I remember Stephen Hart, former Canadian National Team Coach (also past Technical Director of Soccer Nova Scotia and Halifax Wanderers Head Coach), once telling me back in the mid 1980s that he had to stop reading about soccer. As a young enthusiastic coach he was reading everything that he could get his hands on regarding the game and development. All of the information was overwhelming him and sending him in many different directions. There certainly is a great deal of information out there now. We have access to considerably more information that Stephen would have had in the 1980’s. We have access to everyone’s coaching philosophy, yet we struggle to define one for ourselves. This certainly happened to me.

After years of reading, listening, watching, writing, experimenting and practicing both the art & science of coaching, I finally found my philosophy (EPIC). As a young coach if you were to ask me what my philosophy was, I would have gone on about ‘teaching technique and possession’ football. However, my philosophy has grown to be much more than that but at the same time it has become less. My philosophy nestles within the pieces of the very complex development puzzle. What is consistently observed is that the pieces of the maturation and learning puzzles do not align the same with every child. As soccer ‘experts’ we may believe in the framework (the border) and we try to put those pieces in first, but after that the pieces of the puzzle go in at a different time for every child and every player. The picture of a complete player (Sinclair, Zidane, Sawa, Pirlo, Gerrard, Kerr) is what we want to see when the puzzle is together, but how they get to that point is as different as if each of us were putting together a 1000 pieces jig-saw puzzle ourselves.

We begin with the ‘Essential References’, the border of a puzzle, then we help fill in the middle but we can’t force pieces on players just because we want them to get them. Some players mature physically early, while others are late, but they all get to their full maturity at some point. Some players understand possession, or defending, or transition, before others, however if they are all purposeful in their pursuit of being a complete player, they will all get these concepts in the end. Technique (Decision Execution) itself comes in different stages and then their execution must mesh with the developmental stage of the player. Some players have the tactical understanding but less of the technique and others may have the technique but less of the tactical understanding. We can only create the environment, which is patient and consistent, providing the expertise where we can, while we understand that they control the learning.

Do we teach if they have not learned? I would say the answer is no. We may have stood in front of them, provided a picture, and described what we have wanted to see, but if they were not ready for the message, or open to the message because of an environmental factor, then they have not learned, thus we have not taught them. The component of having an open learner is critical. Our number one job (in my opinion) is to create a safe environment where players are open to learning, by questioning, by taking risks in experimentation, by being challenged, by being motivated by the process, and by celebrating the successes of others. This is the learning environment, and I would state that this is the most important part of coaching. Even then, if we attempt to give messages beyond the learner’s ability to learn, we are not teaching.

Professional Clubs from around the world understand that consistent curriculum and principles taught throughout their youth programs ultimately creates a more efficient structure to their training and games. This consistency enhances development from bottom to top. The top ‘player development’ clubs over the past thirty years such as AJAX of Amsterdam, FC Barcelona and most recently Southampton FC of the English Premiership have created consistencies in their instruction. In North America we have found teams operate in isolation within their own club and the lack of consistency inhibits player growth. There is only one way to change this…change ourselves and change what we do in our club instruction.

We have attempted to site the source of phrases or language which we have brought into our coaching. Many people contribute to the things we do and we can’t claim everything. Having said that, over a long coaching career we don’t always know the source. It could have been television, video, teammates, coaching colleagues – sometimes it is just unknown how it made its way into our vocabulary.