Managers’ View
This bit of the website provides a chance for you to learn what it is like from the managers viewpoint that can help as top tips, if you have a question or want to provide your own top tip then please e-mail info@AFC Lightning.com .
MANAGING A JUNIOR TEAM - THE PAINFUL FACTS
Just so you know!! Note for manager also read coach
- Managers do not get paid and often donate more money than sense to the cause.
- Managers give their own time and efforts, mostly with the acknowledgement and thanks of players and parents, but sometimes without
- Weather permitting, managers spend on average no more than 90 minutes a week training with their team, which is seldom if ever the full squad. Just imagine what managers could achieve given 5 days per week, every week with a full squad.
- All managers have to work with the range and ability of players they are ‘dealt’ at the outset. Expectations should therefore be constructed accordingly
- If a manager’s son/relative is in the team, both the player and manager will often be an easy target for accusations of favouritism or bias. This is despite the fact that most managers tend to be more critical of their own son/relative in order to compensate.
- In terms of discipline, managers don’t purposely set out to penalise or make an example of a particular player. 9 times out of 10 it’s the player who has stepped out of line with the rest of the team and/or manager, not the other way round
- In terms of team selection, there are no set rules bar that managers earn and have the right in all cases to make the decisions. Debate is healthy, demands are not.
- As with every team, someone in the crowd always seems to know the answers to the difficult situations, more often than not after the event. However, that same person never actually faces the dilemmas at the time- that’s left to the manager…without the benefit of hindsight.
- Every manager has his/her opposite number and he/she is striving for the same goal. It’s worth remembering that very seldom does a match produce two ‘winners’. Performance is a much better guide to progress than results.
- Thinking about blaming the manger for a bad result? Before you do, know that managers have very little control over those players who turn up physically or mentally tired, ill, going through a growing phase or carrying school/family baggage. That can mean more than 50% of the team being ‘out of zone’ in any one match.
- Spot the difference:
(Clue: persistent malcontents will fail this)
- Team Wins: Comment constructively, avoid criticism.
- Team Draws: Comment constructively, avoid criticism.
- Team Loses: Comment constructively, avoid criticism.
Remember nobody feels adversity more deeply than a manager. Criticism of a manager comes cheaply and easily. Support and consideration on the other hand requires a degree of thought and understanding.
Some additional Coaching Philosophies
- Tell me and I listen.
- Show me and I see.
- INVOLVE me and I understand.
Deep thought ..
The coach says there are two buses leaving for the training area today, for those players with additional things to learn, the first bus leaves at 2 o’clock................the empty bus leaves an hour later.
|
