25th July 2017 Dunstable Town FC 0 Luton Town 4 - A day in the dugout

Another fantastic evening for a club re-birthed and reconstructing processes learning protocol to run football matches off the pitch whilst we replicate that on the pitch.

So it started with a haircut…I thought, I’m looking a bit ‘Gordon Strachan’ (in his heyday) or maybe Cilla Black here. Going to have to get the groundsman on it if I don’t tackle it.

So I sat in the chair, who would have thought football frustrations would come out here? “You’re the Dunstable Town manager now aren’t you”? Yes I am. “I would love to be a football coach” he said. “Well why don’t you then”? I replied. He said, “Well, I did my badges but I gave it up. I really want to do the big stuff”. I responded again, “So….why don’t you then”? He said “Well nothing came up. Really I would want to be the Luton Town manager”. At that point a lot of frowns appeared on my head along with confused eyebrows and shocked eyes. “Really, Luton Town? fair play mate, maybe I would suggest you learn your trade for a few years, keep learning. Go and coach a kid’s team and start learning”? He said, “Well I only want to coach at pro level and it’s hard to get in so I left it”. I thought to myself, wow, I coached for years in grass roots, I coached senior amateur teams and spent over a decade coaching in academies as well as working in senior pro environments. This guy wants to bypass all of that? I wanted to go from that shocked emoji to the one of the monkey with its head in its hands, but I feared it could ruin my rapidly improving appearance.  Then he continued, “well I also want to be a scout, that’s where I really see myself, scouting players”. For a split second my ears pricked up, I actually could do with some help scouting, this is a young keen guy maybe. So I asked, “oh, fair play. Do you go to a lot of games?” He replied, no, I haven’t been to a game for years”. “Oh, but you want to be Luton Town manager, when was the last time you watched them?” He said “I can’t remember, years. The last actual game I went to was at craven cottage, Fulham v Man Utd and Ryan Giggs scored with the outside of his foot volley” I did another shocked face. Now in my head I’m thinking, that’s years ago. I remember the goal. A quick check when I got home it's 10 years ago. I rarely go 10 days without seeing a live game! So, my head went a bit “You do know that the current Luton Town manager has done all the things you are refusing to do, as well as played a lot of games”? I’ve also coached for 20 years and been at several pro clubs and studied hard and now I’m at club 'beneath him'.

As I left I was thinking how that attitude was consistent with a lot of footballers. They want all the lavish lifestyle and celebrity life, but are not willing to do the hard part in between. Then they wonder why they fail. Is this there fault or simply a culture of young people gaining celebrity status on fast-tracked reality TV shows? Why go to acting school? Why bother? Why write great comedy? Why bother? Why work on great presenter skills with knowledge? Why train in professional entertainment? You don’t need to go through all that, you can bypass it. I wonder if many young people now think football is the same. Do they think there will be a reality TV show football club that takes people out of there lazy lives and thrusts them into stardom and all they need to do is act stupid, talk without any amount of respect and decency and parade around half naked and be promiscuous. Bingo, I’m a footballer or a football manager.

Andy Millman (Ricky Gervais) addresses show makers

I think this was brilliantly illustrated and so well written in the series Extras by Ricky Gervais with the character Andy Millman having a realisation of his life having been on celebrity Big Brother pointing at the camera saying “f*ck you, the makers of this and you lot for watching” after describing how desperate you must be to want to be famous so much you hand in your dignity at the door. 

I think this is one of my favourite speeches of all time Extras Speech It makes me think about football and how its changed with so many quitting after they don't 'make it'. So why did you play in the first place? Was it to be famous or becasue you loved football? 

Anyway, the Football…

I must extend a huge thank you to the ground staff at Creasey Park because the pitch is looking tremendous.  Overall as we go through pre-season you can see the new bunch of lads learning about each other. We are on a very steep learning curve and I have to say a unique situation for me. But that is the challenge I relished. Perspective is something we have to keep reminding ourselves of. We are a very young team, they are impressionable. In some cases they are lacking a bit of confidence and they don’t realise how good they are. But it will come. Because we are not lacking ability.

