Winning Isn’t Bad: It just shouldn’t be used as a way to
measure the development of young players.
There’s a consensus among dads of young boys that play
football in England, that winning in football is a taboo. “I don’t agree with
all this not winning stuff” is an actual quote one of my parents once said to
me. What they believe, wrongly, is that us coaches are not looking to win games
of football, as if we are deliberately losing. I like to win. In fact, I am
driven by it. We just have to be a bit careful on how we go about it, how we
determine what winning is, and what we sacrifice to achieve this win.
It's a surprisingly huge topic, and to me, it seems like
people just aren’t understanding each other. Firstly, there’s not two sides
Winning v Development. The two are not mutually exclusive, but they do not mean
the same thing. It’s more like a spectrum. Where you should place yourself
depends on so many variables.
Often when this debate is had, the two people arguing are
usually a lot closer in their opinions than they seem to be. Essentially, they
both want to achieve the same long term goal of improving players. The problem
is that either they do not disclose the environment in which they are working,
or that they are unable to see things from the other’s point of view. An U7
grassroots coach will have very different priorities to an U18 pro coach. These
arguments often get stuck on the semantics. The U7 coach will state that all
players deserve equal time on the field so that they are all given the opportunity
to practise their skills. The U18 coach will say that he will only pick his
best players, or give more game time to certain individuals, because that’s how
it works when they enter the pro game, or that he focuses on those individuals
because they have a chance of making it, while the rest of the team are just
there to make up the numbers. Can you see how one could agree with the
sentiments expressed by both coaches, yet the sentiments appear to be at odds
with each other? Both coaches will be right to do what they do, but should not
try to apply their thinking to the circumstances of the other. What works or
what is appropriate at one level may not be at the other level.
This is where we will enter the Winning v Development
Spectrum. Now remember that the two are not necessarily mutually exclusive.
Rather than trying to argue Blue v Red (opposites) it’s like trying to argue
Blue v Soft (different things). Just because something is blue doesn’t mean
that it can’t also be soft. Winning or development are priorities. If you could
only choose one; would you rather finish the season in first place, or finish
the season with all of your players demonstrating significant improvements? If
you do win the league, it might be that many of your players improved
significantly throughout that journey. If every one of your players improves
significantly, it might be that you become good enough to win the league. Would
you rather it was blue or soft? You can order a blue one, and it might still be
soft, or you could order a soft one that might still be blue. [Not a Brexit
reference]
When trying to determine your priorities (not which side
you’re on, as the two are not mutually exclusive) first ask these questions;
-
Are the players being paid?
-
What are we looking to achieve?
-
What are their motivations for being here?
If you’re a top European side competing regularly for
trophies, your players will be paid excessively, they will be looking to win
trophies, and they will be there for the money, success, and stature of the
club. That’s why a lot of top, successful managers, such as Mourinho, have such
a terrible track record for bringing through youngsters. If an U18 does come
good, then they will be put in the squad, but they will not be given a chance
to develop. They can develop in the reserves or out on loan somewhere. They
have to hit the ground running. If they are not good enough, they won’t play.
This is exactly what happens when managers are brought in to save a team from
relegation. If there’s a young player in that team, they will be there on
merit, not because the manager took the time to allow them some mistakes and
bring them gently into the first team. At the top, if you’re not good enough,
you’re not picked.
If we take a group of U6 kids playing formally for the first
ever time, they will not be paid, they will be looking to learn how to play the
game, and their motivations will be purely fun and enjoyment, mainly tied into
the psychological and social corner. Some will be better than others. One or
two may be involved in other sports, or will play in the park or at home (the
ones who, as if by magic, appear “naturally talented”) and will just be a lot
better than the ones who are far less active at such a young age. They should
all get time on the pitch, and they should even rotate the positions too. No
one is a “my son’s a goal scoring centre forward” until they are at least
thirteen. When they play other teams, don’t ever judge their performance based
on the score line. Youth football is stupid. When you get scores like 12-5 and
18-7, you shouldn’t be looking too much into it. At U6, some kids may have been
playing since they could first walk, and some will be kicking a ball for the
first time. We refer to this as “football age.” In a game of 5v5 at U6, look at
the accumulative football ages of the team. There could potentially be as much
as a three-year difference between some players.
I am twenty-seven. There are many other twenty-seven year
olds out there. I can speak conversational Spanish. Many can’t speak a word of
Spanish. This is a much easier concept to understand as we don’t view a skill
like language as a natural ability, but as a skill that is honed and developed
over many years. I’ve been learning Spanish for three years now. Another
twenty-seven-year-old may have not learnt any at all. That puts me at a
three-year advantage. Therefore, you could quite rightly expect me to be able
to speak better Spanish than the twenty-seven-year-old that can’t speak
Spanish. We compete at a Spanish exam, and I should win.
