – was obvious. And, despite this, there are still those vehemently against the idea of introducing any new technological support for referees. The same applies on the coaching side. The idea of having proper nutrition took years to take hold. The irony is that other sports where resources and popularity are more limited than football are much more forward in their adoption of technology. Australian Rules Football is a very prominent case in point. This sport that to outsiders might appear one where brawn is the only pre-requisite is also one of the earliest adopters. Global Positioning Systems (GPS), for instance, has been in use in Aussie Rules for more than a decade. So integrated is their used in AFL that in 2012 it was extended to measure activity in junior football. “The key thing about this study is that it is the first time we have ever gathered information like this on kids playing football and the first time we’ve been able to quantify how our kids are experiencing sport. The study is unique and groundbreaking in that we’re getting real data about what kids do when they’re involved in junior football.” So said at the time Associate Professor Pamm Kellett who was handling the research aimed at measuring player’s activity during games as well as how long they were on the field, the amount of exertion used and how fast they were running. Football is a completely different world. At around the same time that AFL was being involved in that forward looking experiment, football was just dipping its feet into the pool. The pioneer was David Casamichana, a Spanish coach involved with Rayo Cantabria de Santander (a semi-professional Spanish third-division team) monitoring their GPS use during training and friendly games; at the time FIFA banned their use in official games (the ban was only lifted towards the end of 2015).
Despite the limitations of the technology at the time – the GPS that he had available tracked movement every second meaning that movement that took place in a fraction of that was not measured – Casamichana’s worked proved the value of this tool. It allowed teams to measure just how much their players ran, how often they were involved in sprints (thanks to an accelerometer) and, ultimately their fatigue.
Based on this he found that centre backs and centre forwards are the ones that run the least distance. Contrary to that, midfielders run most but they cover least distances in sprint. When they do sprint, however, they top the table for high intensity. On top of it all, his studies found that as games wear on the intensity begins to decline. All of that might seem obvious but that is because it discounts the finer level of detail that can be obtained through GPS. Not all midfielders play the same role within the team meaning that not all have the same characteristics. Having that data at hand provides another tool that coaches can use to fine tune their side. It also helps improve the quality of training. If you know the characteristics of different positions than you can provide different preparation. Having access to such data allows you to view the session as a whole rather than just one sprint whilst it provides you with historical baselines with which to compare a group of players or an individual coming back from injury. Indeed this data can be used to help prevent further athletic injury given that it is possible to gauge when an individual is getting close to his limit that provides you with the ability to stop them before they hurt themselves. All such knowledge can be used to improve the intensity that a team can show during a game. A team’s ability to keep on going during a match for longer than their opponents can provide a significant advantage. And the future will see even more extended use of GPS, in particular during games.
In an article late in 2015, Wycombe midfielder Matt Bloomfield explained the benefits that he saw from GPS. “Every footballer is different and some of the lads pay more attention to the information given to us than others.” “Some lads are really interested in the feedback and check their stats first thing every Monday morning, while some aren't so interested and will only deal with the stats when told to. And then there are the lads who pretend not to care but still check when no-one is looking!” “I'm fascinated by it all so I'm always asking for feedback and information about what I should be able to do and how far I should be running. It's all part of the competitive edge needed to build a career for yourself.” “I'm sure that the technological advances will continue and I will always embrace them while always trying to gain that edge.” Sadly, not everyone is like Boomfield. Indeed, Plymouth manager Derek Adams complained when Wycombe used those devices in a game between the two sides. "Somebody could head it and injure themselves, or somebody's finger could get caught in it,” he said. "There are a number of things that can go wrong. Somebody could get choked if they are pulled too hard.” Admittedly, Adams also said that what he wanted was clarification and it would be wrong to label him because of this one incident. Yet such thinking is, sadly prevalent among the football fraternity.
