Week 4 Blog
The emphasis this week fell largely on the coach. Although the players are the ones who perform on the field, the job of the coach is to prepare their players for the challenges of sport. Different coaches will implement different strategies for optimising player performance.
As mentioned in the lecture, Nikolay Karpol, a former Russian volleyball coach is considered one of the greatest international coaches of the modern game. Despite his sparkling record as a coach, Karpol is also famous for yelling at his players. Although the 'yelling' approach may have reaped success for Karpol and the Russian volleyball team, it may not be as well received by everyone. This creates an interesting topic about coaching. Coaching is not simply a trade which can be applied to everyone in the same fashion. It requires intricate knowledge about each player and how they react in different environments and how they respond to particular coaching methods.
So, for coaches to draw the best out of their players they must know what makes them tick and how to best prepare them for competition. As we discovered in today's tutorial, players and coaches can get to know each other quite well and begin to bond from one simple training sessions and some well thought out exercises. For example, allowing the players time to discover a little bit more about their teammates by asking them to answer some simple questions about themselves is a good way to spark conversation and build knowledge about how a particular player operates best.
Once the coach knows their players and knows how they perform best they can implement methods to further develop each player and help them reach their potential. Combining the players different methods can become challenging for the coach. However, once this has been developed and the players are happy, a strong harmony amongst the group is created. From here the group can become somewhat self sufficient and begin to develop together and realise their collective potential.
Quote: 'The more you coach, the less you talk. By coaching more you tend to observe more'.
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