Football age itself is not an exact science, but more of a
rough guideline. Take another twenty-seven-year-old that has also been learning
Spanish for three years. Surely we should have similar test results, right? I
think you know the answer to this one already. If they had better teachers,
more formal learning, and dedicated more hours per week to study than I did,
it’s obvious who would win. We both have a Spanish Speaking Age of three years,
but in that time, my opponent has practised more and better than I have, and
has thus developed further. It’s the same in football. My Spanish speaking
opponent would be superior to me, and would crush me in a competition, despite
us both having an age of three. In just three years, huge differences in
quality of practice can become abundantly apparent. Now if you were to compare
myself and my superior opponent to a native Spanish speaker of twenty-seven
years old, we’d both be slaughtered by the native speaker. My opponent would be
closer to the native speaker than I am, but it would be the difference between
9-0 and 10-0.
Here's where attitude comes in. Imagine if my opponent
(twenty seven year old Spanish learner with three years learning), despite
being better than me, had placed their worth in winning and comparison to
others. They would hate the 9-0 defeat. It could literally destroy them. They
may give up and stop learning Spanish. My 10-0 defeat to the native speaker is
worse, but imagine if I had been taught to value improvement and perseverance?
The 10-0 defeat would show me how far I need to go. Sure, I’d hate the 10-0
defeat, but I’d embrace it. It would quite clearly highlight my areas of
weakness. By valuing the improvement, and having the perseverance to achieve my
targets, I would get there in the end. I would make significant strides, and in
another three years, would be far better than my original opponent that had
only valued winning, and had given up after a tantrum following a 9-0 loss.
Three years later, with the constant improvements that I will have been making,
that 10-0 loss doesn’t hurt any more. That was three years ago. I’m not that
same person any more. I’m much better than that now. The scars have healed and
I have improved massively.
That’s precisely why we have to see it as a journey, not a
destination. Winners don’t just win once. Winners win repeatedly. To win one
game at U8 means nothing in the grand scheme of things. It feels great on the
day, but it will be one of many insignificant results along the way. If you intend
to make it to the top, you will play countless training and competitive games.
You will play games at school, at recess, in the park with your friends.
Winning just one of them does not make you a winner. The only time winning just
once is perhaps acceptable is when a player wins a World Cup or a Champions
League. This is the pinnacle of football. Very few are ever able to accomplish
this. Those are wins that will stay with them forever. Even then, once isn’t
enough. The hunger of these players means that they want to come back and win
it next time.
What does winning actually mean? What does it tell us about
the game or about the players? I’ll provide some facts about my most recent
game as a coach at the time of writing. My team won 1-0. We got three points,
so good, right? My team finished third in the league last season, and our
opponents finished second bottom (10th out of 11). My team had 41
points and were +40 GD. Our opponents had 11 and were -28. The two games our
teams played last season were both wins to my team, at 6-0 and 3-0. Given that
context, our 1-0 win doesn’t seem so impressive now.
Considering my team slaughtered the opposition twice last
season, we should have slaughtered them again this season. They only won three
games out of eighteen played. Surely they are useless, right? Now some more
facts. The opposition had strengthened significantly during the summer. My team
is littered with problems. In fact, I am new to this team, with this game being
only my second game with them. I don’t know what’s happened, but they are a
shadow of their former selves from last season, and it is my job to get them
back on track. We’ve had a mass exodus of coaches and players. For this game we
had a back four of two midfielders, and our second choice keeper. We also had
no subs, with some key players missing, while our opponents had a very strong
eleven, and a bench of five. Before the game, we were fifth in the table, and
they were fourth, one point above us. The previous meeting for the first game
of the season finished 2-2 away from home. Now our 1-0 win actually seems
impressive.
See, from something grand like a win, we realise that it
tells us very little. Football is a game of intricacies and chance. It just so
happens that we got a goal and they didn’t. What I haven’t told you is how, or
why. Was it a smash and grab 1-0 against the odds, or did we have 80%
possession, twenty shots on target, and yet only managed to score one goal? We
won the game, but does that mean that all of my players were brilliant? Does it
mean in any way that any of my players were good, and that we fully deserved
the win? Was the win down to tactics or individual skill? Was it fortune or
perseverance?
The winning goal came in the 85th minute. The
opposition were attacking down their left side. The fresh-legged substitute was
running down the wing at our defence. She cut inside onto her right, her
stronger foot, as she approached the box. Two players went diving in and bought
the fake. She was through. Two more players rushed back to get in her way, as
she faked again, and they bought it. She was through on goal, just the keeper
to beat, fifteen yards out, certain to score. At that moment, our left back,
who had initially been beaten after diving in, had come flying in to the block
the shot. She blocked it successfully. Had she stayed on the ground for a
second longer in despair, she would not have got up in time to block the shot.
Had she not have been a former player of our opponents, she may not have had
the determination to get up and attempt a block. Had the striker chosen to
shoot to the other side of the keeper, then the block never would have
happened.
