Please Note: The transcript is automatically generated by Supertranslate.beta in case you come across any typos or misquotes during your reading.
[Jamie]
Hello and welcome to Coachcast by England Football Learning, the coaching podcast that brings you insight from people across the game. As always, I'm Jamie and I'm with Louise, and today we're joined by Debbie Barry, an FA physical education officer, who's returning to Coachcast to discuss planning for the whole season. Well, hi Debbie, welcome back to the show.
[Debbie]
How are you? Hello, I'm good, thank you. It's good to be back.
[Louise]
Yeah, it's really nice to have you back with us. For those who haven't heard from you before, can you give us a bit of a recap of what you do at the FA?
[Debbie]
So I'm a PE officer, so basically support trainee teachers, primary school teachers, secondary school teachers, just in their delivery of PE in the curriculum and maybe how to use football as a vehicle within that. And then we also support coaches who work in schools and yeah I suppose that would be the main aspect of the role and then there's a lot more to it obviously but yeah that's the main part of it.
[Jamie]
Brilliant well just before we kind of jump into the rest of the show, as you know Debbie, we do kind of like to give coaches some good advice at the top of the show because they might be on the way to training right now while listening into this. So yeah, we like to give them some good top tips to help them.
[Louise]
And also use it as a bit of an arrival activity. I'm sure you're used to this before. So what we're going to do is you're going to give you 30 seconds and we're going to ask you for as many top coaching tips as you can in those 30 seconds. Are you up
[Debbie]
for this for another time? Sounds good, sounds good. Let's do it. Okay, I think to create a really positive environment, you need to be able to build relationships with the players. I would say make sure sessions are challenging, competitive but fun, and use visual aids where possible would be my top tips.
[Jamie]
Lovely stuff.
[Debbie]
I thought I'd go sensible this time. I think last time it was like, you need a coffee, you need to listen to music, you know, pump yourself up. So I thought, no, I'll go sensible this time.
[Louise]
Well all of those things work and they're all perfectly fine.
[Jamie]
They're all really good tips to remember if you're on your way to training right now, definitely keep those in mind. Well Debbie, I think you last joined us probably around a year ago, so how have you been since you were last in the studio with us?
[Debbie]
Yeah, it's hard to believe isn't it? A year's gone past. I mean, just it's been business as usual, really busy, a lot of courses, a lot of PECPD. I suppose over the last year we've been supporting a lot of the Playphase content that's come out, doing those kind of roadshows, filming other content and supporting with the disabled footballers workshops, which has been really good. But yeah, just busy, busy as usual.
[Louise]
What were the roadshows like? Were they good fun?
[Debbie]
Yeah, really, really good. So, you know, those were happening all over the country. So that was a really good thing to be a part of and just again meeting new coaches and it was really nice to see other coaches coming back that maybe we've met before. So just engaging the coaches within that was really important and really good.
[Louise]
Do you feel like you've learned anything different or new that you'd like to share with the listeners at all?
[Debbie]
This is, I think, my third year in the role. I am, and I'm just always really conscious and blown away by people that I get to work with on a daily basis and just the knowledge that coaches have. And I think, you know, with a lot of the media and a lot of the content being produced, you know, that's so accessible for coaches around the country. So it's just, we're really fortunate to do what we do and not all that knowledge is so easily accessible. It's just, you know, finding ways to, you know, reach it and just finding the time to watch it. But it's all there. And yeah, there's a lot of good stuff that we don't have to replicate because it's already been done for us. And, you know, I look at it myself. So.
[Louise]
And have you had some kind of good reviews and stuff for a lot of the content that we've put out there?
[Debbie]
Yeah, no, absolutely. You know, everywhere we go, kind of, you know, on our courses, we're always talking about the resources available and the amount of time coaches will say to us, you know, I found this on the website or I've listened to the podcast, you know, it reaches so many people that probably we're not really aware of, but yeah, all positive.
[Louise]
Nice to hear.
[Jamie]
Yeah, absolutely it is. Now Debbie, you've joined us today to chat about planning skills and how to actually plan for the whole season. So to start, how important are planning skills and what would you actually recommend coaches to plan for?
