The Sports Path Newsletter
Number 6
 June  2013 

 

  

Welcome to our Sixth  FREE monthly newsletter ( sorry it's bit later this month !)

 

 

We now have over 1,500 subscribers from soccer coaches who want to find out how the web can support the development of soccer players and coaches 

 

There is an awful  lot of material for soccer coaches available on the web - the purpose of this newsletter is to signpost this material more clearly and simply for you,the coach. We have a lot for you this month: we hope you will forward this newsletter onto your friends and colleagues and encourage them to register here to receive future issues 

 

If you missed the January, February or March  Issues and wish to view this click here for January , click here for February   

Case Studies of Good Practice in Youth Football

 

This month I provided some presentations for the NSCAA Advanced Directors of Coaching Course at St. George's Park in England. For one of the presentations I created a blog of ' Good Practice in Youth Development in Europe ' and gathered about 30 studies of good practice in Clubs and National Associations and some relevant research. Lots of great examples of good practice by clubs and national associations with track records of developing players.
To view this collection go here and please free to add comments or links to other studies of which you may be aware.


 

Presentations 
As I mentioned last month I  was fortunate enough to be asked by UEFA to present at the AFC Grassroots Workshop in Kuala Lumpur.Details here  
I was impressed by many of the presentations from Asian Federations and especially the work that is going on in Vietnam driven by the Football Association of Vietnam assisted on some projects by the Norwegian FA.
Please view here the presentation of Nguyen Hoang Phuong Vice President of Football for All in Vietnam
Research 1:
 
 Some very interesting data on the shooting and shooting accuracy from last season's Barclays Premier league as well as an update on research from Prozone.
For more information on evaluating players and teams,have a look at our online course on ' Evaluating Performance ' here 

 

Research 2:   

My colleague Professor Jay Williams from Virginia Tech has just reviewed studies covering 1.5 million hours use of synthetic surfaces and over 10,000 injuries. Details here and for Jay's book as well as the Soccer Diet course we have put together. Seems playing on synthetic turf may reduce the risk of some specific injuries under specific conditions ! 

Research 3: 
 

 Sports Coach UK  has just released a Research Study : 'The Appetite for Online Coach Education: Now and the Future' This report details the key findings from a survey of around 500 coaches who were asked about their usage and preferences for online resources to help develop their coaching knowledge and practices.Details here

Major findings were: 

  1. Coaches are using (and continue to be likely to use) online resources to help them develop their skills and knowledge; they are doing so on a weekly basis from home and they feel very confident in doing so.
  2. Coaches perceive online resources to offer them greater flexibility to learn in their own time and to access information that would otherwise be hard to find
  3. The most useful experiences of using online resources are those that allow the sharing of ideas and networking within and across sports and being able to watch video footage to learn and gain ideas.

 

(See our next section below on video editing skills!)

Web Skills
Number 4 : Editing Video Clips made easy ! 

In last  month's newsletter we introduced the idea of providing more context to video clips.Readers did share their experiences and use of any of these products listed here 

 

I am especially indebted to James Lambert who I consider to be something of a global leader in the SIMPLE use of video on the web for soccer coaches.James is an experienced coach working in Australia ( originally from England ) and he holds the Australian ' A' Coaching Licence.

 

He has provided the simple guide here  to editing video clips below. If you have any questions please post them on that site. In next month's newsletter James will outline really simple ways to put captions on video

  

Please also look at some of examples of James' excellent work in this field on his website www.positionalfootball.com

 

 

Also we are still continuing with our 'social bookmarking' project: to assist readers and demonstrate another means of social bookmarking, as an example, we have established a ' Circle ' on Google + dedicated to showcasing what we believe are the best free video clips on the web which demonstrate ' turning with the ball'.

 

 

And you are invited to join it, post comments and add comments. The Circle is titled ' Sports Path: Turning with the ball'

To access the Circle you will need a Google account. If you do not have one type 

'Getting a Google Account ' into a Google search engine. It's free!

 

 

May 2013 Recommendations


Website of the  Month:  
 

Ron Smith has wealth of experience as a coach in Australia and Malaysia where he has been held Technical Director and Head Coach Posts with Clubs, States and National Associations. He has also acted as a Technical Analyst for Australian National teams at the World Cup and Olympics.

He has recently launched a website principally to assist coaches with their own personal development. We recommend it.
 
 
Blog of the month 
  

Bryan Holland is the Director of Coaching at Capital Valley United Soccer Club in Sacremento, California. He is yet another example of an innovative coach who has developed a blog for the coaches in his club. http://cvucoaches.blogspot.co.uk/

 He uses this in conjunction with a with an account on https://delicious.com/ where he bookmarks and shares video clips he recommends for his coaches 
 
Book of the Month: 

John Sullivan is an experienced coach who was most recently Executive Director of Oregon Youth Soccer Club. He has initiated the 'Changing the Game 'Project together with a book. http://changingthegameproject.com/

I hope you have found something useful in this month's newsletter.If so please pass on this email to your colleagues and ask them to sign up for future newsletters
We can promise you more material in the June  newsletter to help you use the web to support coach and player development
 
Yours Sincerely,
 
Robin Russell 
RRussell@sportspath.com
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