By Nicholas Baldacchino I have followed the English football team since I was a young boy. I fell in love with the Italia 90 team and was ecstatic during the wonderful performances of Euro 96 on home soil; I also endured Euro 92 and missing out on the World Cup in the USA. These tournaments were, in my opinion, the major high points and upsets for this great nation during the past 35 years. All the other major tournaments were all a reflection of a very hectic campaign which always saw the England team players very tired and showing no true cohesion and fight within them; not to say that the team was based around 2 or 3 star players and the other components were under par. Euro 2016, for different reasons, has left me very perplexed at how a manager with so much experience in professional football and who has also managed in continental Europe did so poorly with a talented team which most certainly should have done much more. It is not nice to criticise a fellow coach and I do not want to do this as it is surely a very difficult task managing any team and football is a simple game but very complex as everyone sees things differently and has different opinions on every aspect of the beautiful game. What I shall do is ask a number of questions and give my view on how things seem to run in the best way and maybe I can get some answers from someone. First of all, when you take a job there must be a cohesive and comprehensive plan which is both short-term and also long term. Each and every coach is identified through his style and how he is able to convey his style through his team of players which he assembles in order to engineer his game plan. This is not such a straight forward task with a national team as the man in charge has an identified group of players which he needs to mould into a winning team, at club level the manager can identify particular players which may fit into his style to work with. Everyone talks about different systems of play; 4-4-2, 3-4-3, 4-2-3-1, etc.... but the system is only a tool which is used to express your style of play and should facilitate your team depending on the type of players you have. In this respect, which style of play did Mr Hodgson intend to stamp on the English National team? As I take it, during the 3 major tournaments England played in with Hodgson at the helm I saw a very compact and defensive team during Euro 2012 which tried to counter, during the World Cup in Brazil a very offensive team which tried to keep the ball as much as possible and during Euro 2016..... it is still a mystery till this day. Let us take Antonio Conte’s Italy team as an example; Mr. Conte was appointed National team coach by the Italian Football Federation due to his style of play and his tactical prowess. The Federation had a clear picture of the material available and appointed Antonio as he had shown that he could mould a winning group with these players. He focused on a very solid style of play which has at its centre compactness and organisation and mixed it with the inventiveness and the strength and speed in his forward line. Did Mr. Conte do anything different throughout his tenure? No, he set up his team worked hard through qualifying and did not change for anyone or anything even when his team seemed to be under par. Did he change the players he worked with and believed in throughout the qualifiers? Neither because he had a plan and he stuck to it leading to a clear success despite the elimination at the hand of Germany. This is the same for the German National team and their great manager Mr. Joachim Lowe. Although some of his stalwarts have grown older and are not on the same level of many younger players who are establishing themselves in the Bundesliga, he has decided to keep faith with them and his style of play. The likes of Bastian Schweinsteiger and Lukas Podolski still are an integral part to his team even though they have had abject and injury prone seasons lately and this shows that planning on the long run and believing in your players can reap benefits. With this in mind I go to the next question to Mr. Hodgson: why did you decide to make such radical changes to the Squad you took to the Euros as you were able to qualify through the group stages with a defined nucleus of players? Players like Dier, Alli, Vardy and Kane all had a great season and should have been in the England Squad but not at the expense of not playing in the same balanced way the team was set up through qualifiers. England qualified with ten wins out of ten with 31 goals in favour and 3 against which is a pretty good result. The set up of the team was formed through a strong back line which included Clyne at right back, a good number of different left backs and Cahill together with either Jagielka or Smalling at Centre back, three in midfield with Henderson at the heart of midfield and the likes of Wilshere, Milner and Delph creating the much needed cover and balance, the captain Rooney up front and a number of quick and talented forwards working around him; Sterling, Oxlade Chamberlain, Sturridge, Walcott and Andros Townsend, to name a few. With a style which was a possession game attacking through the flanks and with combinations through the middle England looked the real deal through qualifying and had a very good balance in the middle of the park allowing the team to defend well and concede only 3 goals in 10 matches. What happened during Euro 2016 is bewildering and I would truly like someone to give me a reasonable explanation to