[Debbie]
I've been involved in teaching and coaching for probably 12, 13 years and I suppose the longer I've been in this role I've become more convinced just how important planning is, I suppose in terms of quality of learning, you know, and promoting that with your players, but also from a personal perspective in terms of kind of maintaining your own mental health and keeping that enthusiasm for the work that we're doing. It's just to make sure that we leave ourselves enough time to plan for that. Coaching is so complex and there's so many tasks and qualities needed within, So having that planning time is really beneficial for us for a number of reasons. We can use it to help us maybe be more innovative, think of new ideas, new approaches, how to change things up a little bit. It also gives us the time within a session that we can be adaptable and reflect on actually what is happening in front of us because we've got a bit of an idea of what's supposed to be happening and so we can take a step back and actually see how we need to maybe adapt or challenge or support different players and I think for me personally it just helps relieve stress because you know the role is so busy and I know a lot of people will have that as well with full-time jobs, families, things like that. So the last thing that you want to do is be thinking of a session on your way to training. And certainly for me it just relieves that stress that I've got something prepared. But also for like novice coaches, it helps build confidence I think as well if that planning time is added in. It's important and also I want to say in terms of training and match days, if we can have a link between those two aspects of our commitment to the players and what we're doing, that's really helpful.
[Louise]
Yeah, I can really see the benefits there from you outlining, just thinking my day to day life, it helps a lot to plan, isn't it?
[Debbie]
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.
[Louise]
What does planning look like for you at Doncaster Bells? And when do you start planning and how long does does it take for you?
[Debbie]
With the role that I have at Bells, we and all the coaches there, we're really fortunate to be in a position where we have a technical director who has written a text syllabus curriculum for us. So in that sense we're quite fortunate that we can just go week by week with themes that have already been written. That's from the under 10s up to the under 16s and then there's obvious differences and variations depending on the age group. But what I would say is it's quite holistic and there is the technical, tactical focuses each week. So for example, you know, there might be a primary focus of say defending in wide areas. We would have two coaches per session. So one coach would deliver one aspect, the second coach would deliver kind of the opposite aspect off that so that the players are really getting the full range of that topic. I think from a psychological point of view that's already woven into the session because that's what games are and there's lots of aspects to that that coaches can highlight and then you know make it a bit social, making it fun, those arrival activities that we've talked about, you know that's a really important time that we need to add into the session itself. But in terms of the themes itself, they are already ready written for us and yeah we're quite fortunate in that respect.
[Jamie]
If you didn't have that sort of technical director or even thinking back to teaching, how would planning for whether it be terms or whether it be actually for the season, how would that actually look then for anybody that's listening that might not have the personnel there that's obviously going to be directing what that curriculum looks like?
[Debbie]
Yeah it's really overwhelming actually you know to think about if you haven't got that experience or that extra support to kind of guide you and that you know just having a blank page in front of you or a blank screen is just like, where do I begin? But I think the best advice that I can give coaches is just to think about the elements of the game. You know, there's going to be attacking, there's going to be defending, there's going to be elements of transition. And, you know, just to have those overarching themes and what's important to the coach themselves and then it's to break it down into chunks throughout the season. We talk about six weeks mainly because that's it aligns with the education and half terms and things like that so I think that's the easiest way but just to break it down, what time do you have across the year with the players and then break it down into those six weeks and just narrow your themes related to the game.
[Jamie]
And would you, and again this is personal opinion, like there's no right or wrong way to do this, but if you're focusing on the six week block, would it be one theme for a six-week block for instance then?
[Debbie]
Yeah, absolutely, and you know you could have a theme of say pressing and tackling, That could be your theme for six weeks and then you just have to think about what each session will look like more specifically, keeping that theme. And it's really personal and there's no right or wrong way to do it. But the really good thing is there's so much content and support and help available out there so you know coaches who maybe are a little bit overwhelmed with the idea of it you know they just have to jump online and there's a really good help and support for them to just get started.