Luckily for us, the block was a solid one. The ball pinged
out off her knee about thirty yards away to our centre midfielder. Like a
precision pass. She was not expecting the ball to come to her from that
situation, but was in a good enough position to start running at the defence
with speed (think Torres v Barcelona). She carried the ball all the way up to
the edge of the box, before sliding our striker through on goal, who coolly
finished one-on-one against the keeper.
Now you know about the goal, is that enough information to
determine whether we deserved to win the game? Were we just lucky? Did we
deserve to win it due to the perseverance of our recovering defender? Did we
deserve to win it due to the opposition striker making the wrong decision at
the key moment? Or did we deserve to win the game because we kept a clean sheet
despite all the absences and injuries against a very strong team? You still don’t
know our possession stats, interceptions, chances created, shots on target etc.
That’s the difference. Those are the parameters one might choose to measure
performance, whereas goals are the only parameters available to measure
winning.
My view on the day considered many things. These are young
players playing in a reserve league. They have ambitions to make it into our
first team that play in the third tier of ladies football. It’s a decent stage
to be playing at. With all the players and coaches leaving, this side have been
greatly under performing, and making many basic mistakes that need eradicating.
We have new players and new coaches. Everyone needs time. Even though I know
the opposition fairly well, I’m not working with them, so can’t change what
they do on the pitch. My sessions and team talks can only affect my team. I was
thinking about what we’d been working on in training recently, and our weak
areas from previous games. I wanted them to move the ball quicker out of
congested central areas, with the right and left back providing better width,
to always be available for the switch. I wanted them to recycle the ball better
when playing forward was not an option, rather than turning and wasting a pass.
These, and a few others, are how I was going to measure the success or failure
of the game. Essentially; are they doing the thing that I have asked them to
do?
If I had instructed them to win the game, it may or may not
have happened, just like if I had instructed them to make certain passing
choices. If we had played the exact same 85 minutes, but the striker shot to
the other side of the keeper, or our defender had not recovered, or our own
striker had missed from close range, meaning we either drew or lost, should
that have affected how I viewed my team’s performance? Performance and results
are closely linked, but it’s not an absolute. Congratulations we won! Or
commiserations we lost! It doesn’t really teach the players much. One goal is
such a small event that has such large ramifications, and is often
uncontrollable.
An 11v11 ninety-minute game with no substitutes means that
each player has a 4.5% stake in the overall result. It could be that one player
suddenly pulls off a sublime bit of skill, or makes a horrendous mistake, and
that could be the moment that changes the game. In an average game of football,
there is usually just two goals scored. We’re looking at 1-0, 1-1, 0-0, 2-0,
2-1, and 2-2 as our most likely score lines. At any time in those ninety
minutes, a goal can be scored, by any player, in a whole variety of ways.
Think of it like this. I have been driving for ten years.
I’ve driven over 100,000 miles across ten different countries, on three
continents. At the moment I’m doing about three or four hundred miles a week.
Sometimes late at night when I’m tired. In all those hours of driving, I’ve
been involved in one minor collision, which was completely the fault of the
other driver (anyone who has seen the buses in Mexico City will understand).
Does ten years with a perfect record make me a good driver? It goes some way to
suggesting so. Does that mean that I won’t run three kids over tomorrow while
looking at my phone? Does it mean I might not spot black ice and go skidding
out of control? Of course not. It’s highly unlikely that I will be involved in
a crash, just like it’s highly unlikely that in any given moment of football
that a goal will be scored. There are 90 minutes, which means 5,400 seconds of
play (we’re being crude with numbers here, as the ball does spend considerable
amount of time off the field). If there are two goals in the game, that means
that there are 5,398 seconds of a match where the ball is not crossing the goal
line. If you were told that the game would last exactly 5,400 seconds and
precisely two goals were going to be scored, that gives you a 1/2699 chance of
accurately predicting the second that the ball would cross the line. That’s a
0.004% (roughly) chance of getting it right.
Sure, we can make it a little more predictable by knowing
more goals are scored at certain times in the game, and that certain teams
speed up or slow down, some players are more influential and likely to score,
and some players are more prone to mistakes. Absolutely, yes, but we shan’t be
factoring this in at the moment for risk of over complicating the point.
How do you define success? In Spanish, it could be that the
recipient understands my point. Or maybe that’s not good enough, as I want it
to be perfect. In driving, it could be that I don’t die on my way home. Or
maybe that I get to my destination a little quicker than normal. What
determines how I define success? That’s a question that opens a large can of
worms, and goes off onto many tangents. The point is that to win or lose is
very difficult to predict, and that it is a terrible way of measuring
development. When looking at measuring performance, winning or losing is just
way too vague.
Is Usain Bolt happy with just winning the gold, or does he
want to smash his personal best? What if he smashes his personal best but comes
second? What about beating his opponents by a long distance but falling way
short of the world record? It’s like when a Premier League team only defeats a
lower league team by one or two goals in the cup; what should we expect? They
crossed the line first, they won! Is that not good enough? At what point are
you happy with the result or performance?
