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[Jamie]

Hello and welcome to Coachcast by England Football Learning, the coaching podcast that brings you insight from people across the game. As always, we're Jamie and Louise, and today we're joined by Katie Sorenson, who's returning to Coachcast for a two-part episode to provide you with an ultimate guide for training. Well, hi, Katie. Welcome back to the show. How are you?

[Katie]

Thanks, Jamie. Thanks for having me, both of you. I'm really good. Really looking forward to talking about the subject today and really excited to be in our brand-new podcast room as well because it looks absolutely amazing.

[Louise]

It's a bit of a change, isn't it? It looks nice though.

[Jamie]

Yeah, it's a fair bit of a change for anybody watching on YouTube. Yeah, no, it's great being there in the new studio and for you to be our first guest as well.

[Louise]

Yeah, thanks for joining us again. It's really nice to have you back on. We always enjoy having you on.

[Jamie]

For anyone that hasn't tuned into an episode though before, do you want to give us a bit of a brief reminder of what it is that you do before we get on to the rest of the show?

[Katie]

Yeah, of course. I think Last time I was with you both, I had a different role. So I was previously a game insights analyst. So looked at insights from across the game to support coaches with what that might look like within their own environments. On my role now, I'm a learning experience lead. So again, I guess taking different insights or different work that we do here within FA Learning and trying to understand how we can best make it personalised and connected for different coaches based on where they coach and where their players play. So slightly different role but really really enjoying it.

[Jamie]

Fantastic and congratulations on the new role. Thank you. Glad to hear you're enjoying it too. Well just before we do dive into the main part of the show, as you know, coaches could be tuning in to this right now as they're on their way to training, so we like to give them some good tips at the start of the show.

[Louise]

Yep, so this is your 30 second challenge where we're going to ask you to give us as many top coaching tips as you can in those 30 seconds. You up for that? Of course, yeah.

[Katie]

Ready, ready to go.

[Louise]

So once the time starts, you can begin.

[Katie]

Okay, so think about your initial connection when your players are coming to the session, whether that's a high five, whether that's a quick conversation, find out about their day, whether they were at school, work, wherever it was, just get that initial connection piece out the way. It's really, really important to create in that environment. Think about an arrival activity for them to get them engaged, a little bit of enjoyment before that you dive into the session and think about how different elements of your session, your different practices linked one to the other. It will just help you massively within your setup.

[Jamie]

I absolutely smashed it just as the timer went up.

[Louise]

Well, we've finished.

[Jamie]

They've absolutely smashed that, Katie. Now over two episodes, we're going to look into giving coaches like an ultimate guide for training is kind of what we've called this by providing top tips and insight on an array of topics. So we'll dive in. And the first topic that we want to put to you is planning. So first, what's the most important thing for coaches of all levels to remember when it comes to planning training?

[Katie]

I think when we're thinking about planning, we can very much go to the, everything's got to be perfect. And sometimes actually what we need to remember is training might not go the way we sometimes think it will. So there's having a plan, but there's also maybe having like a little bit of flexibility within that plan. Definitely think about how your plans are going to support your players short term, but also longer term. What does it look like for them across the season? And I think the final one for me is just how do you connect what you're planning to do within training, how does that actually connect to what the game looks like for your players on match day? I'd probably say those are the biggest considerations.

[Louise]

You did mention kind of medium and long-term plans, but what does short, medium and long term plans look like for you?

[Katie]

I think it can look very different based on where you coach. So for me, short term could be anything between a week and six weeks, but that six weeks could be six lots of one hour sessions. That six weeks based on where you train could be three lots of like one hour sessions a week, so it looked very, very different. But I guess that's your more immediate plans of how you're going to support your players. Think medium, then you're probably going a bit longer term. Maybe if we go in pre season till till Christmas or you know after Christmas, and then the season. And then long term program. I'm really thinking there about well, what am I looking to do across the whole season? So we definitely look for long-term, what are our aims for the season or what does success look like for us? And we probably use that as the end piece and then we kind of plan medium and short term off the back of those.

[Louise]

Do you have any other tips or advice that could help coaches kind of create those plans?

[Katie]

I think just trying to understand very much what it looks like for your players, like what is their reality, I think that's a massive key point because we all have ideas in our head of maybe what brilliant planning looks like, but it needs to match at the end of the day what the players are going to be tasked with during a game, during a tournament, whatever it is. For me, I really find like starting with the end really supports kind of what I'm doing with my planning. So if I've got maybe like three aims, I work power of three, I love power of three. So if I've got maybe three aims for the end of the season, and that's kind of like my gold standard, but then I can start to work back to them what it looks like shorter term for me. And that's how I work. But I know obviously the other coaches work differently, but I know that really works for me.

[Jamie]

So how do you know what actually needs to be covered in these plans? Have you got any advice for anybody tuning into this?

