Courtesy: The FA.com

Busman's holiday

By Graeme Dell

Tuesday, 08 May 2007

It's been another busy fortnight for Graeme, both home and abroad. Here's what he has been up to...

Hello again!

Having had a manic couple of weekends abroad, the trip to Murcia for the UEFA Futsal Cup Final was well worth it - a spectacular venue and some exciting Futsal didn’t fail to impress anyone.

The dominance of the two finalists in club Futsal over recent years, Boomerang of Spain - champions in 2004 and 2006, punctuated in 2005 by this year’s losing semi-finalists, Charleroi Action 21 - and Dinamo Moscow from Russia, ensured that this new Final Four format would possess much of the quality expected of a Champions League Final.

Whilst I’ve seen some international club Futsal, it acted as a good opportunity to explore and educate. There’s a clear difference in the way that club teams play around Europe as opposed to international teams - no different to football, but how different was what surprised me.

When you train and play as a unit almost every day with the same players, the understanding and relationships are more concrete. But on the international stage that’s hard to replicate in short get-together events which is often forgotten.

Players aren’t machines. It’s rare that they can move from that daily routine of a club environment into an international team set-up and instantaneously repeat what they do at club level, out of their comfort zone and with a group of relative strangers.

There lies the expertise in an international coach’s repertoire to create the environment for that to happen. Getting the blend and mix right to get more out of every player in the national team is the challenge.

The games we saw were much more patient with a lower tempo and less frustration between players when sequences don’t quite happen, but also a great understanding and implementation of refined tactics.

The use of the ‘powerplay’ – when the ‘keeper is momentarily replaced by an outcourt specialist to retain possession and pressure the opposition – was probably the biggest single influence in all four matches. This changed three of the four games in the dying minutes including the Final itself and demonstrated how essential speed of thought and accuracy of execution is to Futsal.

I saw some of the best Futsal goalkeepers in the world last weekend which emphasised my view that this position is so critically important to team success.

The fact that they had so much to do with so many skilful players on court proves that defensive talent is limited against speed of thought and tactical supremacy. Luis Amado, probably the best in the world, was pushed hard by Charleroi’s Brazilian Fehrmann, although they are both a special breed.

However, something else stuck in my mind as I travelled home. Every team had a strong Brazilian contingent upon which they relied heavily and it’s a worrying sign for European Futsal and home grown players for the national teams.

It’s something we see only too clear now with football, yet in our game it will have an effect on the development of home grown talent, if it isn’t already. There is something wrong when teams, club or country, are comprised entirely of naturalised Latin American players, and yet the number of young Spanish and Portuguese players coming through in those countries appears limited.

Now don’t get me wrong - many of them have breathtaking ability which has a place in our domestic game and from which we can learn a great deal. Our players can aspire to that too, but that’s no good unless we harness that experience and direct it towards talent development.

As a national coach I want to see English players coming through in our leagues, as I’m sure the coaches of the other national teams do, and that has to start with the domestic leagues in a controlled manner.

Herein lies the lesson for England and we all have to learn from this as a Futsal community if we are to develop the game with a future of English players at its heart.

We need to make sure we attract the right players to fill our leagues and we must get the structure in place which facilitates that and ensures more and more English players playing at the top clubs in the top league once its up and running.

I am very passionate, understandably as a national coach, about encouraging clubs and coaches to look for and develop the English talent we need for the future. It will take some time but if we start off by using a multitude of quick fix foreign imports then that will simply slow our progress and limit opportunities for our youngsters.

Last week I delivered a Coach Educators course for FA Tutors from Level 1 and above within the English Colleges FA. Gordon Staniforth and his students at York College were the hosts and we had a really enjoyable couple of days which will give the ECFA some autonomy in delivering a Level 1 Futsal Introductory course to students at colleges within their structure as well as a coach education programme to aid development of Futsal in colleges.

They have some very talented players in their stream and have already delivered several late developers to the professional game. Lets hope they can do the same for us as their football programmes are very positive and with a good facility stock around the country they will be a huge asset to our programme for coaches and facility access to allow players to train more frequently.

I had a few days off in Portugal over the Bank Holiday weekend and deliberately took time to see a couple of local professional clubs train and see if I could pick up some ideas.

A bit of a ‘busman’s holiday’ I suppose but I learnt something which makes it all worthwhile, maybe that one per cent which will make a difference.

In any sport, to be successful you have to eat and breath it. You have to become a ‘student of the game’ if you’re to get anything from it, a lesson I learnt a long time ago. You have to be knowledgeable which also means having a global understanding in order to know what to expect and how best to get better, not simply a parochial view from your own country. So wherever I go I try to watch and learn.

It’s a Wembley weekend coming up with FA Trophy and Vase Finals so I’m once more on the talent spotting train. I’ll tell you how I got on next time.

Catch you in a couple of weeks,

Graeme



Posted by Luca Ranocchiari --> luca.ranocchiari@futsalplanet.com