Wednesday, 6 December 2006

Dilemma at Last

Ok, thoughts about Sunday are fading, still annoyed and I have replayed the game in my head so many times. However a particular player gave me a bit of cause for thought and I am so glad. I finally have a dilemma on who to pick and who to leave out. The majority of the season the team has picked themselves but now I have a sub fighting for a start and then after training someone else showed they want to start and I think it is brilliant and truthfully about time. At training the ladstold me what I look for when picking the team and the one they didn't get was "effort" this isn't just effort on a sunday but effort in training. I have told the team before if you don't put effort in training I can't put effort in on a Sunday to get people on the pitch. Last night everyone was excellent and now on Sunday everyone deserves to get on and have a game of football.
People may say this is harsh and its all about Junior football and the kids playing games and enjoying themselves. The latter is true, but if you have a squad of 14 and 11 lads train hard, have a laugh and then on a sunday thos 11 start and play there herats out and enjoy there game. Then you have three who can't be bothered turning up for training or when they do they would rather be somewhere else, then on a Sunday they run on the pitch as they have turned up and can't be bothered. Who is this fair on, the 11 lads who want to play and try or the three who have turned up and should play its junior football. It is a debate that sadly with our liberal government that competiveness is a bad thing and certain kids all deserve a chance. They do deserve to run out and play but put the same effort in as others. It doesn't matter if you are not as good as long as the effort is good.
These are just thoughts and I would like to think other football managers agree with this, where as parents may not. They are not directly related to Beighton Falcons either, it is something that has come up with a related subject and I thought I would share the fun of being a football manager.

Cheers
Simon

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Tuesday, 5 December 2006

Little football and something else

Another day and still thinking about the game on Sunday, but it is starting ti get weaker thoughts where as next Sundays game is coming into it more. You play around with your team formation in your head, then have a doodle on a pad, and re jig the team and at the moment the team looks like something like it has never before, so who knows where each player will be playing Sunday.

Anyway the other point (political), I heard briefly regarding the money going into dancing classes for people who choose to be over weight. Preventative measures are great and I am 100% all for it, take the strain of the NHS in the long run. Get people dancing and being fit, however I can't help that the government who has stopped competitiveness in school have shot themselves in the foot. I will ask todays adults to think of their junior school and what they did, for instance I personally from 1st Year (y3) played for the school football team and did all the way to 4th year (y6). There were two teams a and B and a competitive league every year. I played cricket for the school and did x country for the school, I also swam. This was against other schools on top of this we also had in school challenges for house points where I did all the same again. On moving to senior school, I played football, rugby and carried on swimming and then when swimming stood out as the sport I was good at, I did swimming and water polo as well as x country for the school and a bit of football. People reading that are thinking yes we did that, the women probably did netball and went onto seniors to do the same. So why isn't the extra cash going into schools for after school clubs getting competitions up and running again, my daughter does Trampolining and it costs £9, so there is no help for the ones willing to stay fit and keep their kids energetic. All kids go to school and if there are facilities and activities the ones who are from a deprived background will be equal to everyone and get to do sports they wouldn't normally do. I bet there are a few diamonds in there as well. So once again the welfare state dishes out the money in areas where the government has failed when it is far easier to go to the place where all kids are and that is at school.
Schools could form partnerships with other local clubs, Getting the kids to learn different sports, the clubs benefit from potential new kids joining there club and the kids and school all benefit.

Sorry but a very easy solution and once again the government are tring to buy votes from those who don't go out and vote and have done nothing which the people think would be good.