[Katie]

I think it's the way I try to look at my plans. I say it's very much looking at, well, what do my players need? Where do they need support? Whether that's stretch and some challenge, or maybe where is it that they actually just need a bit more support and a bit more of like an arm around their shoulder. I think, you know, especially if you're working with players going through growth and maturation, they might need a little bit more of that tailored support. So just knowing the player in front of you, knowing how they best learn, knowing how they best take on board information. And basically, the whole point of being a coach really is that I spoke about it, that long term player development. So what are you going to be doing for each of your players individually because they're all going to be at different stages and they're all going to have different maybe experiences and exposures to the game. So how are you going to really put a mirror up to each of them and allow each of them to have that development so come the end of the season you can say I've really had success this season working with player A, player B, player C and it might have looked really different for each player but all of that comes from how well you've planned and how well you've structured your planning.

[Louise]

Do you have any advice to help coaches make training plans that are flexible so it doesn't matter how many people turn up?

[Katie]

I think that's probably one of the biggest challenges within football. I mean, where I coach within the senior women's game, we'll have players that are coming from shift work or maybe they have got kids and child's unwell and suddenly they can't come to training or the car's broken down. That happens at the top level of the game. So we know what's happening probably with younger players if they're reliant on their parents or they're reliant on public transport. We know that you probably might plan for 16 players, you might only have 12 turn up. So my thing would be to say don't plan for the players, plan for the principals. So if you had 16 players, you might want to do an 8v8 focused on, I don't know, elements of how to play through the opposition. But you can still do the exact same session with a 6v6 rather than an 8v8. Your principles of playing through are the exact same. You just maybe slightly altering the pitch size and slightly altering, obviously, maybe the number of players on each team.

[Louise]

Yeah, that makes sense. Makes things a lot smoother, I imagine.

[Jamie]

Yeah, absolutely. I can also imagine like people like planning in terms of like wanting set numbers and whatnot and how difficult it then probably is realistically to be flexible to that. So yeah, absolutely. Like think with the principles in mind rather than maybe the number of players that that may or may not actually turn up. How can coaches plan effectively if they don't have much time? So bearing in mind like a lot of people at grassroots will obviously be volunteers and balancing full-time roles as well. So if they don't have much time, what can you do to help them plan?

[Katie]

I think my advice would be, I call it a set menu. So I've just said to both of you around like I have like an almost an a la carte menu. So when you go for dinner, you might have somewhere that's, I don't know, 30 pounds for your starter main dessert and you've got some structure there because you know you're going to be getting your starter main dessert for 30 pounds, but there might be three or four options for your starter, maybe six options for your main and again, three or four options for your dessert. And that's very much how I work. I have like a menu of practices that I really, really enjoy delivering. I know are effective because I get high player engagement. I'm able to get maybe some of my coaching points across and it's competitive because for me, there has got to be elements of competition within whatever you do. And I very much then might go to that set menu and I might pick starter one, main meal three and dessert number four, maybe. And it's just how you vary that. So I definitely say having some sort of menu that you can pick from, pick and choose. Maybe if you have those outlined at the start of the season, mid season when you're really, really busy, you might just be able to kind of refer back to that menu and go, right, tonight, I'm going to pick these three elements. And that for me really, really works. And I think it's definitely a time saver.

[Jamie]

Yeah. Just out of interest, could you kind of give us an insight into what that would look like? So if you're delivering a session tonight and you're picking a starter, a main and dessert, what would that look like?

[Katie]

Yeah. Okay. So I guess if you were looking at maybe you always start maybe with like your learning objective. So my learning objective tonight was I want my team to look at how well we high press. So maybe my starter might be elements of like little 1v1 duels where you've got to press your player, you win it. If you win it, you get a point. If they score past you, then it's a point. But if you win it and you score yourself, it's worth two points. You then might move into your main course, which is maybe more of like a possession game or maybe a wave practice. We're bringing in more players, might be three V2s, four V3s, five V4s, anything like that. So now we're still continuing though, with that elements of high press and what it means. But now it's not just me on my own. I'm working with some of my teammates. And then I guess dessert for me is always the best meal. It's my favorite bit, bit of dessert. And I guess that's now we're going for be more a bit little games, small sided games, medium sized games based on obviously number of players you have. But again, just referring back to that learning objective of we're going after how we're going to press high triggers to do it, how you set traps, but you're basically just bringing elements of your starter and your main forward with you into your dessert.

[Louise]

I like that. Really cool idea and really good way to remember how to kind of pull something together.

[Jamie]

Yeah, absolutely. And I really like the creativity behind that as well.

[Katie]

Thank you. I love food, so there you go.

[Jamie]

While we are actually talking about planning for training, I think it's probably quite a good opportunity to highlight to everybody that's tuning into this and we've worked, all of us have worked across this in terms of the six-week session programme. So we've got plenty of six-week session programmes on our website for you to look into. You can download those for free and use with your teams and obviously adapt them for your team. So do go and check those out if you need help with planning to give you some ideas over the next six weeks. And if you're interested in learning more about programs and how to create one, I believe there was a webinar in August. So go on to our YouTube channel to check out when that's added on there and yeah and see how it goes and then also let us know if you have used any of our six-week session programs to see how it went.