For a team to truly appreciate their wins, they have to know
what their wins are. What constitutes as success for a certain team? A team newly
promoted into the division will consider avoiding relegation as a success. A
team that spent millions on new players and has a history of competing for the
title will consider finishing second as a failure. Is a 0-0 draw away at first
place a good result or a bad result? The striker might not be pleased as they
were unable to score, but the defence would be ecstatic as they would have done
their job right. Another thing to worry about is perhaps false league position.
At the time of writing, Arsenal have only played one league match away at a top
half opponent, meaning their fixtures are going to become more difficult. It’s
why you must absolutely define what is something to be celebrated and what is
something to be embarrassed by.
For kids, when games can finish with stupid scores, and
aggressive coaches and parents that bark orders from the sidelines place large
amounts of pressure upon their younglings, it can be very confusing and
overwhelming. If a U8 team has three players missing at a birthday party, they
could ship ten goals in one game. If the goalkeeper stayed up all night at a
sleepover and can’t focus the next day, it could negatively impact their
performance. If the striker has had an argument with a family member, they may be
distracted, and thus failing to score. Kids football is so random. Can a player
be happy with their own performance when their team lost? I’d say yes, but to
which extent depends on the level. A U7 that scores five goals while their team
loses 8-5 can probably still be very happy with themselves, but at the same
time should understand that it is a team game, and we shouldn’t be okay with
losing. There are no absolutes. It’s all about perspective. I’ve seen teams get
smashed significantly, and yet the keeper on the losing side has been the best
player. “Without you son, it could have been double!” is often a legitimate
claim.
Why in some locations do they have walkover rules, don’t
keep score, don’t keep league tables etc.? Isn’t that teaching our kids to be a
bunch of whining pussies? Where there is an argument for teaching six year olds
to go for the kill and mentally destroy their opponents, that’s not my angle.
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with keeping score and having league tables at
a young age. If you don’t want your kids to know the score, you shouldn’t teach
them to count. Such measures have been brought in to protect the young players
from the pressures of the parents. It’s the typical US soccer mom. The one who
doesn’t have a clue about the game, but wishes to be seen in a positive light
by all the other parents (because other people’s opinions of us are super
important). YEAH JIMMY!!!!! WOOOOOOO!!!! YOU KICK THAT BALL!!!! You know the
type. We get them in the UK too, but are usually middle aged men with a lot of
pent up resentment who are pushing their kids to go pro.
Let it be known straight away; it is completely
irresponsible of a parent to not push their kids at a young age. Hear me out.
At the ages of about two or three (younger, actually) kids will start to really
develop mental skills and understanding of the world around them, as well as
their balance and motor skills. At that age, all they want to do is shove
crayons up their nose and defecate in the garden. No kid of two says “When I grow
up, I want to be [insert a realistic and pragmatic career option]”. If they
even know that they one day will grow up, they literally want to be anything
from a chocolate chip cookie to the colour yellow. They won’t know that they
are at an age where they need to start developing social, mental, and motor
skills. Push them. Push them into something. Swimming, gymnastics, bicycling,
something. You will notice the difference by the time they are seven. At that
age, when they actually want to join teams and play with their friends, some
will already be able to do that. Others will not, and will forever be
disadvantaged by not getting that early start. It’s very difficult to recover
from that.
Pushing them at the age of three to join a soccertots class
and making sure they see out the term is a very different kind of pushing them
to what we see on the sidelines of kids football. The latter type of pushing is
screaming, berating, and downright aggression that can cause embarrassment.
Push them by making them get up in the morning. Push them by making sure they
have a good breakfast. Push them by ensuring they shake the hands of their
coaches and play the game fairly. That’s when your responsibilities as parents
to push them stop. At that point, you sit back and watch the game. Encourage,
applaud, console. Leave the instructions, the criticism, and the praise to the
coaches. After the game, don’t talk to them about it unless they bring it up.
And then, you’re only job is to ask if they had fun, did they learn anything,
and to tell them that you love spending time with them.
Sadly, not everyone can be so calm and rational. “I’m sorry,
I just get that way around sports.” Well don’t be that way. You’re the one in
control of your actions. If you seriously can’t help yourself from becoming red
faced and irate at a youth sports event, you should drop them off, and then
leave to go to therapy. Seriously. You are a deeply flawed human that is having
a massively negative impact upon your child. You are the reason that walkover
rules and the ban on publishing results have come into effect.
The walkover rule prevents embarrassment. Should you be
embarrassed if you lose? Again, it’s about perspective. If my friends and I formed
a team and we played Barcelona, if it was 20-0, we would not find that embarrassing
at all. However, if we lost by that score to another pub side, we’d probably
never play the game again. Because the game would end at 8-0, it stops the
overly keen youth coaches from destroying the confidence of their opponents.
