There was a v good article about Icelandic football before WC. Barney Ronay. Iām sure was linked on here at the time. Was a quite incredible stat that to coach from U10 upwards in Iceland you MUST have UEFA B licence which is one step below pro licence. Funded by Icelandic FA from funds received by UEFA.
They have a B licence coach per 800 people vs per 11000 people in the UK (edit per people not players!!!)
Ya read it at the time, someone reposted it there after the england game.
would agree at the higher level of things about personalities getting jobs. Iāve seen coaches on big money get gigs, and I wonder how the fuck did they ever get in that position. But sure its really up to the club or county to see what they are getting and if they are getting the best person for the job.
But the majority of the time, that exactly what required.
If you have a small country club, your chance of finding 4 or 5 good, inventive, dynamics coaches to take over juvenile teams are slim. More often than not you are relying on the well meaning parent to train the team. Unfortunately most of these lads need to be spoon-fed, they need to be brought up to speed on the basics and how to correct them, and then basically be given a bank of drills to work with.
Itās grand in a big club where you have lads chomping at the bit to get involved with teams, but unfortunately with most clubs thatās not the case.
there is no need whatsoever for amateur sports to have any focus on S&C and sports science
why would some club team in some rural shit hole give a fuck about it - bizarre
Ya but the courses and language used is a major issue with alot of the stuff i see as well. The way sports psychologists deliver working with kids stuff sometimes can be very off putting.
But generally on your point, thats lowering the standard just for the sake of it. Allowences should be made within the GAA for small clubs. It should be all centrally run and accoubted for. If a small club needs more assistance then they get it. But as of now Coaching officers just do āthe roundsā and maybe see the clubs once or twice. Thats not enough.
The IRFU has the blueprint, everything trickles down from them.
Well said @TreatyStones.
Even some of the ex players havenāt a clue about handling juvenile training sessions.
If spoon feeding helps to raise the skills level, then spoon feeding it should be.
I seen a lad one day teaches kid how to rise a ball with one hand out in lit. Heās now employed by the Limerick county board.
Itās not lowering the standard for the sake it, itās lowering the standard because of the reality of it.
Iāve mentioned before, a lot of clubs donāt actually look for help in the first place. They give it out about this and that, but most likely have never picked up the phone and asked would it be possible to get a GDA in for 3 or 4 nights to coach the coaches and/or players.
The more basic the skills being taught, the harder it is to coach them. Coaching the fundamental skills is actually fairly difficult and most have no idea how to do it. Thatās another thing that kills small clubs where every juvenile player is needed if they are to field competitive teams in every grade.
Even Olympic boxers?
Agree with both points.
If a club is to be anyway successful you need the kids in playing ball along with a decent level of coaching and guidance from age 6 up.
Re the small clubs it also drives me mad that the big clubs have plants on every committee and every level on the co boards, they have the numbers to do that.
My own club are involved in a row this week over championship gradings.
All the big clubs run the fixtures and gradings so theyāll manipulate it to suit their club.
IRFU has a very small fraction of clubs and player that the GAA has which allows them to do this. But rugby clubs are incentivised (through additional allowances I believe) for having adequately qualified coaches over various teams which is a massive driver to getting people through the courses and into important roles in the club.
The courses also provide potential coaches with a network of peers and ability to listen to and learn from voices outside own club which is very important IMO
boxing is a proper sport
Iāll cut you.
Well I think that is just foolish to be honest. Iāve been on plenty of courses, some have been shit, most been good. But even the ones I thought were shit, I still took something out of it. Even if it is a negative thing, ie something that reinforces the opinion that I wouldnever do, then it still makes it worthwhile. You cant have enough info, and coaches should be constantly be able to evolve with changing times both on and off the field. If a coach isnt prepared to put in the effort to further their education or improve themselves, then I wouldnt consider them to be a good coach.
Disagree here. Doing courses should not be the determinant of development. Some of the biggest changes i made in the last year came from work and books that have little or nothing to do with coaching. Should people who have very limited time e lost to coaching? Often these people are very successful and smart and value their time. They are likely to really value the time they are there and also respect the time of the kids and their parents.
but at least by doing these courses, it weeds out those who may realise coaching isnt for them. Iāve been on courses where I would be wondering what the fuck is someone doing as they wouldnt have a notion, and by the end of it you can see them question themselves. Iād agree with the assertion that not all good players are good coaches. They are 2 mutually exclusive entities. Whilst it can work that good players are good coaches, it doesnt necessarily mean it will be automatically the case.
