Head Coach's Update

I attended the HKMRFU referees course on Thursday evening for U11s and U12 coaches. It was a very informative evening and hopefully with the discussions held it will lead to a constant level of refereeing across the grades. There was one question raised during the evening which made you think. At the beginning of the evening we were asked to come up with words to describe rugby and the 3 key words were Enjoyment, Safety and Respect of course there were a lot more but these were the 3 words that can best describe what rugby as a team game is all about. Another word that came up was contest. We all know that rugby is a contest that can be physically and mentally challenging. One word that was missing from the list was winning which obviously is very enjoyable and satisfying but is not a word that necessarily describes rugby.

Any way back to the question asked by one of the coaches; it went something like this “what does the referee do about streaming?” which was quite surprising considering we were talking about refereeing the game. The immediate response from the referee was “nothing, it is not an issue that concerns the referee”. This was the correct answer as a referee cannot stop players of the right age group from playing, he does not check also playing up/playing down either that’s up to the coaches. A referee’s purpose is to ensure that the game flows.

Getting back to the idea of streaming and whether it’s a good or bad idea and how does it affect the players? It is obvious that some clubs with an over abundance of players will stream there teams in a particular age group with the logical explanation of “we need to” and “the players get more out of training playing with kids of similar abilities”. This can also lead to the more experienced coaches focusing on these teams and players. I am not saying that this is a good or bad idea. What I am saying is that in my personal view is that for training purposes you should do as much as possible with all your players together. By splitting teams at an early stage in training and focusing your best resources at one team does not help those players new to the game to integrate into the team and to develop their skills by watching and trying to emulate their peers. It also does not help coaches and parents new to the game to develop and expand their understanding of the game.

As a coach you may split you squad into teams and stream your players according to their abilities or experience but you should be able to carry out warm ups and skill sessions as a group and only divide the players up to carry out particular drills as a team (if you need to). We have to remember that all children develop both physically and mentally at different rates and a plodder one day may be the star of tomorrow. By all means take new players off to practice passing, catching and tackling with one on one coaching if that can be provided or as small groups but these players should be integrated into the team and training as soon and as much as possible.

As coaches we have a responsibility to ensure that all of our player can participate, learn from and enjoy training so the next time you go to split up your players at training just stop and think “is this the best for me or the players”. Remember it’s the taking part that’s important not the winning.

On a last note this is what it actually states in the HKMRFU laws”It is not the winning but the spirit of fair play, enjoyment and safety that is paramount”

David

More about the page from Andy

On this page, there are various tools that you, as a coach, will hopefully find helpful.

On the right the 4 boxes contain links to more coaching info. If you just see 4 green Menu bars and no links below, that's because you are not logged in as a Kukris' coach: the Login is the bottom left red menu.

Further down on the right in Rugby Gems, I've added links to various articles that either give you an overview of the game or offer specific training drills for skills.

Please note that FK also hold a number of rugby DVDs, If you want to borrow them, just ask David Holden.

I'd like to think that this process will be a 2 way street and you will get to me with any gems you discover.

Andy