What’s good about that? It means kids don’t quit playing. Does it matter if
they’re awful? Yes, they could be late developers. They also provide opponents.
Imagine if every team Barcelona or Real Madrid thought were bad just quit the
league. That would leave them with only three or four teams to play. That would
not benefit anyone.
Promote and relegate, even at young ages, to keep the teams
playing against teams of their level. I’d suggest even playing four or six
month seasons so that it happens sooner. A year is a long time for a child. If
they’re in the wrong league, they have to wait twelve months until they can
play games against more appropriate opponents. It also keeps things fresh and
adds to the competitiveness.
Also, do away with playoffs for the kids. I know they’re
fun, but they place too much emphasis on the short term rather than the long
term. In life, rewards come from consistency. Consistently do a good job,
consistently achieve good grades, consistently play well. A team may be seeded
in the playoffs, but as we know that football is a random game, anyone can beat
anyone in a one off. Where’s the reward in that? Play cup competitions in
addition to the league. Have summer tournaments. Knockout competitions can
teach valuable life lessons and are an important part of football, but do not
have playoffs in place of a league. Reward the team that has been the best for
the longest period of time, not just the team that enters a run of form during
the last few weeks, despite being average all season.
The idea that the long haul doesn’t matter is an opinion
often expressed (sometimes verbally, often through choices and actions) by
players and parents alike. “I only go at about 70% in training because I’m
saving my best for the game at the weekend.” Ever heard something like that
before? It is the anthem of the mediocre. The war cry of the perpetually
average. Remember how you need to give your best at every opportunity? Remember
how you need to munch your cornflakes and down your orange juice like a
champion? Winning takes time, effort, consistent practise. You don’t just win
once. For these people, it is far too late. You get good at what you do in
practise. Spend your time talking; you’ll be a good talker. Spend your time
walking; you’ll be a good walker. Spend your time pulling out of challenges;
you’ll be good at not being able to tackle anyone. You can’t improve your best
if you never work at your best. That’s why theatre groups spend months
practising. That’s why dress rehearsals are exactly like the real thing. They
don’t go over their lines and think that’s enough. “We’ll be alright on the
night. I can remember most of it.” They practise until they can’t get it wrong.
What makes football different to performing on stage is that
it is completely random, and anyone can affect it at any moment. A band plays
the same songs in the same order. They are not competing with anyone else.
There’s no band that can take the instruments away from them while they are
playing. It’ a well-rehearsed, carbon copy performance. Football has so much
randomness. Players need to be able to adapt to all sorts of new scenarios,
considering a plethora of live information, using a range of learnt skills and
abilities, with decisions being influenced by past successes and failures. The
speed of thought has to become instinctive. That does not happen at 70%. Would
Muhammad Ali box with a punching bag at 70% and think he was ready for a
heavyweight title fight? Would Bradley Wiggins bike around the track at 70% and
think he was ready for the Olympics?
Going at 100% all the time almost makes it seem like the
developmental aspect is not important. That’s just not true. Practising at 100%
actually makes it realistic. If it’s not realistic, players do not develop.
Conversely, practising at less than 100% makes players susceptible to picking
up bad habits. It leaves players underprepared. It’s not about winning; it’s
about trying your best to win. It’s not about winning; it’s about preparing to
win. |
| The complexities of maintaining possession. |
This is what gives players that winning mentality. They’re intrinsically motivated. They’re task orientated. They have long term vision, but focus on the minute details of the short term. They do not fear set-backs and failures, yet embrace them, and convert that pain into fuel. It’s hard to create a winning mentality in a world that thrives off of the instant gratification of modern life. If you have good news, you don’t need to wait to see your family and friends, it just goes right on Facebook! “Look everybody! I have a kid/dog/meal/best friend/diploma/pay cheque/excellent selfie/destructive cleavage/nice message/rainbow/” or whatever else it may be that people use to fish for compliments. No longer do we have to wait until we see our extended family to let them know about our new girlfriend, engagement, or vacation. No longer do we have to wait until the next big family gathering to let them know about the wonderful new job or the graduation. We love those moments, but they’re always over too soon. So now, enjoy my holiday photos, spread out over the next few weeks, so you can spend extra special time and attention admiring the selfie I took, then comment with some fake response that conveys jealousy and affection. Just look at any girl’s Instagram account to see what I mean. Girl goes somewhere (doesn’t matter where, it could be a world famous landmark, or it could be the McDonald’s drive-thru), takes a selfie, usually with a forced smile or duck face, always from an angle that is slightly above the forehead, often with some serious cleave on display (there’s a strong inch-to-like correlation), and as a rule, the face has to be at least 30% of the picture. Sometimes as much as 60%.
Do we have a winning mentality or do we have a dopamine
addiction? Every like is a shot of dopamine. That’s why we communicate via memes.