Tyeeeq Bakinson along with Freddie Hinds now Bristol City
& Cameron McJannett now Stoke City

I had a very warm chat with Andy Awford as he shared some of the work they do from a holistic view of player development at Luton Town. It would be wrong to go into detail but I was really impressed with the approach to ensure young chaps are afforded equal opportunity. He also spoke about the importance of creating good people with life skills. Well done Andy and thanks for bringing them to Dunstable Town. Although it is a reality check to be looking young men in the eye that I coached when they were 11/12/13/. It fills me with personal pride to see them doing so well. I remember a young Arthur Read and complimenting him only for my fellow coaches to remind me that I always rate the ginger haired players. Well I don’t think anyone that was at last night’s game would disagree that I think I have been proven right as he pretty much dominated midfield with very clever movement and rotation and use of good first touch and passing range. Good to also have Tyeeq Bakinson also come to me and say hi, such a nice humble well mannered young man. I recall his parents well and I know they will love to hear that. I wish him and all them other lads huge success and nothing would fill me with more delight than to see one or two take the field in the football league, let’s hope in a gleaming new stadium and gleaming new era for our professional neighbours.

One of the challenges we face with our brand new crop of players is self-belief and confidence. We have to remind ourselves that we also were a very young team. Dare I say, not your typical Step 3 Southern league semi-professional outfit currently. Added to to that we have had 9 training sessions, in our lives as a team. In those 9 sessions we have had to fit in a recruitment program, followed by a pre-season. When most of our competitors were starting pre-season games in gleaming new kit, we were still drilling down on a new squad selection after rustling together some footballs. So, this is very much a fledgling outfit. All things considered then I feel we are in exciting times when you consider that against two excellent similar level teams we have more than held our own and have put fear into team’s defenses. These lads have got a load of work to do, but I’m so proud of them already. We had two 17 year olds on the pitch yesterday. I’m so confident in their ability, they are not filled with that confidence yet, but they should be, they were terrific. When I see Aaron Hudson whipping down the line, beating his opponent, showing great skill I couldn’t help but smile. The score didn’t bother me one bit in moments like that. Brandy Makuendi in centre midfield also, you wouldn’t believe he is just 18 as he demands the ball and shows great ability to stay on it. That’s bravery. Nimmy up front, 17, hangs on every word you tell him. I think if I asked him to make his runs from the defending corner flag he would do it. These young men are learning fast and we will watch them mature as young men as we go. In the next bracket we have a group of 19-23 year olds desperate to learn and willing to work hard to improve. That leaves some pressure on our experienced ‘old’ players, Scott Betts (24) and Skipper John Sonuga (28). These chaps have shown great calmness. Fantastic role models.

Overall Luton Town dominated this game. That statement is not an embarrassing one to make. Tactically we needed to place ourselves in better positions to be able to make contact and we know that now and will work on it. A shift in shape helped with that and for the first time it allowed us to get forward in a sustained attack. There keeper made a good save from electric Ryan Young (he will terrify teams this season), that would have been 1-1. Instead a combination of errors from us allowed them to tap in a second.

Of course we still have a lot of questions to answer as to who and where so from that point we had to remind ourselves that we are preparing for a season and therefore we have to put preparation ahead of the result as we moved personnel around and tried some different things.

So, full credit to Luton Town lads and another good work out for our lads as we get nearer to the season.

We should give a mention to the guys off the pitch. The people who volunteered to save this club and now work tirelessly to get the club prepared for genuine football matches. We still have kit to sort out, we are rustling together water bottles for the lads along with many other things which they are sorting and have sorted. But the ladies and gentlemen behind the scenes are all on the same page in that we want to create a togetherness and professional approach from here in. There is a real solution and can do approach and it has created a buzz around the pitch and place. The fans have been brilliant to the players, they understand the dynamics and there patience and support is hugely appreciated. The amount of young children in Dunstable Town and Luton Town kits enjoying a night out was also great to see.

