Coach observation. The activity that will be analysed is Futsal. It is a format of small sided football that is recognised and supported by FIFA and UEFA with World and European Championships for club and National teams.

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19-502-00L   Sport Coaching      

BSc(Hons) Sport and Exercise Science                                    Oliver Sharp

Sport Coaching

19-502-00L

Oliver Sharp

16010990

Sport and Exercise Science

Contents

1. Introduction

2. Literature Review

3. Method

4. Quantitative results

5. Qualitative results

6. Conclusion

7. References

8. Appendices

Analysis of Observed Coaching

Introduction

The activity that will be analysed is Futsal. It is a format of small sided football that is recognised and supported by FIFA and UEFA with World and European Championships for club and National teams. It is played between two teams of five players, one of whom is the goalkeeper, and up to seven substitutes per team. The game is played on a hard court surface delimited by lines; walls or boards are not used. Futsal is also played with a smaller ball with less bounce than a normal football. The objective of the game is the same as football; to manoeuvre the ball into the oppositions goal, and the team with the most goals wins. However certain rules create an emphasis on improvisation, creativity and technique as well as ball control and passing in small places.

The coach that is going to be observed is a qualified FA Futsal coach who also has FA level 1 and FA level 2 football certificates, an FA child protection certificate and an FA Emergency First Aid certificate. His philosophy is; ‘simplicity is genius’ but he also has an attacking mentality, as he told me that he doesn’t mind if they concede as long as they score goals. He coaches the Sheffield and Hallamshire Futsal team which competes in the FA Futsal League North. The league is a club level standard with varying talents. Using the Scale of Sports Participation (Alderson, 1996. Cited in Beashel, P. and Taylor J.) the level is representative competition. The team consists of 16 players, most of which are not English, which may show that Futsal is more recognised in other countries than in England. Their standard is very good, the goalkeeper for example used to play professionally in Italy and Brazil. The training sessions that are going to be observed happen twice a week and will take place at various locations. On the Thursday night between 8 - 9.30, it will take place at Ponds Forge sports hall, and on the Monday session between 8 – 9 it will take place at Parkway Academy. They play their games on Sundays at Hillsborough Leisure Centre.

In a typical two hour coaching session, performers arrive and carry out an independent warm-up with little input from the coach. This is then followed by a different routine preparing the performers for development of skills and routines. The coach then leads drills, either tactical or skill specific. This will focus on performance enhancing and will then end with a small sided game and then a short cool down.

When coaching or teaching, it is essential to construct an environment in which the performer is able to experience pleasure, growth and mastery (Weinberg and Gould 2007). Most professional coaches consider feedback to be the key to creating this environment (Kidman and Hanrahan 2005). Relative to coaching practice, feedback is the most commonly used tool to enhance performance and also one of the most misused (Williams and Hodges 2004). This outlines the reasoning behind observing a high level coach and the feedback they issue. This interests me about the coach because he is a Brazilian coach and has players from all around Europe under his wing. For example; how do you communicate with a Finnish goalkeeper and an Italian midfielder at the same time? Effective coaching behavior implies that the role of the coach revolves around the direction and management of the process of improvement (Lyle 2002). Franz Stamphl (1955) as cited in Pyke (1981) believed a good coach must have more than knowledge; he must be a guide, philosopher and friend.

Literature review

It is generally agreed that coaching is a process that primarily aids athletes achieve their peak performance in competition (Woodman, 1993; Bompa, 1994). To fulfil this objective the coach is engaged in a wide range of roles, and is required to apply a vast array of skills to a range of problems (Abraham & Collins, 1998; Lyle, 1993; More, McGary, Partridge & Franks, 1996). Indeed, the complexity of the task is underlined by Jones, Housner and Kornspan (1997) who identified 37 standards to describe the coaching process, confirming the assertion that the requirements of effective coaching are both wide ranging and specialized (Blundell, 1985).

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Feedback allows an athlete to evaluate the effectiveness of a movement they have performed (Williams and Hodges 2004). Chiviacowsky (2007) suggests that the most effective form of feedback should be of good quality and promote absolute task orientation from the performer. Two forms of feedback have been identified by Weinberg and Gould (2007).  The first, knowledge of results, is where the performer receives specific feedback regarding the correctness of their response. The second form, knowledge of performance, relates to how the performer undertook their response.

Positive feedback can act as both a reward for correct behaviour, and as ...

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