[Katie]

Absolutely, yeah. Definitely please tune in, get our views up.

[Jamie]

Yeah, I just thought, get that plug in there.

[Louise]

So finally for this section, so we've worked our way through planning, got some really good tips there, but what's the biggest mistake coaches can make when planning for training? That was our last question in this section.

[Katie]

I think it's something I was very, I did quite a lot maybe when I started coaching, where I wanted to just coach absolutely everything. So maybe I had a 90 minute session with my players and I probably had six or seven different practices within that one session. So I'd be like, right, 10 minutes, now we're going to do this for 10 minutes, then we're going to do this for 10 minutes, then this for 15 minutes. And the issue with doing that was my players never got much opportunity for the repetition element. They might've got really good at something and I'm already trying to move them on to the next practice. So they're not actually getting any opportunity really just to confirm their learning and something that I see a lot of is, you know, it's very easy to take practices from online. So our six-week session programs are fantastic. It's Very easy to just take it and use it yourself without actually thinking if it's something that your players actually need. So can we start developing sessions for our players that are for the players rather than starting with a session and going, oh, my players can fit into that session. And for me, yeah, overcoaching, I think I just said I did it. I'd move on, move on, move on. And I spent so much time talking to them and they didn't actually have much ball contact time. So for me, I know you asked for one mistake, Louise, but I've given you three that I think are things I know I was definitely conscious that I was doing and on reflection I've probably adapted now how I do plan and then how that affects how I create my programmes and then how I deliver those.

[Louise]

Yeah, it's really useful point to kind of, well, three points to kind of come up with because I suppose it's that not wanting to over... Sometimes you feel like you're doing more but you're actually overloading people and giving them too much. So keep it simple I guess.

[Katie]

Yeah keep it simple is definitely the key message.

[Jamie]

Brilliant. Well the next topic is practice design. So first what do we mean by practice design? And then can you give us your top three tips to help coaches with it?

[Katie]

It's very hard to describe practice design without saying it's how you design your practices. But I guess really is like the creation and the delivery of what you're going to be doing with your players, because, you know, we talk about sessions, that's probably your overarching hour, 90 minutes with your players. And then the practices are the elements within it. So obviously, I've already spoken about your starter, your main, your dessert. So those are the practice elements in terms of like, what makes a really good practice design, it's got to be enjoyable. It's got to be engaging for the players. It's got to allow for your learning objectives to come out. So I said about, okay, might be learning objective is I want us to be able to play through central areas really, really well. So if that's my learning objective, then my practice design has got to match up to that. Because there's no point in me setting that as the learning objective, but actually my players are only getting loads of opportunity at finishing because the whole point of it is I want to see how we get to the point of finishing. And then finally I think it's again just yeah recognising what do your players actually need in that moment compared to what probably we think we want to coach. It's almost marrying the two up because we have thoughts of what we want to deliver but we know the needs of the players. So if you can marry those two up then I think you'll be able to to put together really good practices.

[Louise]

So when you're designing a practice where do you usually start? Is there a theme or a problem or a specific activity that you're going after?

[Katie]

I think within the environment that I coach, because we are very performance based and performance focused, so we at the end of the day need free points week to week so we can climb the table or, you know, to obviously, we don't want to be in a relegation battle. So a lot of how we base kind of our practice design is off of maybe a problem from the game. So it might have been, I don't know, a team that we played against on the weekend sat in a really low block, really compact, and we just couldn't break them down. So I know that my theme for the week needs to be around. Well, how are we now going to break down a team that sits on a low block? Because that was our problem. So then I'm thinking ahead of, right, so this is what the players were challenged with on the weekend. So now I'm trying to think, okay, so now what do they need from us as coaches? What do they need from the practice that gives them loads of repetition then of playing against a low block. It's then realistic because obviously it's what's happened, but then it's also relevant to where my players are playing with kind of their age and stage, those kinds of considerations and the needs for those three points. So for me, I guess yeah, we're probably problem focused which then allows us to almost like derive what theme we're kind of going after and then I build the practices off of the back of those game problems.

[Jamie]

Kind of touched on a little bit in terms of what you think effective practice design looks like for you. So just wondering if you could maybe talk us through a practice you actually love to use and what made that effective and how the players responded to it.

[Katie]

Got so many. I think one that really stands out for me, I love small sided games. I think they're really, really critical element for players because in terms of like your three hours, they all come out and it obviously allows your players loads of different situations on the ball off the ball. But one that I really like to do is it's almost like width of the 18 yard box so we're looking very much like lane three central to the goal but in terms of then like the high it's the 18 yard box and then another 18 yard box on top so if you try and imagine that you're basically mirroring the 18 yard box and just putting it in front of it again And then I slightly cone off like a slightly wide section within the 18 yard box, maybe about five yards on one side and five yards on the other. Then I might have like a 77 practice going on in that central area. But then one player from each team can almost patrol that little section I've kind of cornered off. And then what we're looking for there is then like opportunities for them in wide areas, crossing and finishing because we know the game has loads of different types of crossing in it. So what I'm looking for there is like timing of our movement to finish technique on our finished technique on the cross so many different ways you can cross like you've got driven crosses, cut back crosses, passes across lofted crosses. So I'm trying to give my players loads of repetition of different techniques to cross and then allowing them in those wide channels to build the relationships with their teammates who are trying to be meeting those kind of crosses to finish. It's basically small-sided games, it can be 6v6, 7v7, almost with a player on each team kind of locked into that wide area, so we get loads of repetition of kind of crossing and finishing elements.