the changes made before such an important tournament. Why was the midfield and defence torn apart to make way to players who had limited involvement previously? Was this pressure from the media? How can one expect a midfield with Dier taking the role of the additional defender he truly is and players like Alli and Rooney being the two midfield maestros. Rooney as a midfielder getting the ball from the defenders? Oh my! Who decided that? What style was the team based on and what were the movements the players had practiced and worked on? Could anyone identify any coaching in the team? And most important of all what was the game plan and did the England team have a plan B? All I noticed was that when England were either loosing or couldn’t break down the opposition substitutions took place to put more strikers on and pray that something just happened! Is it just me who could see these things or am I still to learn some special traits in the simple game of football which I need to discover through magical sources? Another thing which is bewildering and elusive to me and many other is the work done on set pieces. I cannot understand how one of the most dangerous players in and around the box was given the responsibility to take free kicks and corners. How does this even make sense? And to top it up how does a manager which should be the leader and a person of strong character and one who should be able to take prompt and effective decisions not be able to take crucial decisions like leaving players who have not performed out of the team. With all due respect, playing Kane and Sterling and not omitting Hart shows a lack of true leadership and decision making which is the main aspect of football today on and off the pitch. I augur that the FA does not make a shambles of the upcoming managerial appointment as the present and future bauds well as the talent necessary to perform is in place. The next England Manager needs to be a strong character that has a strategy and is able to lead a group of players who he believes in and who believe in him. No more excuses just smarter decisions. Hope Mr. Hodgson has the time to give us some type of explanation on his decisions prior to and throughout the tournament. He was bright enough to prepare his resignation letter prior to the Iceland match and surely did the same by preparing an explanation to all these questions that I have raised! Nicholas Baldacchino is a UEFA A Coach and Director of Youth Coaching qualification, currently Head of Coaching and Development at Valletta FC's Youth Development Sector.
When Tottenham told Kevin Stewart that they weren’t going to offer him a contract, that could very well have been that. Although Stewart had done well at Spurs, at Crewe Alexandra (where he had spent a month on loan) and Sheffield United (where he spent some time on a trial) many had enjoyed similar starts to their career only to find it impossible to earn a way back into the professional game once their time at an academy came to a close. The big difference for Stewart was that he had come across a coach who felt that there was more to him. Alex Inglethorpe had seen him progress through the ranks at Spurs and clearly felt that his former side had made a mistake in letting him go. Recently appointed the head of Liverpool’s academy, Inglethorpe quickly stepped in to offer Stewart a contract. Eighteen months down the line, Stewart was making his Premier League debut for Liverpool after impressing in a couple of cup outings. His progress was rewarded with a new four year contract and, irrespective of what happens to him at Liverpool, he’s made enough of a name for himself that there will always be someone willing to take a chance on him. There is no doubt that Stewart has worked hard in order to get to this position. He’s held strong to his self-belief despite not always finding the faith of the managers of clubs where he went on loan and at the same time invested time in improving his game as he made the transition from defence to midfield. His strength of character played a big role for him. Yet it is also fair to wonder what might have happened if Inglethorpe hadn’t happened to believe so highly. Stewart might well have made a career out of the game yet, given how he seemed to be struggling to get game time at Swindon whilst on loan earlier in the season, there’s every reason to believe that he might have struggled a fair bit to cut out some space for himself. It all highlights the important role that a coach plays in the life of his players; how he should always fight for the players he believes are worth it. Not everyone has Inglethorpe’s wherewithal to take a player to a Premier League club but that’s not the only route open to a coach. Even talking to other clubs’ coaches and convincing them that a player is worth an opportunity might play a big role in a players’ career. It is also worth wondering how many players end up being lost to the game simply because they don’t find anyone who believes in them enough. It is an example that proves those who believe that talent always rises to the top are wrong. One only has to look at Harry Kane for an example of this. Kane had done well on loan but Spurs seemed reluctant to give him an opportunity. Then along came Tim Sherwood – a coach who had worked with him in the youth level – to give him the opportunity that he was looking for and that his talent needed in order to blossom. If Sherwood hadn’t come along then he might have ended up being sold off to a smaller side.