I think you didnāt get what i was saying. These people are not suited to the coaching, but still plough thru the course as āthey have to do itā. I donāt think its weeding them out at all. Iām saying i am meeting, and hearing first hand parent/athlete stories about these really qualified people. And they are still bluffers after all that.
As i said, i think being a good player more often than not (unless good time is taken) means you wonāt be a good coach due to the culture that exists in the British Isles, you will be fast tracked. And what happens is you get too big a job too early and even the potential is gone. The 2 best cases of the opposite of this happening is Maurice Fitz and Seamus Moynihan. Moynihan must be one of the most qualified (and qualified does not alone mean badges or courses or degrees or anything educational) football coaches around but i get the feeling he doesnāt want the bullshit the higher levels bring. I think he has 3 degrees one being in S&C, was a star player, knows what it takes and has a great temperament. Maurice Fitz may not be as qualified with bits of paper but is equally perfect for coaching. We may never see them coach at county level though.
The bottom line is its about participation, retention and health and social skills. You said up along about ānever having too much infoā and i couldnāt disagree more. I think everyone is totally over loaded with info. Courses need to be shortened, basics taught and maybe refresher resources online etc. The focus should be on human development and not hurling or football development
ā¢ How do we get these kids playing till 18
ā¢ Is there any way we can make this even more fun
ā¢ Am i as the coach improving these kids lives
ā¢ Are all the kids developing at a pace best suited to them?
ā¢ Is there progression
ā¢ Am i innovative?
ā¢ Am i self aware as a coach?
ā¢ How am i improving as a coach?
These specific coaching sessions are total bull shit. This is why the games are getting so boring, everyone singing off the same hymn sheet. For hurling coaching is about teaching the basics well, really well over and over and then the rest of it is about developing people be they kids or adults. Having talks about puckouts at a coaching course or specific night is a waste of time and resources. Coaches should be encouraged to figure it out themselves. This is the problem with alot of coaches, they have become reliant on copy & paste.
All this time spent getting your club mates in coaching courses could be spent on the field practicing the craft. Yes a form of course is needed, but what you will find, and i have encountered this a number of times now is the coaches become competitive and you get people complaining (or even actually blocking) others from coaching because they, lets say Joan, have level 1 and Mary only has foundation. Now Joan has very little experience and didnāt play that much and is a strict school teacher type whereas Mary has coached and is more suited to it. Mark my words you will encounter this. Its caused alot of hassle in clubs, ridiculous hassle. Courses should be about the competency of the coach to deliver the very basics, the bare bones. On the flip side i like the swapping idea and that is good and will spread (hopefully positively) the knowledge.
The answers are not in GAA, they are further afield and alot of the good evidence based approaches are not even utilized yet because major sporting organisations donāt want to think outside the box. Are ye on Facebook? I can add ye to some of the forums if ye want, the stuff you get to read is incredible, the discussions cutting edge.
The GAA should centralize everything. Have a coaching section to the organisation a d make people accountable all the ways down the line. If you take on coaching a youth team you are taking on huge responsibility, alot of people i see around completely ignore that. You could have a huge effect on a young person, you could actually be part of keeping them Mentally and physically healthy for life. Or you could turn them off completely. The GAA is at its weakest position in years. Crowds are dwindling, numbers are dropping and they still continually make an ass of themselves.
Why has nobody done anything about the clear advantages being born in Jan-March has on athletes. Or indeed that the highest drop out rates are from people born in Nov/Dec. Someday soon someone like Dublin or Killkenny is going to change the rules drastically and start splitting the development squads into months or maybe dividing by height or weight like other sports are doing. Or even abandoning elite squads altogether until u18 and pouring the money into delivering better coaching at all clubs and allowing athletes develop at their own pace. This is already happening in Swedish Soccer, driven by a Corkman btw.
We are way behind the science now, coaching and education are very closely linked and Ireland is miles off course right now.
Exactly. Whats wrong with that?
Nothing at all in fact I think it is a good idea. What led you to believe I thought it was a negative (assuming we talking about incentives for coaching?)
Again though, much harder for GAA to do this with no of clubs. Albeit they have more cash than anyone
I hope you back track as well on the tennis court