We have nothing interesting to say, but know some friends we never see will
find the meme amusing, and give it a like. Instant gratification via a dopamine
shot, and we forget about everything that’s plaguing us. My longest meme
benders have been when I’ve been at my most busy. The work is boring and
stressful, the deadlines are approaching, there’s too much on my plate, and I
now I have a choice between staying up late and getting it finished, or waking
up early to get it finished. All of a sudden, I’m on Facebook, hitting share to
forward on a Hank Hill meme. I’ve never even used propane. Twenty minutes go
by, and some kid from Canada I haven’t seen for three years gives it a like.
Yay dopamine. But in that time I would have also shared ten other memes, and a
satirical article about how Donald Trump locks himself in a room so that he can
write Twitter updates, fireside, dipping a feather into ink. I feel like I’ve
changed the world because three friends also read it and gave it a like. High
fives all round for sticking it to the establishment.
Long term joy and fulfilment comes from doing your best and feeling valued. To be able to have that opportunity every day, we need to be working in something that we truly believe in. That’s the key difference between a job and a career. Your career defines you. Your job is just something you do for cash. Don’t get stuck in a job. Short term suffering for long term gain. I (and my parents) have spent a lot of time, effort, and money on my education. I may be essentially friendless, lacking social skills, and be devoid of empathy, but I have built myself a platform from which I can build upon and spring forward. No one can ever take away my knowledge, experiences, and qualifications gained from all this.
It's a temptation of many in their early twenties to live
for the weekend. They’ll take any job because it gives them money. With a bit
of hard work, they start to move quickly in that business. Soon, they’re
working good hours, making a fair bit of money. They love going clubbing on
Fridays, stay in late Saturday morning, hit the bookies, watch the football, go
out to the pub with their mates, play football Sunday morning, then round to
their parents on Sunday afternoon for a roast dinner. They are very active
socially. They are accepted by the lads, meet plenty of birds, and due to their
shagging, drinking, and football, they do accumulate a large amount of banter
points by the end of each month. Kudos. But what are they building towards? The
job soon becomes dead end. The drinking and late nights soon become boring,
frustrating, and take all your cash. Eventually one of those birds latches on
and makes herself a missus, and she wants kids and a place to live. What about
Sunday morning football and the nights out? Hard to do in your late twenties
and early thirties when you have bills, kids, and a wife. The fun quickly dies
out. That lifestyle rarely lasts. That’s when people realise they are going
through the motions. They’ve not been anywhere and not become anything. That’s
when depression hits, and the existential crisis happens.
Who am I? What have I become? What could I have been? You’re
certainly not a winner, though it looked like you were having great fun in your
early twenties. Is this now it for the rest of your life?
We owe it to our kids to give them the tools to compete, to
fight, to improve, to self-reflect, and to stay grounded. We won’t always be
there for them. We can’t do everything for them. Push them, challenge them,
guide them, support them, extend them, criticise them, love them, and give them
a purpose. Or else they’ll turn out useless and miserable, eternally seeking
temporary and artificial highs until death.
Do your kids know how to fend for themselves? Do they know
how to be happy? What kind of person would they become if you were tragically
removed from their life this instant? We need to be honest with ourselves if we
wish to avoid the above trap. It’s okay if they are driven or obsessed. Help
them find a passion and a sense of purpose, even if it’s not yours, and help
them grow into the best that they can be.
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| Developing players using the four corner model. |
What we must never do is to live vicariously through them.
It’s their life. As mentioned before, push them into something. Make sure they
give it their best go. Many quit because they are not used to being outside the
comfort zone. If that’s the case, keep pushing them to try, and help them
adjust. If they want to quit for genuine reasons, help them find something else
that will help them burn off their energy, develop social skills, learn coping
mechanisms, face competition, strive to improve, teach them life skills, learn
motor skills etc. And never motivate them through fear and reward. If they
truly grow to love what they do, it will be their choice. They will be the ones
that have the ownership, and that’s when true enjoyment appears. When I used to
go out into my back garden as a kid and practise my shots and free-kicks, it’s
because I loved doing that. I wasn’t thinking about being a professional or
earning money from kicking a ball. I loved the feeling of seeing that ball
rocket into the top corner of the net. From a very young age, that repetitive
practice helped me develop a cannon of a right foot. It’s still a cannon now,
even if the rest of me is no good. That’s task orientation right there. I was
focussed only on putting that ball into the goal. Sometimes driven, lobbed,
chipped, curled, swerved, floated, and through the panes of next door’s
greenhouse, but it was a constant development of a skill that became useful to
me. My parents didn’t need to shout at me to do it. I didn’t need to set
reminders on my phone. I just went out there and did it. I loved it.