Stephen Fraser The first part of this series of articles on the academy system in Scotland discussed the issues and problems with the academy system in Scotland. In particular it focused on the environment which the system in Scotland creates and the challenges this brings to developing high level young footballers. It can be read here. The Club Academy Scotland system can be regarded as a highly pressurised, cut throat environment. Players are discarded by clubs left, right and centre with limited opportunity to develop and fulfill their potential. We need to provide kids with a more developmentally focused environment which is conducive to unlocking potential. In reality, it is very difficult to progress to become a professional footballer. Rather than focusing solely on developing football players, we should look to develop all-round athletes that can transfer to other sports and can be good citizens. In the long run a system such as this will provide a bigger pool of all-round athletes, which will make better use of our small population. This is in direct contrast to the all or nothing scenario which exists in football at present. Players and parents become so focused on their kids making it as a professional footballer. This can be regarded as counter-productive to development. We would develop players of a higher level if we produced an inclusive, developmental environment which creates healthy, multi-functional athletes who are socially confident. This article will explore the potential solutions to the current problems which exist in the Scottish academy system.
Solution 1: Don’t Over coach Perhaps the biggest issue faced within the academies is the coaching methods used to develop players. Too many coaches speak for too long and do not allow opportunities for young players to develop through actually performing the necessary skills and techniques in scenarios and situations which occur in the game. Players are not afforded the freedom to make mistakes and to learn from them. Good coaching allows kids the freedom to play a variety of games where the constraints lead to different skills and techniques being developed. The game alone is not the teacher, as suggested by a number of people. The coach needs to guide the learner through observation, analysis, questioning and then providing corrections or alternatives. It is important players are exposed to game-like scenarios where they are building up their contextual knowledge and understanding.
More 1 vs 1 games, 2 vs 2 games, 2 vs 1 games, 3 vs 2 games, 3 vs 3 games, 4 vs 3 games and 4 vs 4 games with different outcomes are required to develop contextual knowledge. Repeated exposure to different scenarios leads to the brain acquiring a wealth of knowledge on how to produce solutions to different problems faced in a game. Solution 2: Not Just Football Kids should be encouraged to play a range of sports and take part in school sport. At present, many clubs ban their young players from it. We should be providing hundreds of sporting opportunities from school sport, to club sport, to specialist sessions where the children are allowed to lead their own games. Child-led sessions allow the players to develop ownership of their performance and progress. Clubs need to be more integrated into communities where there is cooperation with other sports. This would provide greater opportunities for children and young people to play a range of sports. This would ensure there is less chance of players burning out and allow us to produce more all-around athletes. We can have pro clubs work with other sports clubs and provide players the opportunity to take part in other sports rather than just go to football training 3 or 4 times a week. This will contribute to creating athletes with better agility, balance and co-ordination which can only help sports such as football when coaches are looking to develop sports specific skills and techniques. Solution 3: Winning Comes Later Games need to be seen as a development tool up until age of 16. Then you can teach about how to win games and more about game management. We have it the wrong way around at present. We teach players to win games without teaching basics which would increase the probability of actually winning games. There is too much focus on winning or simply not losing games. Coaches focus on team shape, tactics and set-pieces for a significant duration of training. Aspects such as set-pieces are irrelevant in the development of young footballers. They are team-orientated and focused around winning the actual game and not developing the young players. Time should not be wasted on telling players where to stand for a set-piece as often clubs have very little time to work with young players. Instead, time would be better spent focussing on developing player’s skill, game awareness and decision-making.