[Louise]

Sounds good. How do coaches know if their practice design is bringing out the right amount of realism, relevance and repetition?

[Katie]

Sometimes that can be a really hard thing to do because when you're coaching, you're looking for so many things. It can be really, really hard to recognize if my three R's are actually kind of like the focus point. And I do think that comes with the more you coach, the more practice you have, the more opportunity. I know we'll go on to it in the next one around observation, but the more you're able to observe and probably take a bit of like a zoom out a little bit and just try to think, well, does this look like the game that my players are playing? Are they getting good opportunities to almost like repeat and have opportunities to try and try and try that particular element? And is it relevant to kind of like their age and stage and those kind of considerations for them. So again, does it look like the game they're going to be playing against on the weekend? And I think if you can just kind of like have that as your power of three, so my realism, my repetition, my relevance, if you can almost tick those three things off every single session, you'll start to again build yourself a really nice bank of practices because you'll be able to say, oh this one, yeah I ticked off maybe two of the three, brilliant. This one I didn't tick off any of the three, so I don't think I'll try this practice again or if I do I might adapt maybe some of the step principles, I might adapt the space, I might adapt maybe the players that we've used within it. And next time, maybe it might be three ticks. So I think if you can almost tick those things off, I think it allows you to have a better understanding of if your practices are the right practices for your players.

[Louise]

Yeah, brilliant.

[Jamie]

I'm guessing now, I think we probably know the answer to this next one in terms of having a clear learning objective when actually designing practices. I'm imagining, does that then help you figure out if it, you know, the realism, the repetition, the relevance, basically by having the learning objective among other things as well.

[Katie]

Absolutely. Something I've trialled is almost I have my whiteboard, which obviously has all my counters on one side and I show players things on that. But on the flip side, I might actually put the learning objective. So as the players are coming in, getting their boots on, maybe having a quick catch up with each other and a quick kick around, they already know what the task is for the evening. I've already kind of just found a little seed in their head. So again, I'm already getting them on board before they already they even know what we're about to do. So yeah, I am very much like learning objective guided. I know I think back to when I was playing and I think it's something quite common with female players. You always want to know why why we doing this? Why am I doing this? Why have you set us up like this? Because we just want to know the answer to everything. So already there, me working with female players now, I'm thinking, I know when I was playing, I wanted to know the why. So that's why I put the learning objective on the board for them. So as they're coming in, they're going, ah, tonight, going to be looking at how we defend the box. Okay, I wonder what those practices will look like. But then already when we go into the practice, the players are going, ah, I can see how what we're doing now in this particular practice links into what was on the board. I think it works really well.

[Jamie]

Yeah, no, I like that. A Really nice top tip and quite a simple top tip to take away as well. I really like it.

[Louise]

I feel like I'm coming in like the voice of doom again, but what do you feel is a common thing coaches can get wrong when it comes to practice design?

[Katie]

Again, it's probably just trying to move on a practice when the players aren't ready for you to move on the practice. So it's almost like having a structure that we've got maybe the starter, the main, the dessert, but sometimes you might need to spend longer on the starter and that's absolutely okay. The thing is, you know, these players will be coming back next week. So there's actually no issue of you spending the whole night if you need to on the starter because you can then go into the main and dessert with them the week after. So I think it's just, yeah, being conscious that do your players need a little bit more time practicing that particular element? If they don't, great, you can move on to your main, you can move on to your dessert. But if they need a little bit more time, gift them the time because you've got the whole season or if you're going short term, you've probably got another two, three weeks working on that particular element. So don't panic and think you've got to hurry things along and move things along. Be patient with your players and show that patience within those practices.

[Louise]

Yeah, brilliant. And I think it just shows you, you know your players as well. If you know they need a bit more time, you're listening to them and kind of it's their practice. Absolutely.

[Jamie]

Yeah. Creating the right environments next. So what does a great environment look like at training for you?