Ive got to thank all the people that have stepped forward to help me and the club already. Like my old colleague from west London Justin Lucas-Hill. He has been provided professional medical support for us as well as helping with staff recruitment. He hasn’t asked for one penny so I feel obliged to tell people how wonderful he is and if you feel you need treatment please visit http://www.sportspt.co.uk/ He might even be able to meet you at the club moving forward

DTFC - The Jackals - No Fear

When I look in the eyes of the people running the club I see such decent transparent people, guys discussing ways to improve things for the lads well post 10pm. I even got a nice bit of homemade cake. When I walked back to the changing rooms I left a chairman sweeping it out in his suit. That is the ego free football environment I’ve always striven to work in, all hands on deck. As I walked back to my car with the stadium lights off and loaded with equipment I reflected on what I had just seen and thought to myself…

This is going to be a long hard season, with many ups and downs. But, one thing I know for sure, I want to do everything I can to give these great lads, fans and people running the club a glorious football day they will never forget.

#coyb

Tony McCool

@antmccool7

Ban the competition. The FA's answer to Englands World Cup dream

Greg Dykes answer to players coming through academies only to be released and managers not picking them, is to ban the ‘competition’. I.e. ban the foreign players. When questioned on BBC Radio 4 on the 24^th March 2015 he was rightly asked “Isn’t the control with the clubs who benefiting from the new Premier League TV windfall will simply go on to buy the world’s best players in order to compete?” Thus increasing the quality of the product on the pitch, thus increasing the audience base, thus increasing the TV revenue and so the cycle continues. Can’t the FA see this? Actually, why can’t the FA embrace this instead of attacking it?

How will England be better footballers if we simply ban better players? We can’t pretend these players don’t exist. The FA should be the organisation starting at the very foundation of the game that helps to increase player’s capabilities and opportunities. Would it not be far better to produce players that academies ‘don’t’ release? If they were good enough for the first team and signed for free (baring the development cost) would they release them and buy a foreigner? The difference would then be that we have a player in the 1^st team that can genuinely compete in the 1^st team which already contains the world’s best players. Then and only then can we expect to see an England team competing for a world cup. Can people not see that? Are England players banned from playing in Germany, Argentina, Netherlands or Brazil? Could it be that they simply are not good enough?

Would Andy Murray win Wimbledon if we banned Djokovic, Federer and Nadal? Would he win anything else?

The FA is really in a dangerous position here. One which is so critical for our futures and could leave us scratching our heads again in ten years’ time. If they can’t hear what they are proposing we are destined for failure. They have to accept now that they simply cannot take on the might of the Premier League. Money talks, times have changed. Academy football is now affectively ran by the Premier League with its EPPP system. Overall, facilities and quality of staff has mostly improved because money talks. But the FA has an over whelming overall goal. A winning / competing England team. Well we have the answer here and no other country has that. No other country has got the benefit of having the world’s majority of best players in its top league. So here’s the challenge now. I have to get my English players, into those teams. The chairman and managers will not ignore them. Why would they? Why then would Manchester City just built a brand new training ground to include its Academy? The FA are attacking foreign owners, managers and players, yet that’s the biggest message from one of the world’s richest saying, “There you go English players, here is a world class facility for your young talent to come and thrive” What does the FA do in return? Threaten to ban its ability to buy the world’s best. Which if happened, reduces the quality of the product on the pitch and then will water down the interest, then the investment will reduce and the opportunity will pass. Overall though let’s be honest, like the League 3 idea, why can’t the FA concentrate on topics it has a realistic chance of changing.

