Hello and belated welcome to this week's slightly later blog. There's been so much going behind the scenes that I found it difficult to come up with a topic for the blog. Thankfully some of the other committee members came up with some great ideas, which you'll be reading over the next few weeks, but this week's comes from Martin Jack (Jacky) who is Head Coach of the Giffnock SC Amateurs and expert in the world of business. Here's what Jacky has to say on similarities between the worlds of sport and business:

Sport and business

As volunteer coaches we all have a day job and a love of football which brings us together at Giffnock Soccer Centre come rain hail or shine. We’re encouraged to attend Scottish FA courses and our own CPD nights to make us better as coaches, improve the quality of coaching of the young people under our wing and take the club forward. However, we bring a great deal of experience from our day job too and if we can channel that into our coaching then we can all become better as a club.

I set up in business almost eight years ago and, as a small business, have had a fair share of ups and downs during that time. If anything, I’ve learned more from the bumps and bruises along the way than the successes, and managed to evolve the business to meet the challenges faced as a result.

I’ve also been a football coach for the past eighteen years with The Giffnock Soccer Centre, starting with boys when they were 6 years old until this season when we kicked off in the amateur leagues.

When you’re running a youth or amateur team you don’t have the luxury to buy in big name stars to fill in gaps in your squad. If you’re lucky some of the team will know some mates who are interested in coming along. As a coach you have to look at the talent you have and blend it into the 11 key positions that any team requires. 

Square peg

Goalkeepers are specialists and generally it’s difficult to transform an outfield player into a good goalkeeper and I’ve yet to experience a good goalkeeper I’d prefer to have somewhere out on the pitch.

In business there are some skill sets you just can’t ask either yourself, if you are a sole trader, or your staff to undertake because basically it’s counter productive to the objectives of the company. So in this instance businesses need to consider outsourcing the ‘goalie’ duties.

For the outfield positions you have defenders, midfielders and attackers. Some defenders can easily play in midfield, midfielders may be attack minded or defensive in nature and attackers are generally selfish buggers who want the glory of scoring the goals and won’t play anywhere else.

In business you may have to look at the balance of the workload ahead of you and blend the current team into the tasks required. These can change on a regular basis so you may have to use the substitutes or move people about. Whatever the solution, those performing the tasks need to feel comfortable. Stretched yes, but not to the point where they are scared to do something in case it’s wrong.

You may need to be more aggressive in your sales campaign and this is where you need some of the selfish mentality that goes with good forwards. They may not score every time but as long as they continue to knock on the door and make themselves available the goals will eventually come along.

The midfield is the engine room of the team offering one part creativity, one part energy. Maximising the opportunities available while making sure the defensive line is holding out. Without the creativity the chances won’t come along for the attackers; without the defensive cover the foundations of the team may well fall apart.

Without a good defence a team is nothing. If you don’t concede goals, chances are one of the opportunities created during the game will be taken and the team can go away with a winning bonus. But good defence isn’t just about the back three or four. It’s about the whole team defending right across the park. Knowing where they should be when they have lost possession, tracking the runs, making sure there are no gaps for the opposition to get into, keeping a clean sheet.

Good companies have staff who will defend their every action knowing it’s best for the long term objectives of the company. They know that everyone else want the company to succeed. They know they sometimes have to make sacrifices to guarantee the long term goals.

Giffnock Amateurs

From a business perspective that’s about doing your research, giving everybody the tools to work to their capability and knowing what the opposition is doing and counteracting any moves they make with your own. Also helps if the manager looks at the bigger picture ahead rather than worry about what went on a few minutes earlier. The past as they say is history. Learn from it quickly and move on.

As a football team we just don’t walk onto the park and play ninety minutes of kick ball.

We train hard before the start of the season. 

We play friendlies to iron out the cob-webs and to try out players in different positions, shape the team differently and find out who has the bottle for the matches ahead. 