[Katie]

I think this is something that I'm really, really big on. I am. I think if you would probably ask players that I've coached, I'd like to say that they think I create a good environment because that for me, if you can create that on and off the pitch, you'll see the success kind of on it as well. I think it's about, I've already hit on it, but engagement, enjoyment, players playing with smiles on their faces, players almost being gutted that the sessions ended for me is like when they're going, Oh, we've already finished. But that's the biggest, biggest win. And I think you definitely get that with younger players. And I think sometimes as players get older, they lose that a little bit, but it's something I'm massive on with, with the players I coach, I coach players that are, you know, 16, 17, all the way through to their 30s. You've got ones at the very start of their journey that are really energetic and want to learn. You've got ones maybe coming towards the end and maybe are thinking about going into their own coaching journeys themselves maybe. And I guess that great environment could look different based on where you coach, based on age of your players and based on their own, what they've got going on outside of the game. But if you can just promote that engagement, that enjoyment, getting to know them, welcoming them, praising them at the right times, they'll want to come back every single week.

[Louise]

Is there one thing that you do or you would like to see coaches do to help players feel like they're valued in training?

[Katie]

I think it's person first, player second. So just get to know how your players best learn. Are they someone that needs a little bit more of an arm around their shoulder? That can be metaphorically, that can be a general arm around their shoulder as well. I've got players that really thrive off that. I've got players who would prefer you to be more to the point with them. So if you're able to get to know the person and how they best receive feedback and how they best maybe deal with setbacks or deal with successes and you get to know how they best respond to your different ways of verbal or non-verbal communication, that for me is like the key.

[Jamie]

And kind of thinking the time with the right environment, how important is it for coaches to embrace mistakes, to make players feel safe in that environment?

[Katie]

I think we all make mistakes. You make mistakes at work, at school, on the football pitch all the time. And I think it's almost like embrace the mistakes because I've believed that if players make mistakes, it's better learning opportunities for them. So I've started to do that with players that I work with. I almost praise the mistake in a way to celebrate, look, it's okay that you've done this, because now think about what you're going to adapt now. So, okay, you might have, if I give an example, you might have made a mistake of how you defended the ball in that wide area. So what are you going to do next time to make sure that doesn't happen? So it's almost taking that mistake and turning it into a learning opportunity for your players. So just reframing it for yourself and reframing it for them, because sometimes it can be the loneliest thing on the football pitch, feeling like you've made a mistake, missing an open goal can feel like the biggest mistake, but then how would you just help players think, okay, we just won't do it again. How do you get them thinking, okay, next time we'll be better. So yeah, just reframing it from a mistake to a learning opportunity, I think is the key.

[Jamie]

I think it's really important that learning opportunity. I think, was it Vinny that we had on recently? I think, and he was saying like, if he was to, you know, you struggle with something and that you was to, you know, see, you might see that you are, you failed to do something, but actually rephrase it in terms of a first attempt in learning is the way that you rephrase it. Just embracing the mistakes. That's what you learn from Ultimate. That's what training is as well. That you're practicing those skills. So yeah, no, absolutely.

[Louise]

How can coaches create sessions that cater for the wants and needs of their players? Because I guess there must be lots of wants and needs.

[Katie]

Yeah, well this is the thing, like we all have perceptions or ideas of what we think the players need, but sometimes I think there is nothing better and I do it, ask them. You know, if you've built a safe environment or a psychologically safe environment with your players and you ask them how they feel within certain moments, they'll be honest with you. And sometimes I think that, you know, we can rely on our own observations and feedback from ourselves, but actually asking the players who are playing the game and performing in the training, it's the best thing I've started doing because I used to think, oh, I can't ask them. I'm not going to ask them. But now I'm like, oh, you know, Jamie, how do you feel within this session now? Do you feel it's going okay? And you might say, oh, I'm really enjoying it. Great. You might say, just not sure if, you know, we're getting it. Okay, perfect. Now I can use this as a learning opportunity for my players. I might get them in. I know we're going to go into it in a bit, but it might just be a word with Jamie. Jamie, how can I help you? Or Jamie might go, I think a couple of us don't understand it. Right. I can just do like a small group or I might look around and go, Jamie's not getting it. I don't think Louise is getting it. I don't think someone else is. Right, it might be better now to have a little bit of a team. Ten second, right, this is what we're doing. How can I help you? So I think it's just recognising the right moments. But player feedback for me is ultimately what can help you shape what you're doing with them.

[Louise]

Yeah, you definitely don't just want to be ploughing on regardless and not thinking about what everybody else is wanting.

[Jamie]

Absolutely. That links in nicely to the next question effectively is, you know, player ownership. Like how, do you have any insight and any advice that you could help coaches apply player ownership?

[Katie]