Greg Dykes other solution is the 3G pitch strategy. The idea of giving young people better sporting facilities is of course welcomed. But here is the problem. What about the people that can’t afford to use them? Across England local authority budget cuts have resulted in local playing fields being left in awful unplayable states. So the answer then is the gleaming new 3G pitch. There is one on the council estate where I grew up. 100 yards from my old house. It’s absolutely amazing. But, I have driven past around fifty times to find it bolted and empty, on a Sunday afternoon. Why? Because it cost a minimum of £35 per hour to use it. But there is a big Lottery and Sport England logo outside, this is a sport legacy from the Olympics, so why is it empty? To reduce my possible answers I drive 30 seconds to the large open playing fields where I see a number of pockets of young people trying to play football on an overgrown cow field. So how is that great for development? It has simply become a non-negotiable commercial enterprise. I even approached them and asked If I together with two ex-international footballers could use the facility as we wanted to get some young people off the street to play football. We were not afforded £0.01p discount. I paid in full for three sessions and we put on class coaching and games for 16 year old lads who turned up in droves. This was FREE for them.

I remember someone saying to me that it was well over £10,000 a year to send their child to an elite tennis centre and I remember thinking, wow, no wonder we can’t win Wimbledon. What if on floor 35 flat 120 in the high rise there is an English tennis superstar? But we will never know because she will never get the opportunity? Well football is heading down the same road. It’s becoming a pay to play culture and soon (even now) if you don’t have money you can’t take part. That will only see a decline in the talent further down the line. Football never was a middle class game. It was a game on the street where children put themselves in the mind of their hero. The houses were terraces and obstacles were defenders. Society has stopped football in the street as unacceptable risk and a nuisance. We have put signs up on every grass verge saying ‘No Football’. So they are forced to the uncut field where it’s impossible for the ball to roll. But thanks to the understanding FA. We have an answer, the glowing new 3G pitch. But it’s locked and mum hasn’t got money for food let alone football, so that’s that then. Ill juggle the ball in my bedroom. It’s like the field mouse that ends up in our house. We remove her habitat, we build house on her land, so she seeks shelter in ours only for us to trap it and kill it.

Typically over all the years of football, the best players have arrived on the scene having come from difficult backgrounds. Does that create more hunger and intrinsic desire to change your family’s life? But equally players are around that have very stable backgrounds. So, the point is, we just don’t know from what community and what background the next great player will be hiding. But for sure we certainly need to ensure we look under every stone and give everybody equal opportunity. If we create a pay to play culture this could eliminate so many people so we have to find a way.

Actually in my experience schools already do so much for sport and the Primary Sport Partnership clearly supports inclusion and participation. This is great for English sport not just football. Perhaps the answer lies there. Some of these primary schools already do great work in identifying talent. I work in one primary school and an 9 year old showed amazing talent. On quick investigation this child had not played in any organised games or clubs. Partly due to finance. Together with the school we worked to find a solution and I proudly went to watch him recently in his full kit in a game where he was breath-taking. So, could schools play a bigger role? Something also suggested by great blog writer: @The_W_Address

My idea would be that children whom teachers or coaches feel show excellence within the four corner model could be awarded FA football tokens. Then on these new 3G pitches there is organised FA (not club) led coaching & player development that means players from any background and any wealth have an equal chance of being spotted. Not just because they can afford to play. Or because they are paying for a privilege to be in a professional clubs development centres.

Overall if you want to make England better:-

·         Embrace the Premier League don’t fight it. Embrace the competition. But use them, find out what they did to get there and act on it

·         Evolve our game. Review EPPP and make it better. Investigate if it really contains the best coaches, the effects of player reports and hours and strain on players families

·         Improve the standard of recruited players. Maybe the FA to have its own “Elite Development Centre” That’s FREE and clubs can come along under certain guidelines to recruit

·         Work better to improve inclusive access to new sporting facilities. Increase participation and don’t ever let money be a reason for not benefiting from what essentially belongs to the football community in the 1^st place

·         For Nick Levett’s work to be further enforced and improved even further for grass roots clubs

 

Equation:

Equal opportunities = Increased participation = Increased competition

+ Improved coaching + improved facilities + improved science

= Players that get into Premier League 1^st team (on merit) / Better England Players

= World Cup?