[Jamie]
This was going to be something that we're probably going to bring up a little bit later, but it seems like quite an apt point that we do actually have some six week session programmes on the website. So if anyone listening or watching this, if you want to go to the England Football Learning website, click on the sessions page and we've given people some ideas to, don't have to go word for word with it, just like can adapt it for your space and for your numbers and for what your players need but yeah if anybody does need some help we've got some some resources there to help them with that.
[Debbie]
Yeah definitely they've been they've been really good and I know the team involved you know have taken a lot of time over that and absolutely totally recommend having a look at that later on.
[Louise]
I guess it's a really good way to kind of take steps into doing the planning as well, or like understanding how a six-week programme might look. If you want to then go on and try your own or whatever. What would you say that coaches need to know before they start planning? Is there something that they need to do before they even go into it?
[Debbie]
It's quite difficult actually because there's a wide range of things to consider. You know, understanding player needs, their age, their stage. It's important to think about that because we want to make it appropriate for them and not make it too difficult. We don't want it too easy either. So I suppose taking all of that into consideration is really important. But understanding also why they're there. So we'll find with our younger players, you know, hopefully they're there because they love it. They love the sessions, they're with their friends, they enjoy being with you as the coach because your sessions are really engaging and they just want to keep coming back. And then obviously as they get older their motivations are going to change. You know certainly when they get to 15, 16 some might be on a pathway to reach the next level, so motivations in that sense might change and you know it's really important what I would say is to have those open lines of communication. Do we as coaches need to signpost them on to other things? Maybe they're thinking about going to, you know, abroad, maybe university and just really helping and supporting them in what they want and where they want to go with it. But like I said, just open lines of communication and having those regular touch points is really important.
[Louise]
Would you say there are any other ways or bits of advice you could give to coaches to help them find out that kind of information?
[Debbie]
Yeah, I think obviously having that conversational aspect is vital, but completely understand that trying to get round 16, 18, 20, 24 players, you know, it's really hard and we're not always going to have that time to be able to have those in-depth conversations. But that would be number one, like that's key for me, is just when they arrive, just have a quick conversation with them, those touch points, maybe three times a season. But then obviously using the technology that we have and maybe creating like a form that they can fill in or having time where they can write down notes and maybe collecting that information at the start of the season might be really good and yeah I suppose it's just building up a picture of that individual player and then that will ultimately inform and help our planning process as we go on.
[Jamie]
One of the things that you probably find out in terms of once you get to know your players, and that does take a lot of time, it's not something that you're going to know straight away, but when you find out like different needs, wants, and you find that players maybe have different abilities, how could you maybe build, or do you have any top tips to potentially build into your plan that how you can actually cater for players that need different things, that have different abilities over the course of the season?
[Debbie]
Yeah I mean it's using STEP I suppose would be the key thing for me and because we want the sessions to be inclusive, we want to keep everyone together as much as possible. Every player will have individual needs and it really depends on the environment that you're working in. So for example for us, and I'm really fortunate as well to have other members of staff that support me. So I was under 16's coach last season and now I'm with the under 21's and I have staff that I can send players to on a more one-to-one individual basis depending on what they need. But again, you know, that's not possible for everyone. So it's just how do we utilise STEP and how do we challenge the players that need that? How do we support the challenges that they need, you know, that extra little bit of help? But you can do that while remaining in the same activity and you know it's all about the space. Do we need to change that? Do we need to add in more players? Take players away? And so yeah I think you just utilising step is a massive one.
[Louise]
And I guess that's something you can use in your planning process. You could like run through the step principles kind of as you're thinking how to switch things up for people I guess.
[Debbie]
Definitely and even having that space you know in the plan for step and plans will have to also be realistic aren't always gonna you know go the way that we want them to, because that's real life and that's just something to be aware of. But I think it's important that we just have something to kind of relate to and go back to if we need to in those difficult moments.
[Jamie]
What would you say, say a coach is brand new to a team and they don't know all the information about the players just yet, what could their plan potentially look like or kind of an outline? Is it the case of identifying points of the season, so you know you've got pre-season, then obviously you've got your break up to, you know, obviously your time up to Christmas and stuff like that. What could that plan look like for a new coach to begin with?