I think it's getting the balance right, because I think sometimes if we say player ownership, that coaches will go, oh great, players can be in charge of this, this, this, and this. And again, I think that's very age and stage appropriate because I don't think you'd be asking eight year olds to do something that you might be asking 16 year olds or open aged footballers to do. But even just something like when the players arrive and you've got the equipment out and you might again on my whiteboard and it might just be right players. You've got these bibs, these cones, these balls, these mini goals, set up your arrival activity. It's just putting it a little bit on them and they go. Oh, great. Right. We're going to work in twos and threes. We've got 15 minutes to put together our arrival activity because I'm gonna do a little carousel of everyone's activity. And that for me is a great way straight away you're getting player ownership. Something I challenge my players with is I might maybe link to like the small sided games. I might say, right, this team, you are, you've just scored, you're one nil up. Now what are you going to do? Because you've got five minutes left of the game. The other team, you're one or down. What are you going to do? Then I love it. They have little conversations in the team, right? We're one new up. We might, maybe we have to go and get a second goal and then you might have someone say, well, actually, no, I think we should sit back a little bit, invite the pressure. Then you've got the other team going, right, we're just going to go one at the back and six up top. And I just love like seeing how they all share their voices. And I'm basically giving them the ownership to go, right, this is maybe the formation we're going to play. This is our style. And this is how we're either going to keep the win or how we're going to turn the loss into a win. So those are just two different ways of rival activity and maybe some scenario based thinking within training, within small sided games where players can definitely take a little bit more player ownership. But I reframe it, maybe not player ownership, but player centred. I think that's what I would say.

[Jamie]

Okay, I like that.

[Louise]

Has there been a time that you felt like the environment wasn't quite right? You've kind of said that you've kind of given, got feedback from people and stuff before, but if it wasn't quite right, what did you or the coach learn from that?

[Katie]

Again, I'd like to think within my own environments, maybe some of the players at the back of this will go, no, you are completely wrong. But I think I've tried to set environments that are safe and have enjoyment and engagement. I've definitely been a player in environments where maybe I haven't felt that, or maybe I felt that the coach was too harsh in certain situations. And it's something I think I got more confident with as I got older, was almost to say to the coach, a couple of us feel that this might need to change or have you thought about this? And if you are a really open-minded coach, you'll take on board the information. And if you're not, why not? Because I think at the end of the day, you're there for the players and you are not a coach without your players. So how can you really take on board their feedback and some of their insights into how they feel to almost shape maybe how you might adapt your environment? I know for a fact, if a player said to me, I'm not too sure how about maybe our pre-match setup or we're not too sure of you know how much you're telling the information you're giving us before the game. Brilliant I now know going forward, I might adapt it slightly next time. I can feed back with those players and go, Okay, well, I took on board your your kind of your feedback. Did you see that I adapted it slightly? So a bit of Q&A, I'm like, oh, didn't see it, but it felt okay. I'm like, oh, yes, we saw it and it feels better now. Well, now I know that's kind of going to stick with me going forward unless they come to me next time and say, actually, go back to how you were doing it last time, because actually we've decided that's what's better. I think just being really open to taking on feedback is, can be a challenging thing as a coach, because we like to think we're always right, but it can be so beneficial for you and your players.

[Jamie]

It's just quite a vulnerable thing, isn't it? Opening yourself up for that feedback and obviously we all want to hear that, yeah, everything's absolutely fine, of course we do, but at the same time, getting that feedback is really powerful to go, actually we can tailor it and make this right for everybody involved, really.

[Katie]

Yeah, absolutely. I think it's something I've really started to learn is that vulnerability. I'll be honest, I don't think I was at first because I probably took it quite personally if players said, I'm not happy with this or didn't really enjoy that practice. I'd be like, oh, I've planned it. I've done this, I've done that. And I'd probably get down on myself. Whereas now I think, you know what, I love that players feel they can come to me and voice their thoughts, because for me, it means I've set an environment where they feel they can come in and voice how they feel.

[Jamie]

Yeah. Exactly. Okay, so the last topic for part one is linking to match day. So what's your advice for coaches who find that training looks absolutely spot on, it's great, all the learning objectives have been met, everyone's happy, but match days don't really reflect the work that they've been doing in the week.

[Katie]

Okay, so I'll be going what's happening on match day. Maybe what are three things you're seeing power free again. I think it's the best way to work. So key headlines. What three things are you seeing on match day? What three things are you seeing with within training? And then what you want to do is try and ensure that what you're seeing in match day matches more so of what you're seeing in training. So how can you almost find like a middle ground for those two things? Because we all do training sessions, go, wow, our players are incredible. They're, they're Barcelona. They're amazing. And then, yeah, we get to match day and we go, do I remember anything we took them through? But we have to remember they're two very different environments. You know, training is familiar. It's, it's, you know, where you always train, it's maybe a little bit easy, maybe not as much pressure, maybe not as competitive. And then a match day can be quite overwhelming for certain players. So if it's something that it's not like a technical thing, and it's more like a maybe like a social psychological thing, or how do you adapt maybe your training sessions to encourage a little bit more psychological, social challenge, because that's what is happening on the match day. So that's where the gap is. How do we so that when I gave you around scenarios, you might be one knew what one knew down. That is what happens on a match day. So how can we maybe start practices where maybe you go right, Louise, your team, you got a penalty. If you score it, you're one new up. If you don't, it's still nil nil. More often than not, you should score the penalty. So now, Jamie, your team's one or down straight away. So how do you then feel within those moments? Because that will be happening on a match day. I have no doubt on the weekend, you'll go one or up, you go to know what you might go one or down, you might go to know down. So again, just marrying up the realities of what happens on match day and trying to ensure that those elements come out within training.