Monday, 4 December 2006

Day After

Well its the day after a defeat and I can only say its true what they say, when you win you think about it for an hour when you lose it lasts all week. First you get over the disappointment, then you see the days results and get disappointed again as you realise what could have happened and where you should be in the league. Eventually you get over it again and try and think towards the next game and what should you do in training this week. Then you go back to the game and analyse what happened, you think of each player and everything they didn't do. You pick out the players in your head who deserve to start next week who did perform, and you realise you don't have a full 11.
This is the reason I do not say too much after the game you need to reflect and when I think of the game more and more I realise who didn't perform who didn't do what they should do. I then think of who I had on the pitch and who when they came on really wanted it, those that showed they don't want to be a sub, they want to be in the first 11. I witnessed two players yesterday who battled for everything, just two players out of 16. I then witnessed 4 others who did battle and played really well, just not quite as much as the two. However these 4 seem to be playing at a good level week in week out, and will fight for the team, so I have 6 players who can put there hand on their heart and say I played well and gave everything. Then you bring on Subs and two in particular did well for me, one better than the other. So I have half a squad, I have 8 players in my head the day after who I think should be proud of their performance, I now need 3 more for the starting line up next Sunday, and how to organise the squad. This is how I am thinking that these players deserve to start. Many managers may say you are allowed a bad game and yes you are, but you do need to have a level of consistency that means even your bad games (by your own standards) are still good enough to be on that pitch. I have two of these players who performed OK and battled things just didn't happen for them. So I might have 10 players for next week, so only one more to go. Lets see what happens at training and throughout the week, as I will think everyday about the next match as 3 points will be huge next weekend. More thoughts tomorrow.

Cheers
Simon

Sunday, 3 December 2006

the real game

3rd December , saw the lads play emus, and a win would have put us 3rd, however all plans were ruined completely. You work on certain things in training and the majority of the team play like you ask and try things you would like them to. Turn up at 9.15am to try and get the game on, and with your hands brush the water of the pitch and you have quite a few parents (thanks) actually forking the pitch for the lads to play. So parents do there bit, the lads do there bit in training and what of the manager, the bit people do not talk about. The bit people do not realise how hard it can be, if you are passionate about football like I am, I live and breathe the next game. My lads are everything and them enjoying their football is so important. So I plan the team to play in such an important game, I look at who trained well, I looked at who didn't turn up, I consider the previous game and who played well and who didn't, also who will be up for it and who is interested. You walk the dog and think tactics, 4-4-2, 4-3-3 or even 3-4-3, you change the team and think about what everyone can do. You then don't sleep as the game is so important, not in the sense of points but these are the teams you want to play and test yourself week in week out. These make the lads grow and learn the game better and learn themselves.
Hopefully you get the picture a lot of people and alot of time went into making this game happen. The two teams in question always have a brilliant game that can go either way. Then you have the ref the one person who can undo all work you have done and hard time and effort you have put in, yes a volunteer who should be praised for stepping forward. NOT today, a rule of thumb when you ref, if unsure look at the players there behaviour gives you an answer, so when the keeper and a striker is on the floor, and the striker pushed the ball over the line with his hand and not even the player claims the goal it says everything. The opposition parents didn't shout and everyone behind the goal evn let the ref know it was pushed in with there hand. Completely ignored goal given. I hav echecked the rule book for when the ball is kicked out of the keppers hand, an dthis happened twice and allowed. This does not mention shirt tugging, Rugby tackles yes rugby tackles not given, kicking when players are down. There is too much to mention, and had emus won 2-1 it would have been accepeted, it would have also shown what a hell of game it was. And well done to EMUS yes physical but good on you. The problem being is the ref was our own, we spend the season being ripped off at away games and short changed and do it to ourselves, before the game my words were, he is either completely biased to the away team or hes good. Sadly our most important game of the season and it was the biased ref that turned up. The big question is WHY? is it a power trip? it isn't plain bad its biased against the team and sadly it affects the lads. The outcome is going to be I or Mark (asst) will have to do them, we have given penalties to away teams and denied our own, but we always call it as we see it for either team. If only the Sheffield FA got their fingers out and supported refs then less would leave, meaning all games could get refs.

Anyway the match report on the website is fair for the game of football, the ref didn't warrant anytime on the website.

Tuesday, 28 November 2006

Junior Football

I just thought I would start a weekly Blog regarding my Junior Football team and everything that goes on behind the scenes and on a Sunday, I will also Dicuss anything else reagrding my day and life. My Web Site Simon Hall is always updated with the Beighton Falcons U13's match reports andthe Beighton falcons U11's girls match reports.

Today I have the lovely task of preparing for training in respect to a bug game we have on Sunday at 11.00am at Rother Valley. The game is against East Midlands Utd, which should be a good one. The lads haven't quite hit form yet and we hope they do soon. Even though they are challenging for promotion. The game on Sunday is a big one and one they hope I win. Training aims tonight will be both defensive and attacking, I have a great exercise planned which the lads will love. In fact anything where the lads get to do lots of shooting is fun. At first we will be working on technique as this needs to be improved.

So lets see how it goes later.

Cheers
Simon

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