Sorry this is late unfortunately I wasn't able to get it out on Friday evening like I said it was going to be but better late than never ay?
Last night I took a session with a group of elite U12 girls in Cornwall. The session topic I was given to coach my session around was 'Attacking the space' so my understanding of that was creating space on and off the ball to then exploit it.
Over all I thought the session went well, the outcomes that were set before the session were met by the girls by the end. The main reflection on the session was the fact that I changed my original plan to try and challenge the girls more as their level of ability and understanding was very good for their age, it was obvious very quickly that they needed to be challenged more. To meet this need I changed the technical part of the session by making it more competitive and this automatically increased the amount of decision making they needed to do.
When planning for this group in the future I now know what level they are at an can plan session around that now with more insight into the group and individual players.
This session was one of my first opportunities I'd had to really coach a group of this level and I took an awful lot from it. Realising the jump in ability from sessions I'd run before to this and so realising the amount technical stuff that I was going to be able to challenge them with.
Being able to get to know every player and how they think was also beneficial and this was highlighted when a competitive edge was added, there are some characters in the group and it was obvious that with the right pairing/grouping these players were going to shine. What I didn't expect was that the more shy players also to shine when competition was added and I saw a different side to them, playing with more confidence and aggression. Getting to know the players more helped me when going into my technical practise as I was able to make the groups depending on their personality they had showed me and it seemed to work really well. With them in these groups it also allowed me to set smaller challenges for groups or individuals depending on their needs although I feel like I could have used this more during the session to really challenge all. All players came out of their shell a little bit more as the session went on.
Because this was my first session with the girls I started with quite an autocratic style as I wanted them to get into the mind set of listening and ready to play and learn. As warm up went on I left them to it a bit more to allow them to express their ideas while playing and didn't really have a huge amount of input until the skill practise. I became more democratic as I started to us question and answer and guided discovery more and the girls seemed to respond to that method quite well as all engaged and listened. The characters in the group needed some more autocratic coaching I found to get them concentrating and thinking but that came down to individual personality.
Since the camp I mentioned in my last post I have realised that self reflection is very important in a coaches development and is one of the main reasons I started this blog. This is one of my first reflections that I have taken the time to write down myself and properly think about my coaching and the planning of my session so realise I can get better at reflection and any comments would be appreciated.
So over all I thought the session went well and I adapted well, The use of individual and group challenges is something I need to work on more to really push all players in the group and meet their needs and this would also help me to manage the characters in the group. I will also leave more time before in advance of session to plan and really think about the outcomes I want the players to meet and how I'm going to get the players there.
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