[Jamie]

Out of interest as well, like thinking on match day, how powerful can it be to sometimes bring some of the stuff that you're working on in training, maybe as like a warm up on a match day to try and link that learning. Is that something that you've done yourself?

[Katie]

More so when like working with younger players, I think when I work with players, I work with non senior game. They quite like familiar patterns of what they do within the pre match. So maybe we're a little bit more structured, but definitely have done it when I've worked with younger players. We've maybe taken elements of what we did on the Wednesday night or Thursday night and just almost giving them a little bit of a refresher of it on the Sunday and you can already you can see them going. Oh, yeah, this is what we did, and they're just reconnecting their learning. And for me, it's a brilliant, brilliant way. But I think that very much is about where you work and who you're coaching with. Because again, if I'm going after three points on the Sunday, I might not be doing certain things I did within the Thursday session because I'm trying to do things on the Sunday that are more related to the team that we're going to be playing against. So I definitely think there's a time and a place for it but yeah I've done it with younger players before and it's really great seeing them almost like reconnect or a bit of retrieval. So we talk about retrieval, it's a bit of retrieval for them which can then be really good then as they go into the game, certain pictures or certain patterns.

[Louise]

How important is it that coaches are consistent by behaving the right way at training and match day and can this actually help players link their learning between the two? Similar thing.

[Katie]

Absolutely. I think, and again, this is where I've really had to probably check myself. I like to think on the sideline I'm quite level headed, but I know there are definitely certain things that really challenge my kind of behaviours, pitch side. It might be, I don't know, another player on the other team's done a really bad tackle on one of my players. Well, I know I get a bit emotional in those moments. So I'm trying to be better at kind of like, just staying consistent and not allowing the opposition or my own players. See, maybe when I have those highs and lows, those are kind of peaks and troughs, but a lot of it sometimes isn't about what you say. It's how you stand and like that nonverbal communication. So something I'd probably say to anyone listening or watching this is does what you're telling the players actually marry up with some of your body language? So hands in pocket standing with your arms crossed kind of like shrugging your shoulders in certain moments or shaking your head in disappointment. If that doesn't marry up with what you're saying to the players, there can be a real disconnect. So I think it's can you just have a kind of put a mirror up to yourself and just look at some of your coaching behaviours and are they consistent from training to match day? Because then you're going to get the best out of your players. If you're really consistent during training and you're really full of praise and you're maybe really encouraging but then that's not what's happening on match day can be really really confusing for the players. So I think just yeah bringing in some of that consistency would really, really help.

[Jamie]

Do you ever set player challenges or like objectives at training and ask them to achieve that on match day as like a way to link the two at all?

[Katie]

Absolutely. Working with a few players around them being brave on the ball, so something that we may be trying to do is that we invert our wide players, so you might have a right footed wide player playing on the left so they can cut in and shoot on their right same on the right side. You might have someone who's left footed that can cut in. And something we're really trying to encourage is them being brave at getting out there, defend and recognizing the moments to cut him. So if we keep, obviously like positively reinforcing those behaviours in our players within training, they're getting the three are they getting the repetition of it? The realism because we're trying to make it as as similar to match day as we can. I'll then just reconfirm that with them before the game. Do you remember what we did on Thursday? You got really good at that. You got really confident at taking on your player. We want to see a little bit of that today. Then if they're doing it during the game, praise if they're not. Do you remember? Do you remember what we said before the game and what we spoke about on Thursday? Okay, well, one, why are you not doing it? Like what? What's the challenge? And they might say, are well, they're not letting me go on on the inside of them. They know that's what I'm going to do. Then I might go, Okay, well, think about how you might vary up. So maybe got on the outside of them a couple of times because as soon as you start doing that, you're defending. Go. Ah, they're going to go on the outside of them. You're going to go on the inside of them. You're going to go on the outside of them. And then you're going to start very up. So maybe going outside of them a couple of times because as soon as you start doing that, you're defending go off. They're going to go on the outside of me every time. So next time you're very up and you're going the inside and then again, if they do that positive reinforcement because they've taken on board a little bit of maybe your guidance around, maybe going outside of your player. And then you're seeing them then actually tactically solving that problem solving within the game to go right. My player keeps thinking I'm going to go on the outside of them now. So now I'm going to vary up. I'm going to go on the left side. So it's just how can you, yeah, almost positively have impact with, with certain players and it doesn't have to be all bells and whistles but just a little thing there around right be confident get out your player you can't go on the inside go on the outside and then if you can't go on the outside go on the inside so just giving them some small ideas of how they might be able to to make the right decisions in the right moments.

[Louise]

I think it's really helpful for people to have that, like in the moment, have those little bits of like tips and tricks and then they'll be able to then carry that on in other ways won't they?

[Jamie]

Yeah, no, absolutely. I was just going to think that if I was a new coach, kind of like, what advice would you give me to help sort of pick the right challenges and objectives to give to those players?

