The FA Tesco Skills Programme is a revolutionary new approach to youth coaching that has been providing high quality, affordable football skills courses for 5 to 11 year olds of all abilities since 2007. The FA aim to use football to promote long term healthy, active lifestyles, by encouraging children to play football to the best of their ability, ultimately with the goal of improving the standard of the game across the country. The full time, professional coaches have undertaken a specialist coaching course to improve the football skills of 5-11 year olds. The programme aims to help children develop better agility, balance and coordination, making them better at all sports. Sam Griffiths is the team leader of the Derbyshire FA Skills Team. The team have been in place since the end of 2010 and consists of 4 coaches including the team leader.
Recently Sam has been working with Belper Town FC for 12 weeks, conducting sessions and working with coaches from U8s through to U11s. The Skills Programme has helped the players improve their skills and most importantly given the Belper Town coaches an insight into age appropriate coaching and new ideas of how to run different types of warm up games and conduct sessions which have value to all involved in the session.
The coaches picked a number of topics such as passing, shooting and dribbling which they then watched Sam plan and deliver to their age groups. They were also encouraged to be actively involved in the process so that they were able to learn from Sam.
After working with the club for 12 weeks, Sam was able to leave her knowledge with the coaches to carry on and continue to implement. The coaches also received session plans from Sam to keep and use with their teams. Sam used the opportunity to advise the coaches about the FA Coaching Pathway and encourage them to take courses that will benefit their individual needs.
"The response from the coaches at Belper Town has been a credit to the club, each coach I have worked with has embraced every session I have put on and taken on board all the advice that has been given. All the coaches were very pro active, wanting to learn and gain more knowledge all the time. I have thoroughly enjoyed working with every age group and every coach involved in the sessions. I would like to say a massive thanks to Mark Alcock for the support he has given the Skills Programme and helping mentor his coaches down the various coaching pathways"
Sam Griffiths, FA Tesco Skills team leader
Here some feedback from Belper Town FC coaches and Derbyshire County FA;
“The support of the Skills programme was excellent for our club.
Coaches and players in U8s – U12 age groups benefited from this programme and all sessions were devised for topics that the age group managers wanted to develop their players.
Personally, I believe the Coaches really benefited by seeing more “Q&A” and “Guided Discovery” style interventions which enhance and accelerate the players learning.
All the age group coaches have since enrolled on Age Appropriate and Youth Award Module 1 to develop their coaching and understand the need to develop the environment, develop the practice, develop the player. My vision is for our junior coaches to continually develop themselves in order to develop quality, intelligent players for the Future Game.
I will recommend any Charter Standard Club to get involved with the Skills Team support programme, as it will really enhance their Coaches and players.
I must really thank Sam & her team for really helping us with the programme. We welcome you back anytime!”
Mark Alcock, U10’s Belper Town Juniors FC
“I found the sessions quite helpful and helped reinforce what I had learnt on the age appropriate. I’m just getting prepared to do my FA Youth Award Module 1 which Sam recommended. Sam also gave me a few more personal coaching tips, which I have taken on board and implemented into my own coaching and session planning.
The kids showed they enjoyed it and I’ve had positive feedback from parents as well. The session Matt did I found really useful to and have since used this in my own sessions.
I’ve also purchased a copy of the Future Game book, also recommended, and found this of great help. I would be keen to see the Tesco guys and girls down again, if only to reinforce what we are trying to do. Many thanks to all the FA Tesco team.”
Jamie Allen, U8’s Belper Town Juniors FC
“As the U9 age group manager I think the sessions will be of great value to our players and coaching staff. It will give everybody involved a different view on coaching skills and techniques. For me a chance to see our players react to someone new was interesting, their own commitment to do well stood out the most. All players & coaches involved in the sessions enjoyed a new face delivering the drills and would welcome Sam Griffiths back anytime. The kids found a different coaching approach a breath of fresh air, sometimes this is a godsend to freshen things up.
From a parents view I think it gives us a chance to compare these fully qualified coaches to our own lesser qualified coaches, to see if we are heading in the right direction. All round I think the mini soccer side to our club will benefit from these sessions in the long run, and will help our new younger age group managers/coaches in there running and coaching of the squads.
Thank you for your input and look forward to many more sessions next season.”
Steve Moore, U9’s Belper Town Junior FC
“I found Sam very easy to talk to and she was always willing to answer questions that I fired at her. The sessions that she put on for our squads were well received and it was interesting to watch her set the sessions up and then leaving them to develop without continually stepping in.
From a personal point it was interesting to watch Sam use the same grid the whole session but do different games on it. The kids really enjoyed Sam’s game related sessions.”
Dave Wainwright, U9’s Belper Town Junior FC
“We had two sessions coached by Sam; both on very cold, windy evenings which could have hampered her delivery but didn’t appear to.
From my perspective it was a conscious reminder to build sessions progressively to allow each stage to sink in before moving on. At that time it had been 3 years since my last formal training and had slipped into trying to explain the intricacies of the final product and wondering why no-one was getting it!
She was also the first person I’d seen using a small whiteboard to explain the layout of the session to the kids. Again a simple idea but more useful than standing your players around the astro and shouting across the pitch to explain what you want them to do.
Sam adapted sessions to what we had asked for. She also encouraged the players to come up with the answers to problems rather than just telling them what to do. By working it out for themselves, especially the defensive session she did, they picked it up much quicker.
Each session was fun for the players and they benefited from a new face. I would hope that this is something that could be repeated in the future. I certainly benefited, the players did and hopefully Sam got something out of it too.”
Chris Gilbert & Julie Reeves, U11’s Belper Town Junior FC
“One of Derbyshire’s FA Charter Standard Community Clubs, Belper Town FC has benefitted greatly through Sam Griffiths, FA Tesco Skills Team Leader delivering a 12 week coaching programme for 5-11 years olds, which has helped to develop their football skills.
It has been fantastic to see how the programme has developed at Belper Town FC and also very pleasing to see the positive feedback from the coaches at the club.
The relationship between the FA Tesco Skills team in Derbyshire and Belper Town FC is a fantastic example of how the FA Tesco Skills Programme can have a huge impact on the players, coaches and also developing better links with the local schools.”
Liam Rooney, Senior Football Development Officer at Derbyshire County FA