The biggest indicator for me of which kids will improve the
most is by looking at what they do before and after practice. Sometimes, due to
the restrictions of area and time, it’s not possible. Out of my boys in Mexico,
the ones that got better were the ones who over the eighteen months, showed up
early with a ball, and stayed late with a ball. It doesn’t matter if they came
to me as the best or the worst player, the ones who did extra got better
quicker. If they arrived early by fifteen minutes twice a week, that was half
an hour per week. If we trained for forty weeks of the year, that adds up to
twenty extra hours of football. Completely free. If they stayed behind for an
hour, that makes forty extra hours per year. We’re already looking at sixty
hours more than their teammates. That’s a considerable amount. These boys would
also play with their older or younger brothers, and their dads. They would make
up their own rules, govern their own games, invent their own challenges. I
could show them a few things in training, and maybe plant an idea in their
head, but that’s not where they learnt to be better players. They did that
themselves. They developed a love of the ball. Or better yet, they were allowed
to develop a love of the ball.
Other kids weren’t so fortunate. The mums didn’t mind. It
was always warm, and they’d stay behind to chat. The kids were in a protected
area, having the time of their lives, with only a hint of supervision. Other
boys would arrive on time, or late, and would be taken to the car the second
training finished. They weren’t allowed the opportunity to bond or to
socialise. They didn’t associate positive memories and experiences with the
ball. They were not given the opportunity to fall in love with the ball. They
couldn’t do any of the skills in training because they never had free play at
home or in the park. They were useless in the games because the other players
on my team and the opposition were becoming so much better than them. They did
not hang out with their friends after training.
One boy improved a hell of a lot in that time. I remember
his mum crying when he scored his first goal and all the other boys jumped on
him. He was a year younger than the rest. But for eighteen months he had good
attendance, showed up early, stayed late, played against older kids, joined in
games of headers and volleys, knockout Wembley, 3v3, penalties etc. He started
to become a decent player, after being one of the weakest. Being a year younger
than the team, his football age was also a year younger (years of experience).
He was always swimming in the deep end. Figuratively lifting heavier weights
than he should have. It taught him to cope. It will teach him to excel. His
parents noticed his improvement. I made sure they knew it was nothing to do
with me. He would often arrive early and stay late. It helped that their house
was pretty much the other side of the hill to our club, and so was a two-minute
drive. Still, we had others in a similar situation that did not use that
opportunity.
In the Winning v Development argument, remember that we used
to be beaten most weeks, and he was initially considered a weaker player. His
win was to score his first goal. His win was constant improvement. His win was
to finally be passed to by the better players. His win was to be invited to
play by the older kids. His win was making his parents proud. Do you think he
was aware of any of that? Absolutely not. He was six. He just loved the ball
and loved spending time with his friends. We lost most of our games, and at
three attempts only once did we make the playoffs, yet he improved so much as a
player. That’s the win I’m looking for.
Champions do extra.
Each one of those wins mentioned above is a little win.
Consistent, small, but impactful, like a chain reaction. There are little wins
all around us. Every pass, tackle, shot, block, header, interception etc. can
all be little wins. Outside of the game, every good sleep, healthy meal, good
practice, good rest, extra training, jumpers for goalposts game with your
friends, these are all little wins. Think of it as money in the bank. As an
investment. Every time you play a game, each little win buys more raffle
tickets. The more raffle tickets, the more likely you are to win the game. We
all know it’s possible to play well and lose, or to be an outstanding player on
a bad team. Still, the game experience is money in the bank. As is every training
session, fitness session, game watched, and all the little details from there
that affect growth physically, socially, psychologically, and technically. Has
watching the analysis on Sky helped the player understand Conte’s formation at
Chelsea? Has the strange exercise in training helped the player to understand
how to work better with teammates? Has the humiliating loss at the weekend
helped the player understand how to self-reflect and not blame others? All
little wins. All money in the bank. Explain it to kids like XP points in video
games, helping their characters to level up.
In these little wins, we find what are called non-events,
which is a neglected part of the game. The best way to explain a non-event is
in regards to defending. Players do things all the time that affect the game,
that goes largely unnoticed. It is, in many ways, unquantifiable. The striker
makes a run to receive the ball from the midfielder, but is tracked and marked
by the central defender. This means that the striker does not receive the ball,
and instead, the midfielder has to play the ball backwards, and thus does not
penetrate the defence. It’s a non-event, as the forward pass never happened.
Had the defender not been switched on, he would have failed to mark the
striker, who could have received the ball in a dangerous position. That never
happened. That’s a thing that we can’t write down. If the defender had made a
tackle, block, or interception, then we could notice this and provide a stat.
We can’t do that for things like screen, mark, cover, or in the attacking
sense, overlaps, checked runs, decoy runs, and all such actions that create
space for others or distract the opposition, but do not result in the player themselves
actually receiving the ball.