 

@antmccool7

 

Do Football Coaches Deserve Employment Protection?

Football CAPTIN

The Football Coaches Association for the Trade Professionals – Independent

Its no new story to look into the seemingly high costs of qualifying as a coach in England. However, with all that investment in large sums of money along with the years and years of gaining experience to gain the qualifications for yourself. Do the opportunities that exist at the end represent a real living potential and are we taken seriously as an industry?

Recent changes to Academy football with the implementation of EPPP has had a significant effect on everybody and any investment and attempt to improve our football can surely only be a positive thing. The new system has created many jobs as football pushes home its holistic development method. The FA have created the best business model of all business as the governing body. It overseas our qualification process and has developed many overlapping courses with a CPD program that ensure ‘customers’ don’t just qualify and walk away, they must keep coming back for more with the positive messages about continuous development. For most and myself included, I love to learn and I don’t have an issue with that provided its value for money. However, my personal experience which was well documented, together with the many comments sent to me and what I see and hear further leaves me to still question if there is a real sustainable career path for the majority of coaches.

Whats the problem then?

To simplify the biggest concern for me, it relates to Time v Investment V Return. If a club truly had that latest term approach ‘Growth Mind-set’. Then they like the Academy Manager would be committed to the youth set up. If they simply go out and buy players as a constant solution to first team problems then of course, this in fact is a Fixed Mind-set that the clubs board possess. Regardless of what the FA Course promotes. So, if the Director of Football is committed to Growth Mind-set then the youth academy becomes paramount. For me, that means the youth players become of huge significant importance to the clubs ability to exercise its ethos. Therefore by nature of association the people that come into contact with those people must be of huge value to the club. Holistically there are many alternative members of staff to football who mostly have become very skilled post graduate individuals. The degree puts them in a strong position to deliver their skills they trained for, whether that be Educational, Medical, Sports Science etc. But what about the Football Coach? He or She has in some cases spent just as much time qualifying and gaining experience as the Sports Science and Medical teams but are they equally valued? They are also typically the person that has most contact time with the player and arguably are the ones that have the biggest influence on the player’s chances of success. But do they feel that reward and value? Of course football is a unique industry, one which can be frustrating as you can see others seemingly fast tracked into positions but I’m not sure what could ever be done about that. However, I do believe that there are some basic minimum expectations which would be fair for us and perhaps make clubs and authorities management wake up to the expert people they have under their nose.

Of course many coaches have been recognised and also many of the clubs are fantastic in the way they handle their staff and football coaches. But equally many feel that coaches are easily replaced and as I heard with my own ears, “there are thousands waiting to take your job”. I don’t go along with that concept. Just because you have a coaching licence that doesn't make you a high class ongoing coach. Experience still has a huge effect on development. Equally, many millions of people have driving licences in this country and it is those qualified drivers that make huge mistakes crashing cars every day and take huge liberties. So, a piece of paper in my view is just an indication that you did your studies. If I was in charge and had a coach that I knew was fantastic with his or her players and able to display excellence ongoing with a fair approach and a good attitude, then I would want to really look after and value them. Quality coaches and more importantly, quality people are not easily replaced.

EPPP demands with reporting have impacted on coach’s time and whether you agree with the whole process or not, it cannot be debated that this has added significant time to the job. Not just by demanding a session plan in line with a syllabus. I calculated that as a part-time coach I was in fact working full-time hours. But not afforded the extra pay, meaning pro-rata I was earning circa £1.74 per hour. More or less a quarter of the national minimum wage for over 21’s in the UK. So, with the new investment of TV money bursting the Premier Leagues pockets is it fair to ask them to intervene with clubs and ask to consider coaches remuneration? No, they cannot tell a club what to pay people but let’s be fair, it is them that provide half the academy funding in most cases so surely they can set some parameter’s on how the fund is distributed? What’s more important? A hardly used dome or high quality coaches?

