Coaching Tips from Brian Ashton - The Independent 2009
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MORE COACHING FROM BRIAN ASHTON: Thinking on your feet and the role of the Coach
Brian Ashton. The Independent 2009
It is important to understand how to win a game of
Game management is essential. This means understanding how, where and why to play next in the context of any given moment in a game. Players must be able to adapt in both thought and deed to work this out and put it into operation.
The question is, do we actually prepare players to manage a game properly, or do we reduce their capacity to think for themselves, to express themselves and to make defining decisions in the heat of battle?
How much time is allocated to game understanding and preparation proportionate to its importance on match day? Understanding the game is probably the most important cog in the wheel of success. Because if the preparation comprises an exercise in box ticking – scrums, line-outs, defence, kicking, etc – that are drills and game plan-based and the week ends with unopposed or semi-opposed team runs, game understanding is unlikely to be enhanced.
There are implications at all levels, and this is a massive coaching challenge in the development of younger players. If we expect players, in the white-hot atmosphere of a contest, to implement correct decisions, the preparation should reflect this.
I have found that a lot of work can be accomplished off the field with open and interactive discussions with players. Talk to them, get their views, their suggestions.
Often, a player will shy away from expressing his thoughts to a coach or rugby director if such thoughts are not invited. Equally, the man in charge embarks on a voyage of discovery when he sits down with a group of players and makes it clear he wants an genuine exchange of views.
I remember a discussion I had with three front-row players, all now first-team regulars with their Guinness Premiership clubs, on the subject of counter-attack. One by one they expressed surprise that I would ask them about counter-attack on the basis that, "Hey, what do we know about such things? We're scrummagers." So I told them that when the ball next went off the field, they might as well go with it as they weren't contributing to the team effort.
Instead of standing there, watching a game of tedious aerial tennis develop, why not get back and help out, think on their feet how they can contribute? To a man, the three took this on board and I've watched with some satisfaction all three in action this season, working in reaction to what was going on around them.
Giving more time every week to practising all the "what if?" scenarios such as sin-binnings, injuries to key players, the interpretations by different referees of an identical situation, the collapse of a secure game area such as the line-out, is probably practically impossible. But if such situations are discussed fully then they will not prove to be totally unfamiliar.
I have long held the firm belief that operating solely with game plans is not enough. You can have plan A and plan B for dealing with specific opponents, but when they do something you didn't expect, when a moment of magic unravels your plans, then what?
I've seen this happen, seen talented players looking bemused towards their bench, seeking guidance. Plans A and B have failed, now what ?
The answer is in understanding game management, but players need to have the confidence to function as individuals as well as in a team, to take big decisions not scratched out across a blackboard during the week, decisions in immediate response to what's happening around them.
Too often, I hear people talk disparagingly of a coach who has encouraged his players to become fully engaged with the decision-making process, as though his authority, perhaps even his competence, is somehow diminished by it. Actually, this engagement is precisely what should happen, because the interactive environment – the two-way street – is crucial to success. Certainly, I'm suspicious of any player who is happiest when simply obeying instructions.
Of course, there comes a time when a head coach has to show his dictatorial side, to lay down the law. I dare say Graham Henry has his moments in this regard, just like anyone else charged with running a team under a great weight of expectation from the Club or fans. But this is the same Henry who is happy to describe Daniel Carter, the All Blacks' magnificent outside-half, as his "coach on the field". I cannot imagine for a second that players as accomplished and intelligent as Carter, Richie McCaw and Conrad Smith, to name but three, do not play a prominent role in identifying the optimum approach to winning.
As I've said before, I'm intrigued by the decision of the three coaches to switch responsibilities ahead of this tour. By their own admission, the All Blacks are not at the very height of their powers just now, but instead of retreating into themselves, Henry and his colleagues have chosen this moment to try something a little different. It proves to me once again that, above and beyond almost everything else, the New Zealanders are great students of the sport, endlessly fascinated by its possibilities.
In August, I travelled across the Atlantic to take part in a course aimed at raising the standards of coaches in the
A player like Fitzpatrick did not achieve what he did by simply following a diagram drawn for him by his coach. He was what educationalists call an "involved learner", as opposed to a "dependent learner". My fear is that (Canadian)
