Charles Baxter

Head Coach @Lightningfootbl | UEFA A | MSc Sport Coaching @lborouniversity

[Wasi @Wanalyst007]

Imagine adding this level of controlled progression & creation to our already dominant game model

Wharton's doing all of this in a low possession side, averaging only 30 passes p90. At Arsenal he'd register 50-60

The potential is INSANE

[The Sporting Resource @TheS_Resource]

A young coach once asked Dick Bate who is widely regarded as the finest coach educator England has ever produced, how many times he should intervene during a session? Someone had told him the answer was 20.

Bate's response is one of the most important things any coach at any level will ever hear about coaching ⤵︎

1️⃣ Bate's position was clear, there is no number. Not six, not ten, not twenty, not zero. The young coach wanted a target to hit. Bate told him the target does not exist. Coaches who count their interventions are solving the wrong problem.

2️⃣ His advice was to feel the session, watch the players and ask yourself constantly, how much do they actually understand right now?

If a player is not making sense of what you are working on, go in and help them. If a player is close and you believe they will get there in the next few minutes, leave them alone. That judgement, when to step in and when to stay out, is what Bate called the art of coaching, and he was direct that you will not learn it on a course or find it in a book.

3️⃣ On questioning, Bate was equally direct.

Do not ask questions for the sake of asking them. Know what answer you are guiding the player towards before you open your mouth. When a player gives you a good answer, use one word to go deeper: "and." And what does that do for us? And Why? And what happens next? And how does that affect you? Two or three uses of "and" takes you further inside a player's thinking than a dozen closed questions with nowhere to go.

4️⃣ On self-reflection after a session, Bate recommended asking yourself:

• Did it flow?
• Did I make the points I wanted to at the right time?
• Did I get bogged down or was it smooth?
• Did it lead to what I wanted to move on to?
• Did I come across as certain, or did I say things I was not sure about?
• Did the players interpret what I was working on to their advantage?

5️⃣ On developing this skill over time, Bate's advice was practical. Find a mentor who understands coaching, not just someone with an opinion. Record your sessions and watch yourself back, your body language, your timing, your language. Go and watch great coaches work whenever you can. Go and watch great teams play. Study the techniques of the best players in the world and make sure you understand them, because if you do not understand them you cannot teach them.

[Coach AJ 🎯 Mental Fitness @coachajkings]

John Wooden shares one of the greatest definitions of success - and it has nothing to do winning.

"The definition I coined for success is peace of mind attained only through self-satisfaction in knowing you made the effort to become the best of which you're capable."

Because you can always control your effort, your preparation, and your ability to give everything you have.

But here is where he really nailed it:
"We're not all equal as far as intelligence is concerned. We're not equal as far as size. We're not equal as far as appearance. We do not all have the same opportunities. We're not born in the same environments."

"But we're all absolutely equal in having the opportunity to make the most of what we have and not comparing or worrying about what others have."

You can't control where you start, but you own how you show up and what you do.'

Ownership of your actions, attitude, and approach.

Success isn't about being better than someone else. It's about becoming the best version of yourself.

The only person you need to be better than is who you were yesterday.
(🎥 Academy of Achievement)

[Coach AJ 🎯 Mental Fitness @coachajkings]

Curt Cignetti shares the blueprint for building a championship program.

"You got to have a blueprint and a plan to create an environment where people can thrive and a process where people can improve daily."

Environment + Process = Growth.

"If you prepare the right way, there's no self-imposed limit. There should be no self-imposed limitations on what you can accomplish."

Then comes the next challenge:
"The next job is to get in everybody's head and get everybody thinking alike."

Alignment is foundational. It gives a vision and direction.

"You go into a game prepared, you go into a game with the right mindset - you still have to put it on the field."

"And that's where fast, physical, relentless, one play at a time comes in. That's how we want them to play."

"This team also did a great job in terms of their consistency - day in, day out, week in, week out - showing up prepared and playing pretty darn consistent in all three phases."

Consistency isn't talent - it's discipline.

It means showing up with a mindset of excellence every day.

"You only get to that point because you have tremendous alignment in your staff, your coaches - everybody's rowing in the same direction."

The formula is alignment, consistency, and mastering the process.

Win the day and you'll build something special.
(🎥Bison Drop )

[Greg Berge @GregBerge]

"The process is where the biggest lessons are learned, and so many people are skipping the process."
- Tom Izzo

Izzo Philosophy:

1. Defend-Rebound-Run
2. Toughness = SKILL
3. Accountability > Popularity
4. Player-led teams win
5. Challenge yourself

[Hoop Herald @TheHoopHerald]

“My definition of dicipiline - Do what has to be done, when it needs to be done, as well as it can be done, and do it that way all the time” - Bob Knight

(Via @coachajkings 🎥)

[The Winning Difference @thewinningdiff1]

"Let's just focus on us and being the team that we say that we want to become.
Then the results will take care of themselves."