It's why defenders are largely underappreciated. In life,
realistically, how many sheep do you need to have sex with to earn the label “sheep
shagger”? Just one. You only need to shag one sheep to be known as a sheep
shagger. A striker can do very little all game, and out of nowhere, score the
winning goal. Defenders need to be organised, disciplined, and attentive all
game. Just one mistake can lead to that goal. Think of Man City. Kompany (when
he’s not injured) will run, head, intercept, mark, tackle, block, cover, track
etc. all game. Sterling at the other end will take one too many touches before
getting tackled, underhit a cross, try to take on too many players, will shoot
when he should have passed, will be easily brushed off the ball, won’t track
back, and will choose the wrong foot. Sterling just needs to get it right once
to be the hero. Kompany just needs to get it wrong once to be the villain.
Like non-events, development is unquantifiable. We’re not
talking in terms of the NFL Combine. If you measure, weigh, and test a
footballer, it tells you very little about them as a footballer. In gridiron
football, speed, strength, and arm length gain more importance because those are
the only things those players rely on. Only the quarterback makes decisions,
while the rest run, catch, or block for the next seven seconds until the game
stops. It’s all pre-determined, and pretty much restarts in the same way. There’s
less of a random element, and less individuality within the sport. In football,
so what if you can bench press a large amount or run 100m quickly? How do you
play in a back three? Can you spray passes? Can you anticipate crosses? Can you
play as an inverted winger? Can you drop deep and receive on the half turn? It’s
decision making. This also goes some way to explaining why we’re behind a lot
of sports when it comes to sports science, as the physicality is not the
deciding factor in the game, it’s the intelligence. It’s a game that requires
the mastery of so many different techniques. Is there any part of it that is
measurable?
We try. We do shooting tests, skill tests, juggling tests,
turning tests, and a whole range of tests. In a lot of ways, it’s an attempt to
look busy. To pretend we know what we’re doing. Yeah, sure, there is a link
between these skills and top level performance, but it’s about being able to do
it in the heat of a game. It’s why John Farnworth and Sean Garnier aren’t
professionals. When isolated, just themselves with the ball, they look as
magical as Ronaldinho. They certainly possess a very high level of skill. But
it’s not just skill, is it? Ronaldinho could do it in games. Ronaldinho could
do it with other players trying to get the ball off him. Ronaldinho could do it
on the grand stage. So we do struggle to quantify it.
What about in game stats? They do go some way to helping us
understand performance. Individual stats like pass completion, shots on target,
successful dribbles, interceptions etc. do help us understand some elements of
a performance. It is limited though, and must come with context. If we compare
the stats to the previous game, we’re already very unscientific. Different
teams, different abilities, different playing styles, different weather,
different surface, different time of day, among others. Too many variables have
changed from one game to the next. It’s like scoring a hat-trick at home to
Swansea in a 5-0 win, and forcing two incredible saves from David DeGea in a
1-1 draw away to Manchester United. The stats would be very different, but
surely there’s credibility in both, depending upon what we’re looking for.
With longevity we can gather a larger range of information
which can help us examine, scrutinise, and compare situations. For example,
Peter Crouch’s England record. He’s scored a lot of goals, but many of them
were against inferior teams in qualifiers and friendlies. We have enough evidence
to suggest he’s prolific against mediocre opponents, but it’s still just a
suggestion. His club record may be better at certain clubs, which could be due
to playing with better players, or even just knowing his teammates better. Even
with all the stats and comparisons available, we still rely so much on guess
work. What do we value as harder to do? What do we define as more important?
What’s more challenging? It’s why we cannot scientifically prove Messi or Ronaldo
is superior. Ronaldo may have won in two different leagues, but Messi has more
league titles when they have played in the same league. Ronaldo may have won an
international competition, but Messi has taken Argentina to four finals
compared to Portugal’s one. They’ve both broken goal scoring records, became
highly capped, and are legends for club and country. So who you favour depends
on what you value. For me, Ronaldo is a... A bit like Bono. Bono does such
wonderful work for the poor and underprivileged people of the world, but he’s
so smug about everything that he turns us off him. Ronaldo poses as if to bask
in our appreciation, lifting his shorts up so we can admire his thighs. Amazing
player, just comes across as a knob.
Parents value winning with kids because for a lot of them,
it’s the only way they know how to measure what is good or bad. We won = good.
We lost = bad. That comes without context, and without a greater understanding
for the game.
So I ask you, would you rather your kid was part of a team
that won all the time, but was a bench player, and clearly one of the weakest
in the team, falling yet further behind those getting most of the playing time?
They’d still get all the trophies and appreciation (just like sub goalkeepers).
Or how about being a decent player in an average team, that plays a lot of
games, wins occasionally, loses more often, and is showing great signs of
improvement as an individual?
Would you rather they picked up loads of plastic grassroots
trophies, or became intelligent, skillful players?
Would you rather they won all the time, or learnt humility, kindness,
compassion, and respect?
Now, these are not mutually exclusive. It’s possible to have
both or neither. I just want to know where your preference lies. That’s how you
ascertain your values. That’s what shapes your child’s development.
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