Points for coaches

Tuesday February 03 2004

The Guru gives dos and don'ts

The wisest man in the world, our coaching Guru, gives some points on things for coaches to do and not to do - simple things that make a difference.

1. Realise your own limitations; be prepared to listen to experts and to players themselves but be happy to reserve your judgement on what is given because you certainly get a great number of "experts" who know everything and, my word, are they prepared to give you advice! Especially the club bores.

2. You cannot reserve judgement if you have no sound views yourself. So make sure you know the game and believe in yourself. Players pick up immediately that a coach does not know what he is talking about or that he is unsure. Listen to the players but reserve your right to have the final say.

3. Believe in yourself but do not let your ego become mixed up with your team's results when you are winning. Be humble but strong in victory and defeat. We have all coached outstanding sides and had wonderful results but then it is the players who have the talent. Coach a bad side and help them to improve. That is coaching.

Here is a true story: a coach of a very powerful rugby school was asked how his side was going. He replied, "I beat A by 50 points, then I played B and won by 56 to 3, I then went on to beat C in a tough game and I thumped D by an embarrassing score. Then they lost to E!"

As soon as you hear a coach talking about "I" when he is referring to his team you know you have got a coach with ego problems.

4. Despite what I have said, it is not especially easy to coach a talented side that knows it is talented. It is good to believe in yourself but there is a fine divide between knowing that you are good and arrogance, and arrogance leads to over-confidence and thus disaster. You, as the coach, must be the psychologist and keep the balance.

5. It is probably worse not to believe in yourself, so as a coach, see that the self-esteem of a player is maintained in a healthy way. However, there are players that have an exaggerated self-esteem and that takes some handling - but it must be handled; so handle it!

6. If you have to discipline a player do it in a fair, balanced way and explain to him exactly why you are doing it.

7. When you drop a player have the courage to explain to him why you are doing so before you announce your team. That I find to be the most difficult part of the coaching business. (I have had several young men in tears on their being dropped - not easy at all.)

8. Never be drawn into discussion about players with other players. That is not the same as talking to your captain and vice-captain about selections.

9. Lead by example, be on time, have dignity in victory and defeat and see that your team does too.

10. Treat your players with respect and talk to them as equals; do not talk down to them. They know you have the final say.

11. Be positive in training and in after-match discussion. Do not resort to sarcasm and ridicule but rather reward and show appreciation for things well done.

12. Vary your practices and keep them interesting.

13. Do not over-train or over-coach. When you do that, you kill enthusiasm and flair. Over-training is too common; players need recovery time. Recovery is as important as is training.

14. Look after injured players and do not give in to the temptation to play them before they are medically fit.

15. Do not behave like a yahoo on the side of the field. Keep your composure and then the team will do the same (this applies especially to schoolmasters).

16. If you work on the squad system, give every man his chance or at least explain to the squad exactly how you are going to use it. How often do we see in International games, players being substituted in the last five minutes. It has happened to men I have coached and I know from them how this hurts.

17. Do not excuse results or poor play by blaming the referee. Your team must be better than the opponents and the referee - tell them that.

18. Be happy well into the season to give your players a night off, to miss a practice.

19. Rugby is fun - keep it that way!