Brian McDermott praised insightful interaction from the coach’s as the key to another successful Coach Education workshop on Monday 20th April.
40 coaches from the Rugby League community took part in the second session of 2015, which was based on utilising video analysis demonstration. The workshop provided a video analysis demonstration based around game strategies with the use of game footage provided by Leeds Rhinos Head of Analysis, James Bletsoe, and a Q&A with Brian McDermott.
The Coach Education programme, organised by the Leeds Rhinos Foundation with the Leeds Rhinos Head Coach and his team of staff, is now in its 4th year, and are part of the charity’s Rugby League Development plan, which is sponsored by MEARS.
The interactive workshops are designed to provide a collaborative setting where the coaches can engage and ask questions relevant to their level of coaching. Following the latest session McDermott felt that this area had been a particular success, with the level of understanding and quality of questions from the community coaches in attendance a particularly pleasing aspect of the night:
“I was impressed with the level of engagement again from the group during the session,” said McDermott.
“We managed to cover a lot of game strategy and come up with plans to fix problems we identified through the footage with both defensive and attacking sets. The quality of questions from the group and the theory the coaches are putting into practice now, shows how far many of the regular attendees have come since we started the programme.”
The session covered a range of game strategies from completion and looking for a pass in attacking sets to a focus on more of a defensive emphasis of dominating in the tackle and defensive shape at the breakdown of play.
Sam Horner, who works closely with many of the coaches as the Leeds Rhinos Foundation Community Development Officer and organises the Coach Education programme, commented on the success of the workshops so far this year:
“The second session was another success for us, not only in having a good number attending, but through the level of engagement we are getting that creates a great learning environment for all of our coaches. We now deliver a full programme to try and accommodate coaches of all abilities and age groups and our programme for 2015 will hopefully reflect that.”
Brian McDermott will deliver three more coaching workshops in 2015 with emphasis on different areas of modern Rugby League coaching. The sessions will also call on the expertise of some of the club’s other experienced coaching staff, with Assistant Coach, Chris Plume, helping deliver an on the road session with the Rhinos Academy, Rhinos’ Head of Athletic Performance, Jason Davidson, will cover Rugby League conditioning and Academy Strength and Conditioning Coach, Ben Jones, will look at sports nutrition.
The Coach Education programme will also be highlighted by further sessions that will be delivered by Leeds Rhinos Foundation staff over the coming months. These sessions will target the coaching of younger age groups, from minis to under 11s, and will focus on creating fun environments whilst learning the skills and movements needed for Rugby League.
Details of all Coach Education workshops in 2015 will be released via the Leeds Rhinos Foundation website at www.leedsrhinosfoundation.org
For more information on the how to get involved with Coach Education contact sam.horner@leedsrugby.com
A brief video of Brian McDermott at Monday’s session can be seen below: