A young player will experience many challenges on their player development journey, many of which are outside of their control. PDP Editor & UEFA A licensed academy coach, Dave Wright highlights the importance of truly understanding the player as an individual, outlining the benefits of an approach that helps us understand how constraints shape players’ non-linear development. As adults we spend an inordinate amount of time worrying about systems, statistics, formations, results, tactics, outcomes and all the organisational factors that go on when working in a…
socio-cultural constraints
The question this week comes from our PDP Slack Community: “What ideas do you have to work on team building and culture?” Your Turn: Ask PDP Anything Do you have a coaching question that we might be able to help with? We would love to hear from you! Here’s what you can do: 1. Tweet your questions to us @playerdp, or contact us on our Facebook page.2. PDP Members can chat directly with the PDP team to ask questions, share ideas, and support each other on our exclusive…
In our latest Masterclass Webinar we sit down to discuss the coach/athlete relationship with Keith and David Mayer, authors of Gold Dust: How to Become a More Effective Coach, Quickly. The focus of the conversation is how we build connections with young players, using empathy, understanding, patience and communication. Keith is has over 40 years coaching experience at a number of professional clubs and has worked as an FA Tutor. David is currently completing his UEFA A license and has experience in the USA and…
Jack Martin and David Cox The Big Idea It is rare in conventional social psychological research on sport to consider public testimony as a source of truths. And yet, this is exactly what this study does. These authors pursue what they call a “portrait of possibility.” The subject—the only subject—is the early life of one heck of a basketball player: the Canadian Steve Nash (b. 1974) who played 18 years in the NBA (National Basketball Association), nearly half of those years an NBA All-Star and…
The question this week comes from Sarah, via Facebook. “How do I get to know my players?” Your Turn: Ask PDP Anything Do you have a coaching question that we might be able to help with? We would love to hear from you! Here’s what you can do: 1. Tweet your questions to us @playerdp, or contact us on our Facebook page.2. PDP Members can chat directly with the PDP team to ask questions, share ideas, and support each other on our exclusive Coaching Community. Start your membership…
Christina Salmivalli The Big Idea This review paper was published in the journal Aggression and Violent Behavior. Its subject is bullying. While its context is the classroom, what is reported in the research entails the fields of play as well. If there is an umbrella quote covering the inherent nastiness of bullying, it would be this, Maya Angelou’s reflection: “I’ve learned that people forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” What amplifies…
To set the scene for the following discussion on socio-cultural constraints, we start with Ruben Jongkind’s comments made during May 2016’s NextGen Talks. Ruben is the former Head of Talent Development at Ajax Amsterdam, and after working with Johan Cruyff on ‘Plan Cruyff’ he is regarded as a leading authority on Johan’s philosophy. Ruben Jongkind’s comments give a clear example of how socio-cultural (macro) factors influence player development within academies. While most of us are well aware of the problems with a ‘win-at-all-costs’ mentality, Ruben’s…
Regular PDP contributor and Talent ID Manager at The FA, Nick Levett, gives us his views on the cultural challenges that are intertwined in English football by examining expectation culture and reflecting on how other European nations view their own football teams. The pattern comes around every two years for most people who follow the England national team and, of recent years, it has followed a similar theme: breeze through the qualification structures, soundly beating nations that we can soundly beat and then enter the…
How can play impact performance? PDP Lead Researcher & International Futsal player, James Vaughan examines how important play is when it comes to finding solutions in a high performance setting. Last month New Zealand played against the Solomon Islands in the FIFA Futsal World Cup qualifiers in Fiji. Tied at the top of the table this game was the tournament decider, the game that determined Oceania’s representative for the upcoming World Cup in Colombia. Four years of preparation and sacrifice on the line during 40…