It is very evident how competitive the game becomes as soon as kids move to 11 aside football. We want to encourage kids to individually strive to win and do their best to improve but not emphasize team winning and scoreboard winning. That is not saying just participating is fine, it is saying we want kids to strive and seek to be the best they can be, get the better of their opponents and out think their opponents. Kids are naturally competitive so we don’t need to put pressure on them to not make mistakes to ensure their team do not lose. If you put a ball down and pick two teams the game will be naturally competitive, so we do not need adults shouting and screaming when kids fail to score a chance or let a goal in by making a mistake. Instead ask them what they could have done better to ensure every scenario and situation is used as a learning experience. That is where the skilled coach comes in- they are there to guide the players and they have the knowledge to guide players in the correct direction. Simply just leaving players to play without any guidance will not produce players. Solution 4: Teach Decision Making Skills It is important we focus on developing the correct tools required to produce intelligent and creative players as opposed to creating winning teams at under 14. Kids do not need to be taught how to play 4-3-3 or 4-3-2-1 formations. They need to be taught how to create space, how to angle for a pass, how to provide width, how to provide penetration, how to provide depth, how to time movements & runs, how to read opponents body shape & movements, how to close spaces to ensure they can’t be bypassed, how to make the correct decisions like when to pass-when to dribble- where to pass- where to dribble. Formations are tools used for adult teams to win games, they do not have any real relevance to developing players until they are older. If players are technically good, intelligent, make good decisions and are quick and athletic then they are more likely to win games. Rather than coaching a team how to play 4-4-2 or 4-3-3, we should be focusing on developing player’s brains to ensure they make good decisions, quickly and frequently. Formations are a starting point to balance out the space on the field and provide a bit of structure to a team. We do not need to coach players on the nuances of the 4-3-3 formation at a young age.
Solutions 5: Relaxed Approach Another potential solution may be controversial with some members of the footballing community. Over the years we have become so focused on creating teams at professional clubs starting from a very young age. This leads to early specialisation for many of the players where they only play football and have a very focused regime from a young age. This can lead to burnout very quickly and does not provide kids with the freedom to develop as kids. To counter this problem we could have training groups up until the age of 13 where players train a couple of times a week with a pro club but do not play competitive games. They can play friendly/festival games with the club but do not play in focused matches every single week. This would allow players to play with boys club and play a range of other sports throughout the week. This approach is less cut throat and more relaxed. They would still have plenty of access to games with friendlies and playing for boys clubs. Players can then be taught the necessary skills, techniques, decision-making and game understanding without being put in team shape and coaches coaching to win games as opposed to developing players. Pro coaches could also take sessions with boys clubs in their local community to ensure all kids are provided with access to good coaching, not just the ones that mature early or show early promise. Solution 6: Pay For Coaches It is time we treat coaching as a profession like any other and pay for full-time coaches to work with kids at young ages. Instead of spending thousands of pounds a week for mediocre professional players, pay a few thousand a year for a highly skilled, qualified and experienced coach to develop players. This in turn will make the club more sustainable and will provide a good product on park. It is feasible to get 2/3 players through to 1st team every year with the correct investment, correct environment and clubs providing more opportunities to young players. If we keep wages lower in general then clubs will not need to panic about being relegated and there would be less pressure on managers. This would create more stability at clubs and allow managers to gradually develop the club and the team.
At present, mediocre players are being paid unbelievable salaries compared to doctors, nurses and other normal jobs. It is a waste of money to pay vast salaries to players who are not top level. It can also de-motivate players and stop them from working as hard to improve and fulfil their potential. With lower salaries players may become more focused on reaching the next level and they would still be able to live very comfortable lives with lower salaries. Rather than paying players £40/50k a year, clubs could halve that amount to allow them to pay a full-time youth coach £20/25k a year. This would ensure clubs have more full-time professional coaches at the younger ages with the correct skills, experience and qualifications. Solutions 7: Age Suitable Game Formats At present the Scottish FA have adapted the format of the game to suit the age and development of players but this could be developed further. It is important we use incremental steps which fit in with way kids learn and the number of solutions and scenarios their brains can process. Moving to a full size pitch and playing 11 vs 11 too early can be detrimental to development. At present the SFA are suggesting kids play 4V4 up to under 8. This is a great step and exactly what should be used at very young ages. The next step in the development pathway sees players play 7v7 from 9-12 years of age. Rather than move straight to 7v7 we could let the kids play 5V5 at under 9, 6V6 at under 10 and then 7v7 for under 11 to under 13. This aligns better with child development and the way the brain and body develops. Moving too quickly to 11v11 and introducing too many variables too quickly can confuse players and can be overwhelming to some. This can cause a lack of creativity, as players are so confused with the amount of variables they cannot make a decision when in possession. The immediate reaction is to think of why it couldn’t or wouldn’t work in terms of pitches and logistics. Perhaps we need to start thinking about how we could make it work. We could use small goals and cones for pitch markings. It does not have to be all official at a very young age. As long as there is a ball, two goals and two teams then it is a competitive game when children are playing. With this new format kids would play 11v11 either halfway through under 13 or at under 14. A potential step of 9v9 could be introduced between 7v7 to bridge the gap. This could be feasible but would require portable goals to ensure the pitches were made smaller length wise. Professional clubs may be able to do this but boys clubs playing in local parks may find it a bit tricky. However, if the collective will is there then a lot can be achieved to change the game for the better.
