Cuttings

Learning the FA way

Alite director Alistair Smith is liasing with the English Football association to develop the quality of all coaching and training across the six divisions of the FA. Part of his role is to input on the FA Professional Licence Course. This course is by invitation only to professionals at the top level of the national game. Alistair's audience at the two week Warwick event included six Premiership managers, three international managers and three national coaches. He estimated there were over 200 international caps represented in the room. The following day he suffered depression at being dropped from the five a sides.

The other, and longer term aspect of the work, is to develop a unique learning philosophy for the FA. This philosophy will be expressed in core values and each of these will have a set of related learning and coach-educator behaviours. A programme of generic tutor training has been constructed around the philosophy, values and behaviours and is now being rolled out. After the summer over 100 national and regional coaches and football development officers have taken part in the training. The plan is to influence every aspect of the national game. Now, has anyone seen Wayne Rooney's homework?