[Debbie]
It depends when they come in as well to coach. So if coaches come in at the start of the season, you know, they've got a much bigger picture that they can look at to kind of break down and look at dates and those six-week plans and half-terms and really embed that into their planning. But coaches that maybe turn up halfway through the season into a brand new team, that can be really overwhelming. If there's no plan already in place, Where do you start? And I think the key thing to remember is that being enthusiastic. I remember going into sessions my first time and you get the butterflies and the sweaty palms and you're thinking, how do I actually build up those relationships with the players and it's just conversations and how was your day and what do you like and learning some names is a really key thing and you know social activities are really good and team building and you know just keeping the players moving, it's competitive, it's fun and then you will realise really quickly the characters in the team and who to look out for and that will really help you then whenever you take a step back and then you can think maybe longer term about actually okay, you get to know the players over, you know, the first couple of sessions and then that will help you as you go on. So, it's hard, like it definitely is, but I think just be brave and just go for it and the learning the names is a really big one. I work with my colleagues who have different approaches to that. Some use the stickers and names are written on that or some just have a really good memory and just use the names throughout the session and that's really positive and really helps the engagement levels of those you're working with.
[Louise]
Yeah, brilliant. In your opinion, what should a short-term plan look like?
[Debbie]
So the short-term plan is specific to that session and there's a variety of ways it could look. So, you know, it could have elements of a warm-up, an arrival activity and then it's really up to the individual coach what they prefer. Maybe thinking about a whole part whole, maybe carousel activities or parallel games depending obviously on the theme. But the good thing about the themes is because they're game realistic, you know, they can be embedded into any of those aspects of obviously the session design. So I suppose it just depends on your numbers and what you prefer as a coach. For us we have quite a lot of players in the programme so we tend to use parallel games and we do a lot of game based sessions to get across our concepts and what we want to go after as a club. So yeah, parallel games for us, just pitches set up side by side is really good for those larger numbers.
[Jamie]
And what would you then say a medium-term plan is?
[Debbie]
So medium term planning is, we touched on earlier, is that six week block where you might want to cover a theme and just go after that then individually over the six weeks. So like we said earlier, you know, pressing and tackling could be a theme for six weeks and then that's all you focus on for those six weeks and then the next six weeks and so on throughout the season so that would be your medium term.
[Louise]
And then so is the long-term plan like a combination of all of those?
[Debbie]
For me the long-term plan is the overarching theme of what you want to get across throughout the whole season. So for me personally I kind of take you know the holistic approach of you know I get the players in in July and by May what do I want to have achieved with them and I want technically competent players, I want them to be physically ready for the demands of the game, I want them to have a really good game understanding, but also I want them to be good teammates and learn those skills that they will need later in life because not all of them, I mean they will want to become professional footballers but that's just not realistic you know for all of them to achieve that so it's about embedding those life skills as well that they will need to take on in whatever career or whatever, wherever life takes them, if it's away from football, if it's within football, you know, I think that's really important. So kind of for me that holistic theme is important throughout the whole year, but then it's in how do we do that in the attacking elements and in the defending elements and transitional elements of the game.
[Louise]
Yeah, I think it's really nice to kind of see it as like this whole plan can really help you, a way of transforming your team, I guess, taking them somewhere that you want to take them in.
[Debbie]
Yeah, absolutely. It's really rewarding as well and, you know, to see that growth from when you get the bid, say in July in pre-season and just, you know, look back over the season what they've achieved. It doesn't have to be cups and trophies. It depends what success means to the individual club or coach. That's quite external but actually how they grow and develop as players and people is just as important as well.
[Jamie]
Do you have any top tips to maybe help coaches plan for the whole season? So you mentioned that kind of like your approach is your long-term plan. So for the whole season is just where do I want to be like at the end of the season? What do I want the players? Which is a really nice framework to work to and then I suppose it's working backwards from there almost to achieve it.
[Debbie]
Yeah exactly and it's you know that working backwards and having that blank page is the hardest thing to do and I think you know it's just having the time to actually set aside to think about it but also to remember you know you don't have to do it alone and you know you can build up those relationships with other coaches you know get a mentor or join a development group and you know there is so much help and support available and you know that people can can utilize and you're not alone in this and like I said there's so many online resources as well but just to have the time to sit down, think about what is important to you as a coach and then thinking of the elements of the game and then breaking that down into those six-week blocks and then your individual sessions from there.
