Are your sessions game-based?
Hi everyone and welcome to another edition of the coach insight newsletter. This week we have some wonderful topics including games-based sessions, a reflection tool to get the most from your career, help with coaching transitions, and much more.
The Top Ten
Rhys Desmond on The Mastermind Site outlines why he believes games-based learning is the best for supporting long-term development. Games-based allows us to bring the context of the game to the training sessions, making it as realistic as possible considering what we have at our disposal (pitch size, number of players, etc). https://themastermindsite.com/2023/05/12/games-based-learning-for-optimal-athlete-development/
An article from the Training Ground Guru team, charting Ajax’s move into building a full model of football. By bringing research specialists into their backroom staff, the Amsterdam-based club is looking to gain an edge in all areas. Why is this relevant to all coaches? As clubs push boundaries with research, we all start to learn more about how best the get the most out of our players and help them become better footballers.
https://trainingground.guru/articles/how-ajax-are-building-a-full-model-of-footballPretty nice team dynamics thread from The Daily Coach on the team culture of the Miami Heat basketball team. They look out for the disease of me. the 6 signs are under-appreciation, paranoia over being cheated out of one’s rightful share, a player leadership vacuum, long-standing feelings of frustration, personal effort for external only reasons, and resentment of the competence of another. What do you think? Anything else you would add?
https://twitter.com/TheDaily_Coach/status/1657743943184920576
David Garcia with a reflection tool he states will help you become a better coach. The clarification of why. Why we do things. Why coach, why that team, why that age group? Tying this back to goals will help you become more structured and thus easy to know where you are, where you want to go, and what you need to do to get there.
Do you struggle with creating realistic training drills, well here is a good thread on how to do just that from MaccaCoaching. 4 steps, identify common scenarios within games, visualise the scenario within a practice setting (using paper or coaching tool), think about how the practice will run, progress, coaching points, and outcomes, and finally create the practice!
https://twitter.com/MaccaCoaching/status/1661104577301606400
Sport Psychologist Dan Abrahams here with some advice on helping your players create thinking to help them play with freedom. https://www.linkedin.com/posts/dan-abrahams-b72a306_something-amazing-can-happen-when-you-don-activity
Next up is the FA Learning article on coaching transition. Their top tips are patience, directional practice, scoring systems for both teams and identifying what you are hoping to achieve. https://community.thefa.com/coaching/b/insights-analysis-blogs/posts/top-tips-for-coaching-transition
According to this interesting article by Jordan Cassidy on the skilled athleticism website, when creating practices we should be setting problems for our players rather than outlining solutions. The main points Jordan sets out is that we as coaches like to set the problem then walk players through the solution, but there can be many solutions to the problem, by not allowing our players to explore the different solutions we don’t allow them to experience the why themselves or build up the deeper connections on solving the solutions themselves. https://www.skilledathleticism.com/post/task-design-set-problems-not-solutions
Free content alert! The Welsh FA’s coaching website has lots of free age-specific training session plans. So if you’re looking for some inspiration, head over to
Finally, an interview with a sports mental skills coach call Stephanie Hale-Burkhart on her journey and methods with her current team, and getting her athletes to be more mentally prepared and withstand the pressures of the game. https://www.mensjournal.com/sports/seattle-mariners-mental-skills-coach
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