[Katie]

This comes down a little bit to you knowing your players and where they need a little bit more support and when they might need a little bit more challenge or stretch. So I talk about like generalised support and then specific support. So generalised support might be to a few players or to the whole team and you might have specific support for one or two players. But if you get to know quite early on just through watching them, what they're good at, and maybe where they need a little bit more support. Well, that one for support, well, then how are we giving them the information to help them with it? If it's that they're really good at a particular area, well, how are we turning our strength into a super strength? So almost if you are a new coach, just look at your players, say you've got 10 players, so maybe you're coaching within a 7v7 game, you've got 10 players, now look at those 10 players and just look at maybe what they're really good at, what they need a bit more support with and start to think about how you might tailor that support for each of those individual players.

[Louise]

Really handy. Have you ever designed any sessions off the back of a matchday problem and potentially gone away from your original plan before and if so how or if not why not?

[Katie]

I think yes I said about it earlier where we played against a team where they posed us the problem of they sat really, really deep. And the problem was then that we just couldn't like get balls into the box because they basically just filled the box and defended it really, really well. They were brilliant. So I'm going, well, they did really, really well at that, but we just couldn't problem solve. So then I kind of ripped up what we were going to be looking at within a session on the Tuesday and instead we looked at how we might draw the opposition out, almost force them to come and press us a little bit higher, entice them a little bit, because then through enticing them we'd open up a bit more space in behind. Whereas what we were doing was we were just sustaining possession in the attack in third, so it just gave the opposition loads of time to get compact. Get into their shape and just slide and screen and not let us through. So we started to work on maybe our center back staying on the ball for a little bit longer, almost like sharing it along the back line rather than the front line, because then what it was doing was it was just then drawing out the opposition and then we were having more success. So then funnily enough, we then played a very similar team on the Sunday again, again sat in a low block, but we were able to break them down because of what we'd worked on in training. But that was me being vulnerable and going right what we were going to do and what I had planned. I'm ripping it up. It's not needed. I can put it on the back burner. We can do that at a different point of the season. What my players really need help with right now is how they're going to break down a low block.

[Louise]

Yeah. And it's useful to kind of know that it's okay to do that.

[Katie]

Oh absolutely. Again I think it's something I didn't want to do at the start. I thought I've made a plan I've got to stick to this plan I've got to be really rigid with what I do and I think as I've got more and more experience I've got more know okay that might be easier for me to stick to a plan, but it's not what my players need. My players need support on what they're finding challenging, they need support with how they're going to solve problems. So that needs me to adapt the practices based on what their needs are.

[Jamie]

Yeah. Okay, so we've talked about four topics within the Ultimate Guide for Training in this part. So looking back at all of those four, what we've discussed, can you summarise the key top tips you want coaches to take away from this episode?

[Katie]

How long have I got? Oh, yeah. I think in terms of like planning, don't plan for too much. I think we can have these plans in place, as I said, and sometimes we do just have to rip them up. I think definitely your menu. So almost have your favourite practices or your go to practices and how you might slightly just adapt those for your learning objectives. But I always start with the problem at the forefront or your theme. Think about kind of how you're setting an environment for your players, maybe arrival activities, maybe setting them little challenges within training. And always, always, always, when you're putting on sessions, you're designing your practices, think does it look like the game my players are going to be playing? I think those would be my key points.

[Louise]

Really good key points. And if we were to ask you to kind of set a challenge to our coaches who might be trying some of these things out for the first time. What one thing do you think you'd suggest that they do first?

[Katie]

I think it's something that I started to do, and that's how I started to learn maybe more about what my players needed. I kept a bit of a reflective log or reflective journal of kind of sessions I was putting on, and I was almost like ranking them out of 10 for the three hours. So the realism, the relevance and the repetition. And then I was able to go, oh, this one's hit a seven out of 10. Really, really happy with that. But how can I make it maybe a nine or 10 out of 10? And then there were certain sessions I would do and I'm very happy to say they were complete failures and they didn't work for whatever reason. And I was able to say, those are my kind of maybe three out of tens, four out of tens. So how will I adapt those to make them maybe eights, nines, tens going forward? So yeah, just keep a little bit of a reflective log, link to your learning objectives, link to what's going well and what could be even better within your practices. Cause at the end of the day, we want to be providing the best learning experiences for our players in training.

[Louise]

Yeah. Brilliant.

[Jamie]

That's really good. I suppose that helps create that menu of choice that you was talking about.

[Katie]

Absolutely, yeah. Those ones on my menu are my 7s, 8s, 9s, 10s out of 10s that I know work and I know my players enjoy.

[Jamie]

Brilliant, well thank you very much for now Katie for part one. That is all we do have time for today, but don't forget to check out the description for the transcription of this episode and for all the links to our platforms. As always, you can head to the England football community to post your community questions for us to discuss on the podcast or simply you can drop them in the comments section below.

[Louise]

Yep, we love to help you out, so please do send your questions in. We'll be back soon, so if you haven't already, hit subscribe to make sure you don't miss it. From all of us at England Football Learning, thanks for listening.