[Jamie]
Now this episode will initially go out like partway through the season, so kind of with that in mind, do you have any advice to maybe help coaches review how their plan's been going so far and maybe amend it based on the findings I suppose?
[Debbie]
Yeah, always plan and pencil. Things will change all the time, you'll have to be adaptable, the game changes all the time so what might be relevant at the moment isn't going to be relevant in a couple of months or a year down the line but What I would encourage coaches to do is also stick to that plan. So coaches who are working with maybe the younger age groups from 10s up to even up to 16s, what I would say is trust the process and stick to the plan that you have in front of you because we don't want to become too reactive. We want to give our players the best education, a well-rounded education and we can only do that by sticking to what's in front of us and if we become too reactive and we chop and we change and there's no consistency, that's really difficult for our players and their learning. And you know, then we'll see gaps appearing in that process. So having that clear, explicit criteria will help the players, but it'll also help us to really remember where we're up to. But also when it comes to reviewing how they're getting on in their development, you know, an assessment, you know, we've got that clear criteria that we can always refer to. So certainly up to under 16s, stick to the plan and don't become too reactive and you know that will come when they reach you know 18s, 21s even in the adult game. You know where points and league table standings do become really important and where they will have to be reactive week on week but certainly for our younger players stick to what you have.
[Jamie]
How difficult is it to avoid being reactive maybe at the younger age, because like you say obviously everybody wants to win and it's competitive, but how important is it to remember maybe the long-term goal than maybe reacting to,you know, we've lost maybe heavily at the weekend and now trying to fix everything in one week for the next week rather than actually, you know what, we might just need to talk about it a little bit but, you know, we'll just kind of get back to what we were working on or planned to work on originally.
[Debbie]
That's the biggest challenge I think and it's so easy because football is so emotional and you know we're invested so much in it and like you said it's so competitive that it's so easy to think maybe an under 10 team might lose heavily at the weekend and the coach is thinking, oh there's pressure, pressure from parents, players and thinking oh I need to do something in my training session during the week to stop that from happening. But, you know, it's just being brave and being strong on your principles and beliefs and just think, you know, what is best for the player, for the child and their learning and their development and that is the well-rounded, every aspect of the game kind of curriculum and yeah it is difficult. Sometimes even myself, you know, I have to think about where my players are at and yes they are older now, they are really in that bridge between first team football where it does matter, but for me it's still there's a lot of development aspects to it. And for the older age groups, having that clear plan, If something doesn't go right at the weekend, we would obviously mention that and maybe add that in to the next week's plan, but it's just being strong and remembering that we need to give them that well-rounded education going forward.
[Louise]
Would you talk to your team about the fact that we're sticking to the plan? Would you be open about that?
[Debbie]
Yeah, definitely. And the players, I suppose, for me personally, they don't need to know the real explicit details of the plan because that's just information that they don't need. But certainly from a week-to-week basis we would be really clear on what we're going after, what is the theme and then obviously relating that to the weekend. So yeah, we'd be quite open about what we're doing, but just certainly maybe from a short term perspective instead of that longer, more detailed planning that we would do.
[Louise]
It's a learning thing to kind of stick with it, not just drop and change. That's a really good lesson for them to learn as well.
[Debbie]
It is and you know they do learn it eventually, maybe not at the start. It takes a while and a lot of conversation, you know, but when it does click with them and they can take a step back and they kind of understand the process and you know that that will benefit them in the longer term which is good.
[Louise]
What top tips could you give people who don't have too much time to plan? What kind of things could they do to kind of get this plan together in the quickest amount of time I guess?
[Debbie]
I'd say just get online and see what's already ready out there. Like I said, you know, you don't have to come up with all of the ideas yourself because somebody's already done it and that's the beauty of coaching and having social media is there's so much content and people are so happy and willing to share what they have done and what has worked, what hasn't. So I suppose if you're needing that short-term fix, it's just having a look and seeing what maybe other people have done, but then adapting it for your age that you're coaching with at this stage and make sure it's appropriate to them and it's not you know pulling off a Man City session that they've seen online and trying to deliver that with their under 11s you know that's not gonna work so it's yeah just thinking about what's appropriate for who they're working with.
