I was six years old when my dad used to wake me up to watch the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. To this day it is still the best world cup i’ve ever experienced. My dad and I would get up at ungodly hours to watch 22 grown men chase a ball around for 90 minutes. Having grown up in a rugby household where names like Ma’a Nonu and Piri Weepu were staples, it was a very unfamiliar experience to me and I don’t remember all too much, but I remember the way I felt, an excitement like nothing i’d ever felt before. The colours, the vuvuzelas… the Jabulani 🤩

After that world cup, it was over. Gone were the days of collecting weetbix cards hoping to pull Dan Carter or Richie McCaw, a new game had become my obsession. I played football at school, for school, on weekends, although funnily enough, I never touched the pitch for a club team. After breaking my foot and realising my dream of playing any higher than sunday league was dead I turned my attention to coaching. I figured my value to the game would be much better expressed through trying to be an exceptional coach rather than a player. Fast forward to today and that’s exactly what I’m doing, plying my trade as the reserves coach at my local club (the mighty Claudelands Rovers #COYR!!! 💪).

As a coach, there’s something that really bothers me in New Zealand. Football is our most played team sport yet the support is lagging. You ask anyone what team do they support and they’ll say something really cool (like West Ham #COYI⚒️) or something really dumb (like Arsenal 👎). Point being, I’ve not once spoken to someone that outspokenly supports their local. And why not? The games are on at reasonable times, you feel involved, you can interact with players and staff, I could go on… That’s exactly why I created MUDDY STUDS. The game in New Zealand doesn’t get the love it deserves and I feel it is my obligation to try and change that. Welcome to MUDDY STUDS, I hope you brought your season ticket, because we’ve got lots to cover.

Good Point - Well Made 🤝

This section belongs to the team. Every week MUDDY STUDS will cover a person, a story, a club that is helping to keep the beautiful game alive in New Zealand. This week, I gave you a little bit about me, but from next week, it’s all you! If you know someone or something with a story worth telling, we want to know about it. Flick me an email and tell me about it 😊

In this section I will share some of my learnings in my time as a coach that you can (hopefully) apply to your sessions and teams. Remember, I’m not a guru, only a guide. In the words of some of the best coaches, “take it, use it, adapt it!” This week has absolutely nothing to do with session design and everything to do with environment design.

Too often coaches are caught up on planning the perfect session and making sure that they come as prepared as they possibly can. My question to all of you is, are your players in an environment where they feel like they CAN learn? Stay with me. Coaches need to look at themselves as environment designers. You are responsible for creating an environment where players feel like they are heard, seen and valued.

Real Madrid recently released footage of the halftime talk in the 2024 Champions League against Dortmund. What was really interesting about this was despite being put under copious amounts of pressure in the first half, Ancelotti waltzes in, calm as a cucumber and asks his players how they would like to approach the second half. No screaming, no yelling, no dictating. Just a line of questioning which gave his players the confidence to solve their problems themselves. I highly recommend you give it a watch, you will need captions though, unless of course, you already speak Spanish 🇪🇸

The point is, a good environment will bring you more benefit as a coach than any perfectly designed session ever could. Part of our job as coaches is to design environments where players feel comfortable expressing themselves and taking accountability for their development (with a little bit of help).

Valued players are confident players and confident players make good decisions.