Take home message from the Confederation of African Football C license Diploma

Football Coaching courses are normally designed to enhance an expansion of existing knowledge. Weather the content of the course provides insightful learning; continuous education or the reinforcing of existing ideas it is often a good idea to expand the knowledge base every year. If possible try getting a coaching qualification annually, being it formal through a Football Federation or through short online courses such as Barcelona innovation Hub or the professional football scouts association.

Every coaching course will have a different take home feature. In the Confederation of African Football C license Diploma I attended in August- October last year (2021) in Pretoria, South Africa this is what I learnt on the course:

1.??????Football is continuously evolving; we are always learning something from the game. Like the famous English idiom “we can’t stand still on the escalator of life, we either go up or we go down”. No coach has all the answers, but some coaches are closer to the truth than others so try and learn as much as you can from these coaching courses and from your fellow coaches on the course.

2.??????One of the take home sessions that stood out for me at the course was when a colleague did a session on overlapping as his final topic for assessment. I had never seen or come across that session before and I immediately added it to my go to sessions in by training toolkit. The whole process of the session was appealing. From the third man running exercise linked to the overlapping in the warm up, to the main phase of play exercise where the players over lapped and under lapped in a competitive game situation. It was a masterclass session that filtered in the components of the game of football focusing specifically on the topic of overlapping. ?High level teams in competitive football use the overlap advantage to gain a numerical superiority over their oppositions full back. This overlap session taught me that its critical for a fullback to learn the essential skills of overlapping if they want to play at the highest level. If you are a fullback or a winger and you can’t overlap or under lap you will struggle to make it in professional football. Being able to over and under lap is a prerequisite of the skill sets that fullback and wingers are required to have to play in Europe.

3.??????Another training session that caught my attention and that I added into my knowledge bank was the session presented by the facilitator on the movement of the three attacking players entering the box in relation to a cross from the wide area.?The players need to make checked runs to the front post, back post and penalty mark area by evading the defender marking them. This is a well-known universal rule as players need to make these runs, but I never paid attention to the minute detail of the timing of these runs and the ideal position these players need to be to execute an shot, volley or header from the subsequent cross. If an attacking player arrives beyond the front post for a cross then he wouldn’t have the angle to wrap his foot or head the ball towards goal. Likewise, if a player didn’t time his run to the back post and ran straight then this would make it easy for the defender to track the player’s runs into the area. It is crucial that players learn how to check off and create space between themselves and the defender that’s marking them.

4.??????Furthermore, one other take home feature of the course was a world class session on switch of play through a possession game and then later through a small sided-game which had two goalkeepers in an area the quarter size of the pitch. In this game the goalkeeper or goalkeepers have the goals back to back and the only way a goal can be scored is if a switch of play happens on the field. So the ball needs to be switched for a goal to be scored. Switch of play can happen through small interchanging passes or through a lofted pass across the field of play. This session teaches players to head and volley the ball which is essential skills that`s needed to be mastered to reach the top. Heading and playing the driven lofted pass is a problem area in South African football, as not many players can loft the ball accurately to a supporting team mate in a more advanced position. So this small sided game drills home the technique of lofting the ball and using your head or the volley technique to have a shot on goal.

5.??????In coaching courses there will be major coaching points to remember but there will also be smaller minute items that can take your breath away. I learnt more from the coaching course than these topics I mentioned, but the stand out themes that will be stored in my long term memory are the ones I mentioned above.

6.??????I was ranked first for my final practical assessment for the CAF C Diploma by the invigilators. My theme was finishing from crosses using the feet and head. The whole topic ran smoothly and I was able to transition from playing form 1 to playing form 3 with ease. My presentation included coaching the coaching points without opponents, focusing on the player crossing the ball as well as the movement of the players into the box of front post, back post and penalty mark area. I then moved to passive pressure of adding two defenders then followed up this activity by having a competitive game I went on to add full game pressure with all the players included in the session. All 12 outfield players were actively involved in the session as well as the two goalkeepers. The session had a combination of crosses that were in the air, on the ground and at chest height level. The feedback I got from the instructor was that not all crosses needed to be in the air and that I should vary the crosses with low, medium and high crosses.

In closing, different coaching courses offer different content. It’s critical that a coach absorb as much content as possible that’s applicable to them. Especially taking into account the demographics and socio economics of their local environment as a coach. Look for coaching courses both locally and internationally that would add to your existing knowledge base and that could be advantages for the type of football you trying to play. I have identified these countries courses as places I would want to go to get a coaching qualification as these countries football style identifies with mine, Spain, Brazil, Germany, Japan, Argentina, France and the Netherlands. Its important though to take content whats applicable to your coaching philosophy and there is nothing wrong with discarding irrelevant content. Do ensure though that the relevant content gets placed in your back pac. ?

One may ask where too from here? I am currently in Japan learning as much content as possible about Japanese football from three experienced coaches. God willing Spain will be my next destination. I have charted a 15 year plan in my mindset of being immersed in different cultures, experiencing different food and learning different languages through the medium of sports and education. Who wouldn’t want to write a football development book about experiences in Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, South Korea, France, China, Spain, France, Portugal, Mexico, Netherlands, Zambia and USA? How about getting that CAF B license in Zambia, or fulfilling that dream of getting a KNVB international license in the Netherlands. What a dream it would be to learn from the Brazilians through a course conducted in Portuguese from the CBF. What a pleasure it would be to do a Spanish coaching badge in Spanish or go to Argentine where football is treated like a religion. I pray that this could be my life`s work and through the treacherous waters of life I can live one suitcase at a time through different countries. ?The language of football is global as billions around the world love the beautiful game. Who knows maybe I’ll meet another person who loves the beautiful game in some alley in Lisbon, Portugal. Being a student of the beautiful games requires us to constantly keep learning about new football trends and the way forward. I am looking forward to learning as much as I can about the J league and especially about women`s football in Japan. Wherever you may be, constantly strive to be a student of the game. Let the beautiful game thrive.

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Yours in Football,

Sithembiso nkosi