All season long we train each week and coach players to make them that little bit better. We don't rely on the pre-season work several months earlier.

Small steps which when taken over the course of the season will add maybe 10% to each player’s performance.

There is so much sport can learn from business. However, there is also an awful lot that business can learn from sport, even at an amateur level too.

Dribbling and Beating An Opponent

 This week's blog takes a look at what dribbling is and how I train it. As ever, please leave your feedback in the comments section below.

Second only to scoring goals, dribbling is a skill players enjoy the most. For many fans of the game, passing, especially since the success of Spain and Guardiola's Barcelona, is the most important aspect of teamplay. However, dribbling has always been the essence of the game- since its earliest forms; football has been about dribbling the ball from one end of the field to the other. In football, the ball must be dribbled with the feet and for many the joy in dribbling is to dribble past another player.

Warm-up

As one of the core skills of the game, I ensure that all of my coaching sessions start with dribbling. Each player gets a ball each to familiarise themselves with the feel of the ball at their feet and I encourage them to get as many touches as possible. While dribbling around the pitch players are using other skills such as vision/awareness of event s around them and also working on their fitness as they move continually without stopping.

Players should be encouraged to use both feet so as to make it changing direction easier and also more unpredictable when facing an opponent. Next, I encourage players to dribble with each foot; so we'll do right foot only and then left foot only before alternating right-left-right-left for a couple of minutes each. Finally I finish my warm-up with some footwork patterns such as:

• Inside-outside on one foot/alternating feet
• Inside/outside only on alternating feet
• Laces-laces-sole-sole
• Inside-outside-laces-sole on alternating feet

These patterns encourage players to develop quick feet, familiar with the ball in a range of movements.

Key Coaching Points

When I work on a dribbling session at training I give these key coaching points:

• Keep the ball in 'your space' (the ball should be no further than arm's length from your body)
• Lots of little, soft touches
• Use both feet
• Keep your head up for awareness

And for dribbling to beat an opponent I encourage:

• Change of speed
• Change of direction
• Change of feet

*Dribbling at speed, with bigger and fewer touches, I distinguish as 'driving'. Dribbling should be about closeness to feet with lots of touches.

Drills

As with any coaching session I will avoid queues and straight lines of players. I like to throw down lots of markers and gates/slaloms for players to make their own way around. I tend to use two main dribbling sessions- the 'network' and one with gates for driving and slaloms for dribbling. I think that having these freeform sessions encourages players to make decisions for themselves while experiencing lots of repetition which helps to learn the skill.

Network

Gates and slaloms

Players may only dribble between cones of the same colour i.e. red to red Players may dribble between alternating colours i.e. red to blue Coach may use as many different colours as possible Encourage players to move in straight lines from cone to cone For younger players I let them be cars driving on the 'blue/red road' or bees going to 'red/blue flowers'

Players may dribble freely between obstacles but must use small touches to dribble through blue slaloms After each slalom players should drive through a red gate at pace Emphasise the change in pace between dribbling and driving

Game-related

As with any training practice I follow a drill with a game-related practice where player face opposition and have to then react as they would in a game. I often use channels where players must simply try and dribble past a defender to score a point. I also use a small 'rondo' game where the team must keep possession with passing before dribbling between two defenders to score. Both games encourage bravery and decision making on the offensive player's part.

   

Red player passes the ball to the blue player Blue player then attempts to dribble past the red defender to score a point Coach should use a broad, short channel to help the attacker enjoy more success, with a narrower channel increasing difficulty as required Remember to encourage change of pace, direction or feet

Blue team retain possession until the red defenders are drawn far enough apart A blue attacker should then attempt to dribble between the red defenders to score a point A bigger area will allow more success for attackers, as will more attacking players

Here are some more dribbling ideas:

http://www.scottishfa.co.uk/scottishfootball.cfm?page=2590

http://www.scottishfa.co.uk/scottishfootball.cfm?page=2591