The Last Day!!
To be 100% honest, I really didn't want to get out of bed this morning. The very busy week was most certainly catching up with me. When that alarm went off, I struggled to not hit the snooze...more than twice ;-). Then I began to focus. Today was the last day and the day of the extra session I signed up for, Meulensteen Method: 200 Level Course "Training the Difference: Developing Creative and Confident Players" with Rene Meulensteen, Former First Team Manchester United Coach and Erwin van Elst, President, SportPartnersUSA - Meulensteen North America. I mean, Rene Meulensteen worked side by side with Sir Alex Furgeson and coached players like Wayne Rooney and Cristiano Rinaldo!!!
So that got some pep in my step and off I scrambled to get ready, check out of the hotel and grab some coffee.
The five hour session was all that I had hoped for. It would realistically take me 4 hours to go over everything we covered in two lectures and two field sessions. In summary, the Meulensteen Method is all about a player development curriculum based on age and developmental stage. It reinforces the importance of basic skills at the youngest ages, but also suppliments that with a philosphy of adding the building blocks of creativity. The curriculum accomplishes this through reinforcing a certain type of coaching style, the repetition of skill building activities and the freedom of letting the kids play!!! I was really excited about everything I was hearing in the lecture and then saw some very talented U10 and U12 boys learning from the activities.
I will list a few very important key points about this ideology for everyone's consideration:
- Identifying, developing and building successful players and teams
- A four piece puzzle to the player's development
- Technical, tactical, mental and physical
- All aspects have overlapping priorities depending on the player's age and skill level
- Providing skill moves at an early age for building blocks to use in creative play
- Kids respond to the environment that coaches create
- Constant positive coaching and reinforcement during training
- Training guidelines include:
- Purpose
- Challenge
- Quality <> Intensity (Directly related, adjust for each)
- Fun
- Meulensteen said the art of coaching included
- Don't talk too much
- No negative coaching (e.g. you did that play wrong!)
- No shouting or coaching from the sidelines
- Don't coach failure, recognize success
- Develop a CULTURE for the player, the team and/or the club
There's that word again.....culture.... three of the five days at this convention, I have heard world leading experts overstate the importance of culture when talking about soccer programs and players. I couldn't agree more!! But what I need to figure out is am I providing that culture to my players? Am I creating the correct culture for my J4K goalkeepers? Am I leading the NSSC in making sure our culture is one that truly places development of the player first? And is it a culture that is building creative and confident players? Not just a winning mentality?
I promise to think of all of those things and use my new found knowledge from Rene Meulensteen to make sure I am in fact, creating the best possible culture for all of the players that I affect.
Much to reflect on as I headed back to the hotel, grabbed my bags and had some lunch before I made my way to the train station. I guess one thing I didn't think about was how was I going to carry all of my stuff back home???? :-)
So there you have it!! Another awesome NSCAA Convention!!! I definitely enjoyed myself and absorbed a great deal of information. Of course I could have done without the cold and the cold weather, but all in all a very positive experience. I certainly hope I don't have to deal with the cold weather when I go to next year's convention....it's in Los Angeles!!! You coming along????
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