Solutions 8: Collaboration Pro clubs work with each other and with boys clubs and don’t be so ‘us against them’. It will benefit everyone, as there will be more & better players to choose from. Players naturally find their level in time. Clubs do not need to go around poaching players from other teams. Instead, their time would be better spent if they worked with the players they had to make them as good as they possibly could be. The better players would eventually gravitate to the better teams in time. Clubs could also work together more to learn from each other rather than compete against each other. They could do in-service events where other clubs came to watch their coach’s work with their teams. This would hopefully ensure we can develop a best practice model throughout the country. Also, if a kid wants to leave a club then clubs should let them leave rather than stop them playing football and making life difficult for them. Surely, we want kids to be happy in the long run. An approach such as this also provides an opportunity for other players to come into the club and develop. The potential solutions highlighted in the article are designed to provoke thought and generate ideas. They are not aimed at being definitive answers to the problems faced in Scottish youth football. It is important action is taken going forward to try to come up with solutions to the problems we currently face. We need to produce more skilful, intelligent and creative footballers to allow us to reach a major finals for the first time since 1998. If there is a collective will and desire to work together then who knows what can be achieved in the future. One thing is for certain, if we continue with the same methods then we will drift further into footballing oblivion.
Stephen Fraser is a qualified football coach who was worked in Scotland with St Mirren and America with Seacoast United. His blueprint for football can be found here and he can be contacted on Twitter.
Our highly regarded Blueprint According To... interviews are collected into three Volumes of e-books that are available from Amazon (US Versions here). To receive a free copy of the third book in the series, get in touch on Twitter.
Stephen Fraser This is the first in a two part series. The second part of will look at potential solutions to the issues we face in Scottish youth football. There has been lot of debate recently regarding the academy system within Scotland and whether it is actually working. The national team manager Gordon Strachan has suggested clubs should scrap the academy system and replicate the past where players were developed in boy’s clubs and in schools. Although there is merit in such a set-up, life has changed and there are too many distractions for kids now. We need to find the balance between the old ways and the modern advancements in coaching and player development. A system which replicates play scenarios similar to street and park play can provide many benefits. However, it is crucial players are provided with guidance to unlock their potential. Many pundits and coaches have stated their opinions with a number in favour of scrapping the pro youth system all together. They are fully justified in questioning the system as we have failed to produce enough top level players for a number of years. However, being a high level ex-pro or adult coach doesn’t mean you know how children learn and develop. Nor does it automatically mean that you know how to teach kids from a young age through to adulthood. The same way as being a primary school teacher doesn’t qualify you to be a secondary teacher; being a good doctor doesn’t mean you are a good paediatrician or being a criminal lawyer doesn’t mean you are a good immigration lawyer. Although the subject or sport is the same, the audience, the methods, skills and knowledge required are vastly different. We should be questioning the academy system and looking for ways to improve it. However, it would be a monumental mistake to scrap youth academies in Scotland altogether. This would lead to far fewer players being produced and would leave the game in Scotland in dire straits. The actual system of academy football is not the problem, it is the environment we create which is the problem.