[Jamie]
That kind of ties nicely into a question that was probably going to ask us a bit of a follow-up, is like what does planning look like depending on who you're coaching? Does it actually change, does it differ and maybe are there any top tips to help coaches keep that in mind a little bit?
[Debbie]
I mean in terms of themes and the game itself it probably won't change that much but it's how we we deliver it and the language that we use and the difficulty and the detail will change. So yes, we can have, for example, maybe a pressing theme and what we would do with our under eights, you know, there's elements of pressing, but it's the language that we use and we don't want it to be too difficult. We need them to understand what it means and what that looks like, but then we can have the same session, and same theme pressing and do it with under 21s. And all we would need to do is add in that more detail and add layers to it. And maybe think of a primary focus there would be a secondary focus and then a tertiary focus as well embedded in that. So yeah in terms of themes similar but the detail and language you know that would change.
[Jamie]
Yeah it's just really important to just to really know who it is that you're coaching and just making sure that they understand it and also that it's fun for them and just easy for them. So I suppose like I say with pressing like it might the terminology or like say the layers of detail are going to be different and you scale that up and down but the actual theme in the session obviously can can kind of be the same then.
[Debbie]
Yeah exactly and then just being really clear and what success looks like and that's where you're questioning and answering and really the coached in detail comes out and just making sure that the players understand that. Are they verbally able to communicate to you? Maybe technically they're not quite there, they kind of know what they're supposed to be doing but if they can repeat back to you what they're doing and understand it, then you've got a really good basis to work on and then it's just kind of adding in those little elements to help them maybe in the technical detail.
[Louise]
If we just go back to people who are kind of quite time bound as well, Do you think it's crucial that they plan for the whole season or is it okay to just focus on short-term planning and medium-term planning instead?
[Debbie]
I think it comes down to the personal preference of the coach so you know if timing is an issue you know I wouldn't worry too much about having the whole season planned out. That obviously takes time and takes a level of detail to be able to do that. But if you don't have that time, focusing maybe on the medium term and just have those six weeks maybe at a time and then you can break it down individually. I think for myself I need that plan. I think it's really difficult just to go in blind to a session and just coach it. So for me and my personal preference, I probably would like that, but I know coaches that don't work like that and they can just coach off those shorter term or the medium term plans, which is fine as well.
[Louise]
I guess it's like, there's almost a little bit of, it might take you a little bit of time to do the planning, but actually in the long run, it might help you save time because you've got it there and you've got something to refer to when you're short on time.
[Debbie]
When you write it, you'll always have it. So that year on year and the more experience that you get, then you can add bits, take bits away. And just having that basis of something is really vital.
[Jamie]
And like we mentioned earlier, obviously we do have six-week session programmes on the website for anybody that does want to have a bit of a medium-term sort of plan and needs some help with that that can be a bit of a guidance and just see how that how that goes and if anybody does give it a go let us know in the comments as well like we'd love to hear your feedback on that. Now if my memory serves me right Debbie, last time you were on the podcast you mentioned individual development plans. Now I suppose it depends on your coaching context as to whether they might actually be actually needed but for anyone that hasn't heard that episode Could you maybe quickly summarise what they are and what they maybe should have in them and why they might be important to you?
[Debbie]
Yeah, definitely. So we just refer to them as IDPs and it's basically just for the players to get to start thinking really about their strengths and maybe areas of improvement in their own development. So it's really giving them the ownership of what they want to achieve that season. For me personally I think it needs to be a collaboration with the player and the coach but I think that the player certainly needs a little bit of ownership over that and how we would do it is think of two aspects in possession, two aspects out of possession and get the players to really think about, like I said, their strengths and areas of improvement and then during the touch points over the season you've got something to refer to and I suppose it goes back to what we talked about at the start and building up that picture of the player and then you can add in questions like personal goals, what do you want to achieve that's maybe specific to your position or you know where you want to get to in your football journey and you know having that information is really important and really helpful and it's a good I think it's a useful tool for coaches if they can do it definitely recommend it.
