Organising sponsorship
Arranging match
Motivating players
This week after the first training it was up to me as head coach to advertise for sponsorship for the team’s kit, this included a full set of home and away strips and a tracksuit for training with, fortunately two of the parents of the team own their own business and were more than willing to sponsor the team for their strips, this was finalized and was a massive relief as unfortunately at grassroots level sponsorship is not given to you, (The F.A, 2007) you have to go out and advertise your case of kits and equipment, this will all entail to the players fulfilling their potential and increasing motivating players as the team spirit that was concreted in the first session should hopefully relate to the teams moral.
This week I also had my first experience of arranging the time and the referee of the game, this was a stressful experience especially arranging officials for the game as of all the hundreds of referees that were displayed in the Northumberland F.A handbook only one person was available to referee the game which resulted in a cost in money through phone bills and time as it was on the Friday when the referee confirmed he could officiate the game. The other option was to referee the game myself or the opposition’s manager, this however would stereotypically give an unfair advantage to whoever was officiating the game so it was important to have a neutral referee. I was still working on the players judgements of myself and I did not want to come across unorganised this may leave the team feeling a high level of anxiety (Baker, 2000). Officiating the game would take my commitment away from my team, as communication with your players is key during the game (martens, 1997) in order to motivate the members of the team, this could hinder the chance of the team achieving their goals, as my dedication would be distracted which is an important role as a coach (Sabock, 1973).
Last weeks session was about setting the foundations of what was expected from myself and most importantly from the players. The game on the Sunday ended in a 1-0 victory over Wallsend Boys Club, this was a massive start to the season with the players playing above the expectations of myself and themselves, in the team talk I emphasized that the opponents were just eleven players on the pitch, no different to them, I also instructed the captain of the team to get the team together in a huddle before the game to identify what their aim was in the game as there is only so much a coach can do in order to motivate and instruct the players, once the players cross the white line it is up to them to take on board what has been said and perform to the best of their ability, this seemed to be effected by their motivation, the team were obviously aiming for achievement and respect from others this coincides with Maslow’s (Maslow, 1954) hierarchy of needs, as their lower demands were met in order for their state of arousal to meet the demand of the situation. This was proven with the players selected and substitutes coming on playing above their expectations.
After the game we spoke about why we won and they identified that they took on board what was said, that they are only eleven players like them despite their history and knew if they were together in their goals they could achieve them. They also mentioned that they knew there were other players on the bench who could come on and influence the game and stake a place for their place in the team, having competition for places raises the motivation of players, there was a distinct display of intrinsic motivation showing a strong locus of causality resulting in greater effort in performance (Deci, 1985).
The cohesion of the team was high, external factors such as communication and having team goals, which were achieved, influenced the cohesion of the team (Gadson, 2001; Schneider et al 2005), where as authors such as Tuckman (Tuckman, 1965) addressed that cohesion is achieved through the team becoming acquainted with one another, this was the first training session’s main aim and the end result was achieved.
Baker, J. Côté, J. Hawes, R. (2000). The relationship between coaching behaviours and sport anxiety in athletes. University of Queensland, Department of Human Movement Studies, USA. Journal of Science and Medicine in sport. 3 (2) June, pp.110-119
Deci, E.L. Ryan, R.M. (1985). Intrinsic motivation and self determination in human behaviour, Plenum Press, NY
Gadson, S. (2001). Psychology and Sport. P55
Martens, R, (2004). Successful Coaching.
Sabock, R.J, (1973) The Coach. The University of Michigan
Schneider, F.W. Gruman, J.A. Coutts, L.M. (2005), Applied Social Psychology: Understanding and Addressing Social and Practical. Sage publications. pp 132
The FA Centres of Excellence (1997), (2007) [online] accessed 14/10/07 23.16pm
Tuckman, B. (1965). Developmental sequence in small groups. Psychological bulletin, 63, 384-399
1 comment:
Try to make the goals that you set SMARTER and then evaluate your session in the context of the goals that you have set.
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