You control your effort. Your attitude. Your discipline.
If you stack those choices long enough, the results don’t “happen”- they show up.

[The Winning Difference @thewinningdiff1]

"Earn a role.
That's your job.
There are a lot of roles and a lot of jobs on this football team at all different levels.
Your coaches and I are here to help you get there.
There will be no victims here.
There ain't a coach in the world that isn't playing the best players."

[Daniel Abrahams @DanAbrahams77]

Steve Nash engaged in self-regulated learning early!

His father, canny as a fox, pointed out what he did well and encouraged him to bottle the details. Remember this, remember that! Remember this, remember that!

Memory - but it was never about remembering the performance outcomes, it was always performance process - the actions and decisions that helped the young Nash to score, not the scoring itself.

All detail! All detail!

This has been called attentional density (by neuroscientist David Schwartz). When you pay attention to something, your brain fires in patterns akin to that something. The more you think about it, the more the brain fires that way. The more the brain fires that way, the more chance you have of remembering what you’re paying attention to.

Pay attention to the details! Pay attention to the details!

[The Winning Difference @thewinningdiff1]

"Every team wants to win - every player wants to win - every coach.
But it's really the teams that honor what goes into winning and work at those things every single day that will be highly successful.
In order to win large victories, you first have to win small victories."

[Triple M @Tripple____M]

Watch Martin Odegaard then and now
https://t.co/REYTso36VQ

[The Winning Difference @thewinningdiff1]

“ I’ve embraced the idea that myself and players can have different personalities but what we can’t have is different mindsets,” Mike Vrabel

Culture doesn’t negotiate with mindset.

[Coach Tony Miller @tonywmiller]

One of the hardest mental toughness concepts for players to master. Put all your energy, effort and focus in the present moment!

[TeachTapes @TeachTapes]

Another Gem 💎 “Principles vs Methods”

[Coach Dan Casey @CoachDanCasey]

“Leadership is Lonely.”

- Kobe Bryant

[Thad Wells @ThadWells]

https://t.co/zMjrmuBssf

[The Winning Difference @thewinningdiff1]

The scoreboard doesn’t care about your intentions.
Your competitors don’t care about your excuses.
And your potential doesn’t care about your promises.

So here’s the question:
Are you committed to the process… or just attached to the outcome?

Talk is easy.
Do the work.

[Vala Afshar @ValaAfshar]

How not to be average is a must watch speech by Curt Cignetti, Indiana University

[Daniel Abrahams @DanAbrahams77]

I really enjoyed listening to this 2 minute clip from Mikel Arteta…

He talks about the power of the ball - specifically, the relationship people have with a ball.

You put a ball in the garage and it gathers dust - it deflates and is redundant. You throw it across Piccadilly Circus, with a bunch of kids around, it creates joy. You throw it across a village in Africa, perhaps where some kids have little to play with, it creates hope. The ball is an object that influences psychological states and behaviour.

His words make me think of the construct of confidence. Specifically with relation to leadership.

When leaders avoid the word confidence…ignoring its importance, its influence, and its development then

But when leaders initiate regular conversations with their people about the experience of confidence then it can be managed, protected, grown…even controlled to a degree.

“What does it look like when our team is filled with confidence?”
“When you’re executing confidently, what do others experience?”
“Who gives you confidence and how do they do that?”
“What does confidence look like to you?”

My point is that leaders can’t just ignore a psychological construct like confidence. Doing so is like throwing a ball into a garage to gather dust. That ball can be used in so many great ways.

Leaders need to help their people establish a positive relationship with their experiences of confidence - as individuals and as a team.

[Daniel Abrahams @DanAbrahams77]

Curt Cignetti with the slam dunk…

Stripped back - “Get into High Performance Mindset and stay there no matter what. Do not drop in attention. Do not drop in intensity. Keep a high level of intent no matter what…”

A short narrative that makes clear what a great competitor does. No guarantees of a high performance or a win…but a mindset and style of play that leads to the best possible performance and the best possible result.

Sounds simple doesn’t it? But it’s devilishly difficult…why? So much so because of the human brain…

A brain that tends to be anti-high performance. Working in milliseconds, constantly judging what’s going on around it, shifting attention outwards and inwards, distracting, easily exhausted during a metabolically hungry game, hating uncertainty, and sending thoughts, emotions, and feelings into conscious awareness that can destroy athleticism and coordination.

The brain tends to be anti-high performance, and so everything Coach Cignetti speaks about can be defined as simple but not easy. Simple to talk about but not easy to execute.

And so players need simple mental frameworks with simple mental techniques to play with high mental skill.

Simple!