The academy environment within Scotland is highly competitive. Clubs need to understand they are working with kids and not mini adults. Players are not allowed to make mistakes and are not afforded opportunities to just act as kids. We need to let them have fun, be curious and work out their own solutions with guidance from qualified, experienced and skilled coaches. We need to work with players with a development focus in mind, rather than releasing players when they appear to be struggling. Usually clubs get rid of players because they are not winning games so they correlate that with not having the correct players in their system. However, this is often not the case. It may just be the players are not as quick learners as players from other teams. Talent identification needs to be better to ensure more suitable players are signed by clubs in the first place. Clubs need to get away from focusing on players who make the biggest impact in games. This is usually down to early physical and psychological maturation and has very little relevance to future potential. Similarly, clubs need to place more emphasis on movement mechanics and the mind-set of young players. We need to focus on creating more all-around athletes which will produce a bigger pool of players to choose from. If players are well balanced, co-ordinated and can move explosively in multiple directions then it is easier for coaches to teach them the required skills and techniques in football. It is also crucial players have a growth focused mind-set and are able to embrace mistakes and learn from them. It is ludicrous to suggest you are born with specific ‘talents’ or genes for football. Genetic attributes like fast twitch and slow twitch fibres are significant in developing physically and do play a part in player development. However, we learn to walk, talk and run through imitation and trial and error. In reality it is a mixture of environment mixed with initial physical traits. Without the correct environment then you cannot make use of physiology.
In his recent book Black Box Thinking, Matthew Syed explores in depth the way major industries and professions have progressed through the years. The main tenet of the book is related to making mistakes and learning from them. He highlights potent examples such as the medical profession, aviation and the criminal justice system. In particular he discusses how, often a culture exists within particular industries, where they are so ingrained in doing things a particular way because it has always been done this way. Syed highlights, many so-called leading experts do things in a particular way even although it leads to poor results. The positive examples he discusses highlight how making mistakes is crucial to learning for individuals and industries but only if they analyse them and learn from them. He uses the aviation industry as a prime example, as they have learned from a number of aviation mistakes to ensure the safety record is of the highest standard. This example is very pertinent to the system within Scottish youth football for two reasons. Firstly, the way players are developed is usually based on the previous experience of coaches and practioners and not on evidence based coaching. Clubs tend to coach in a particular way because they think it is the correct way to develop skill but in reality a lot of the work is counter-productive. The second reason the issues highlighted in Black Box Thinking are pertinent to Scottish football is concerned with allowing kids the freedom to make mistakes and learn from them. The environment within Scottish football is very negative and making mistakes is seen as a criminal offence. Young children are often lambasted for making mistakes, when in reality, making mistakes is the only way they will learn.
Syed concludes, many of the great developments within top industries and professions are made through trial and error. Therefore, we need to let players make mistakes, analyse them then come up with better solutions next time. The only way they are going to learn is if we give them the freedom to make mistakes and discover solutions via guidance from coaches. This way of teaching, is the polar opposite from instructing them what to do all the time. The debate around the academies in Scotland has mainly centred on players being over-coached in highly structured academies. It is very difficult to argue with this point, as a lot of the development work focuses on telling the players what to do all the time rather than let them discover the solutions themselves. However, one can argue with the issue regarding academies being too structured and this being a negative. Clubs such as Barcelona, Ajax & Southampton have very structured academies where players are highly coached. Southampton in particular look upon themselves as teachers of football and look towards improvement as the key aspect of their club. It is extremely difficult to argue with the proven track record of these academies. They have consistently produced high level players who have played in their first team and those of other top clubs around the world. It would be a challenge for anyone to say that is incorrect. I would argue, it is the type of environment and coaching which needs to be improved, not the structured environment which academies produce.
Nations such as Holland and Iceland are very much ‘coaching nations’ where they believe good coaching will improve players. They coach players correctly, with the correct type of interventions and the correct types of practices. Over the years Holland has produced top coaches and top players. Recently, Iceland has risen to the Elite of European football by qualifying for Euro 2016. By all accounts, they have achieved this through good coaching by well-educated and qualified coaches. Iceland has a population of nearly 330,000, which is considerably lower than Scotland. This example gives hope to smaller nations and proves that the correct coaching environment with well-educated coaches can lead to significant progress in player development. Stephen Fraser is a qualified football coach who was worked in Scotland with St Mirren and America with Seacoast United. His blueprint for football can be found here and he can be contacted on Twitter. Our highly regarded Blueprint According To... interviews are collected into three Volumes of e-books that are available from Amazon (US Versions here). To receive a free copy of the third book in the series, get in touch on Twitter.
