On Wednesday the 15th of February, as part of Leeds Rhinos Foundation’s Clubs Education offer for 2023, the charity delivered a ‘Transition to the 13-a-side game’ workshop for under 11s and 12s coaches. The session was supported by Chris Spurr, the RFL Community Coach Development Manager, who is working closely with Leeds Rhinos Foundation to help develop our Educational Offer.
24 coaches from various clubs, both Leeds and outer areas attended on the night. The workshop was certainly not a formal event, but designed to let the coaches have their say on opportunities, concerns, and dangers – forming an open discussion on the subject of transitioning from the primary rugby league game to 13-a-side with full size pitches.
The subjects further discussed were as follows:
- Playing Positions
- How do we measure our success as coaches?
- Coaching Philosophy
- What does training look like?
- Don’t follow the crowd
- Support your concerns
Coaches were separated into specific age groups and asked to discuss each subject, feeding back their findings to the whole group. There were concerns regarding pressure put on coaches by parents surrounding pitch positions, winning mentality and game plans. The positives on the night outweighed the negatives and much was debated on upskilling the layer within small, sided games, creating self-led learning environments, problem solvers, free thinkers, and decision makers. The group spoke about creating the holistic all-round player – a player that can be rotated and be given the tools and skill set to carry out tasks in front of them.
There was also discussion on the formal side of the game and knowledge around kick off positioning, marker techniques, along with defence formations. The group spoke about how they measured success and gave comparisons with a professional coach and a community coach and they concluded by saying don’t follow the crowd, be innovative and keep it simple, focusing on teaching skills but applying them as soon as possible.
The groups were also asked to design a session plan based on the discussion from the evening, putting their thoughts on to paper. This will then contribute to the content of the practical delivery for the next session on the subject matter.
Please CLICK HERE to sign up to one or more of our upcoming Coach Education workshops:
Primary Rugby League skills and games
Saturday 11th March
Football World
10-11am
Rhinos RAMPAGE
Monday 20th March
Headingley Stadium
6:30-8pm
Or CLICK HERE to book your place on our:
Primary Rugby League Workshop
Wednesday 1st March
Try Zone at Headingley Stadium
6:30-8pm