[Jamie]
Yeah and just the only reason for bringing it up is just thinking like that might help in terms of with the planning in terms of the long-term planning just thinking has these things, are we kind of preparing them to achieve what you're determining as success but I'm assuming for IDPs it's maybe more older age group players is it or am I wrong in saying that?
[Debbie]
It can be you know right from our younger players obviously then it goes back to the detail and the language that we would use in that but certainly we would try and use that with you know our younger group age groups from even 12s and I would use them still up with the under 21s I think it's still relevant to them and what they need.
[Louise]
I suppose it helps you explain your plan to them as well like if you know what is in their plan you can kind of say I'm trying to help you with this that's in your plan and it kind of helps everybody keep on board.
[Debbie]
Yeah definitely and that collaboration is really important especially for the relationship building. I think players just want to know that you're going to help them and you know they want to know how they're going to be supported and having that to talk around is really important and helps with, like you said, the planning throughout the season. Every club is different, every club has a different philosophy, every club has a different way of playing, a style of play and if we can really hit that then individually then it kind of helps us to develop those players to move in ultimately to be fresh team players one day.
[Louise]
Well looking back at everything we've discussed, can you summarise the key things you'd like coaches to take away from this episode?
[Debbie]
Plan. Even if it's, like we said, just even a few themes in that six-week medium-term kind of block, as long as there's something, I think, to work off, it's a great start. And, you know, we don't have to go into vast details straight away, that will come. But certainly just having you know at least a six-week plan to work off is good and I would definitely encourage that.
[Louise]
And would you, if you were to set coaches a challenge to kind of go away and do something to take that step into planning a bit better, what would you suggest they do?
[Debbie]
Just find half an hour, 20 minutes to sit down with a coffee, Think of a theme related to the game and then, you know, six bullet points. Can we break that into six smaller chunks? And that's your medium term and short term plan sorted. So that's it.
[Louise]
Simple as that.
[Jamie]
Right. Well, we are coming up to the end of the show now Debbie, but that does mean it is time for our Swift Session feature.
[Louise]
Yep, so hopefully you remember this from last time. I do indeed. Another 30 second challenge and this time we're going to ask you to explain a session idea to us. Are you up for the challenge?
[Debbie]
Let's go for it.
[Louise]
Okay, once the music starts you can begin.
[Debbie]
My favourite session is all around pressing, so press for success is a really good session that I would encourage coaches to do. So You've got a directional game, split the pitch in thirds and then encourage your players to win the ball as high up the pitch as possible in their attacking third. If they can pinch the ball and score, it's worth triple points.
[Louise]
Wow, There you go.
[Jamie]
Nice and succinct as well that.
[Debbie]
I think last time I couldn't get my words out. I was a bit flustered, I didn't know what to say.
[Louise]
You've been practising since.
[Debbie]
I've been practising.
[Louise]
Yeah, you're telling everybody everything in 30 seconds.
[Debbie]
But honestly that's my favourite session and you can use it with your youngest players right up to the older players as well. Like I said, just add in the detail. It works for a range of ages, which is really good.
[Louise]
Brilliant, sounds fun.
[Jamie]
Brilliant, Yeah, no, that was good. Well, thank you very much for your time today, Debbie. Really appreciate you coming back onto Coachcast and sharing your top tips. I hope you've enjoyed it again.
[Debbie]
Yeah, my pleasure. It's always nice to see you both. So thank you for having me. Anytime. Thank you very much.
[Jamie]
Right. Well, that is all we do have time for today, but don't forget to check out the episode description for the transcription to this episode and for all the links to our platforms. There you'll be able to click through to the England Football Community and this is where you can post your coaching questions for us to discuss on the podcast or just simply to connect with loads of wonderful coaches.
[Louise]
Yep, we'd love to help you out with your coaching questions so please do check it out. We'll be back soon with another episode of Coachcast so if you haven't already, hit subscribe to make sure you don't miss an episode. From all of us at England Football Learning, thanks for listening.