So what can we do?

I think many coaches are frightened to speak up as they know they can easily be removed from their position on weak agreements or no contracts.  But when I look into this I think to myself, why? Football Managers who have previously earned millions of pounds are members of the LMA who lookout for their interest. Even the England Manager sits in a significant role, yet no one sees that as an issue. The Professional players are part of the PFA. For many they are rightly protected with low incomes. But we also know that in some of these cases some of these people are extremely wealthy individuals yet are still protected by trade associations. Even the scholars are on board with the PFA and educationally supported and advised by the LFE. So, what about coaches? Is your profession protected? We have FACA membership but does that really offer us the independent protection and advice that so many need and does it campaign for better working conditions?

I think there is a room for an independent association for professional coaches. I don’t have the spare resource or current time to risk setting this up but if the industry gets together perhaps it would gain support from the FA and Premier League with membership funds then supporting the project to get off the ground. I propose one but am seeking feedback from the industry to see if we can gauge significant support which will perhaps force our governing bodies to support it.

I would suggest membership to a website www.captin.org (needs setting up) This would provide lots of free service to members.

-          Sessions Ideas and Templates – Syllabus specific

-          Support material and advice for using new applications eg:

o   PMA

o   Replay Analysis

o   Microsoft Office

-          Discussion Forums eg:

o   Excellence

o   Development

o   Behaviour management

-          Recruitment advice

-          Releasing players advice

-          Handling Parent’s and challenging scenarios

-          Pay and Benefits advice

-          Employment contracts and advice

-          FREE Job listings and opportunities

-          Insurance advice

-          Grass roots coaches support section (Often want help with session ideas)

-          Help and advice from Key figures.

People could suggest other topics they would like assistance with but I believe that would provide a starting point. Its members would be Employed at a Professional Football Club either part-time or full-time and within the academy or associated development centres. It will also include coaches that work professionally for independent football delivery companies. We could perhaps also have a support section for grass roots coaches as they are vital to the cycle.

I would recommend an independent vote on social networking to elect a coach to represent the organisation. If it was myself I would have a manifesto as a simple starting point

1.       To ensure all clubs include reasonable planning and review time, typically on PMA systems or equivalent is included in paid time.

2.       To ensure all coaches are paid in accordance with the governments minimum rates with computer work included in that time. (excluding travel)

3.       Arrange a complete feedback study from all its coach members to establish the most important areas for concern that should be addressed.

4.       To have a yearly independent coach’s conference that covers north and south.

5.       To strongly encourage our academy coaches to find grass roots clubs to go and deliver coaching sessions to every year. I would think that its reasonable for our members to commit to at least 2 recorded sessions a year at a youth grass roots club. This will help reduce the ‘them and us’ and perceived ‘ego’ that I hear so much about.

This organisation would not be set up to be obstructive, difficult and to ‘find’ things that are wrong. Its simply a method to support people that have committed huge time and investment into their chosen career and give them a voice that shows that there mortgage and family are just as important as the first team managers.

Twitter @Football_CAPTIN

To gauge interest I have set up a temporary twitter site @Football_CAPTIN If you would support such an association to protect and assist your future please follow. We will RT and post interesting coaching articles and session material as a starting point. If support is significant we will then consider taking to the next stage, if it’s what coaches want. I would be happy to later hand over control and domain (if wanted) to another party if they wanted to activate the Association fully with another chairperson or spokesperson and team.

Too many great coaches have walked away from football. Let’s help fix it and ensure we have the best people nurturing our talented players. That means working WITH the FA and PREMIER LEAGUE not against them. If all key people in football are treated fairly and equally we can together fix the game for our future success.

Tony McCool

@antmccool7