Thanks guys. There's certainly a lot of good sites etc.
I guess the point is that at one of Aucklands biggest junior clubs I can't see any evidence of the Whole of Football plan or whichever strategic document NZF branded their junior development under. It still seems to be each club to their own..
I'd be very keen to attend some coaching sessions. Not to just parrot off what is shown but get some new ideas. I just end up doing what I think is best which is probably OK for my daughters team but it's not OK for the boys rep sides.
Two things struck me today.
1) Only 3 out of my 9 kids in the 9 year old team watched the Wales game (incl my daughter who had no choice). The football diet in NZ is very A League and EPL dominated. About half watched the All Whites recent games after I told them they were on. The kids in my team used words like "horrible", "why are they just kicking it anywhere", "they need you to tell them how to pass" (I liked that one!).
2) our club really struggled to get coaches for all the junior teams. They had to send multiple emails and plead with parents. So I guess the issue may not be getting junior coaches getting credentialed but getting even "football people" coaching sides. Maybe it's just the way society is going. It's a big effort to commit to practices etc. I'd be interested to know what other clubs experience. It may mean the clubs and NZF have to provide the coaching rather than rely on dads...
I assume many NZ clubs have already done this... but the position you talk of is also common in Australia at local park level teams...
At my club, we approached 3 over 35 players who themselves were certified coaches to run monthly a coaching course. So a typical season would go for say 6 months if pre season is added.
Each player would take certain coaches i.e U 6 to u 9, U 10 to U 12, and U 13 to U 16.
They would once a month run a coaching course for coaches, we found on balance it was supported, appreciated and had a good effect... of course their were issues at times and some people struggle to hear someone say something different to how they coach but on balace worked very well...
Hope it helps and I am sure some NZ would also do this.
I did the NZF Level One course in Ch-Ch and thought most of it was terrible.
It ran for 4 hours and only in the last 30mins when we went outside (and had to turn the floodlights on) did I get anything of practical use.
For 3 1/2 hours we sat around and occasionally split into small groups coming up with answers to gems such as 'What qualities does a good coach have?'
The worst bit was when for 30 mins we were given a large piece of butchers paper and told to draw what a good coach looks like and specific features of said coach. For instance the coach should have large ears, because you know a good coach is a good listener. He should also wear a watch because a good coach is a good time keeper.
We had 4 groups of about 3-4 people actually physically drawing stick figures with accessories like watches and whistles, and big ears etc...
Just complete drivel like that...
I'd greatly prefer a small section of theory, maybe an hour of the four and then actual drills to run, why they're run, lessons from each etc etc.