I know there are a few coaches who mainly coach rep teams on here.

Others who coach club, aspire to rep coaching.

Must admit, having chopped and changed, I prefer the club atmosphere and easily prefer club coaching.

Haven't you moved I to a position with a senior team now?

I coach club but don't aspire to coach rep.

What I'd like to know is the difference between the two, not taking into account the "well meaning but clueless Dad" scenario.

Overseeing a program from seniors down to under 10s.

With rep coaching all the admin is done by FFA state branches who are paid employees. As we all know, when any administrative mistakes are made, unless one has a manager appointed immediately, the coaches are blamed by a few demanding parents.

With rep coaching they often have strict criteria about coaching staff. A manager is always appointed by the junior association, or state FFA branch.

I thought with rep coaching even after the initial selection trials I could evict players from the program, visit clubs and select more players as I saw fit. There are strict protocols about this within FFA. I broke so many and only often found out after the event.:roll:

With initial selection trials, the state TD did them jointly with me. After this, permission needs to be given from a FFA Technical Department to bring in new players. I didn't realise and brought new ones in. Again a rep coach with junior associations can do this. In defence of the parent body, high level coaches are responsible for identifying talent. Conversely, as the coach on the ground, one can feel a bit emasculated, even though there is an argument in the infinite wisdom of high level coaches being responsible for talent identification .

With rep teams, one cannot have a co-coach or assistant coach, other than a keeping coach. In a club scenario, if a coach was away, one can simply organise any other club coach to take a session. With rep coaching, they have to be accredited by FFA to a certain level.

In terms of deciding on cancelling a training session, I thought I had the autonomy to do this. I did in a junior association. With FFA one has to consult. I cancelled when I wanted to anyway. I strongly believe it is the team coach's call. This is always going to displease appropriate authorities.

Staff coaches were called in to take the sessions I deemed to have unsuitable weather conditions for player safety, albeit on a synthetic all weather pitch. With a junior regional program the rep coach has the authority to cancel.

In club coaching one usually has a a lot of autonomy. In rep coaching, FFA have established strict protocols to be observed. One rule is that only the head coach is allowed off the bench in the dug out in rep tournaments.

In their defence FFA are trying to professionalise coaching. To the extent, that a new head of program thought he should prescribe what coaches wore! After initially being perplexed I could see the logic of having coaches looking like immaculately attired pro coaches.


In my first foray into rep coaching , a few years ago I thought the parents were the exception , not the norm. They turned out to be the norm. Rep kids' parents are very ambitious about their children, many are very experienced players/coaches themselves. Many also, have an over inflated view of their own kids' ability. Some are even too harsh a critic on their own kids.

In club coaching, the soccer mums and dads are often just delighted that someone else is coaching ther kids. They will keep right out of the way if they can. Often rep parents have strong opinions about who should playing where, and not many of them think their own kids should ever be benched.:lol:

One good thing in rep coaching is often having very competent managers, selected from the parent group. These people were often very capable in their profession and did a lot of the administrative work, extremely well. Added to the state FFA staff, admin can be a dream compared to club coaching.

If one ever needs a ref at short notice, or someone to run the line, there are often about 20 candidates in rep teams I've coached.

A personal Achilles heel is goalkeeping, shot stopping instruction. With rep coaching, it is great having a specialist keeping coach, hard to find at club level.








Edited by Decentric: 5/10/2013 05:22:40 PM

Edited by Decentric: 5/10/2013 05:34:09 PM

Since most coaches pursuing the advanced pathway aspire to coach professionally, including nearly all on here, except me, I can also throw in some insights into people who coach football for a living.

There are many who voluntarily coach rep teams for years. I'm surprised anyone can do it.:-k

One of the things that frequently comes up at state conferences, are club coaches faced with low numbers attending. Hence, making it difficult to work on a specific team problem with 5 players.

Rep coaching usually draws much better numbers, making it easier to address team problems identified from the previous game.

A further problem that arises with club coaching, are social players. Those players who turn up to just have a kick with their mates. Whilst some footballers want to be the best payers they can be, some social players don't care. This is a constant problem in lower level underage club teams. High level coach education is wasted on them.

The social players (nothing wrong with this) also drag down their teammates and team's chances of wining games.

TJ Whalen, or Neverwozza, alluded to this with an under 14s team. A team had success. Henceforth, the next season a number of new mates, inexperienced and social players, joined the team, dragging the quality of the team down the next season.

Edited by Decentric: 5/10/2013 05:15:26 PM

In this state there has been a high turnover with state TDS.

In rep coaching , in junior association there was an excellent president presiding over a junior region, when involved in that venture. With FFT there was a very good TD.

It was always good getting advice from these guys, who always had solutions for most issues that arose. Unfortunately, both found the job too stressful and quit in the initial stages of the job.

Then there can be a vacuum, as others try and fill the void, whilst replacements are found. With bigger jobs, they often take longer to find permanent replacements. Club officials seem to be found more readily. Club problems usually seem smaller and easier to resolve too.

Thanks for that D, appreciate it.

I'll be taking part in rep coaching for the first time next year, so I should expect some sort of attempted involvement by parents?

i agree the best thing about club coaching is that the parents are just glad someone else is coaching their children and relating to anyone on this forum, that they actually have a passion to develop the players.

Ideally it is best to have managers and assistant coaches (keeper coaches) who are non-parents.

I 've had excellent parents as assistants. However, the dilemma is when you have to make decisions about their children. Things changed from the moment you selected players at the initial trials over the course of the season. Some we overlooked for selection, came into the squad and improved more quickly than identified 'stars' at the beginning of the season. Some of he best players at the beginning of the season, were not good enough to make a starting eleven , if one could have such a thing.

It is harder to 'discipline' players who have parents on the coaching staff. Sometimes it is more a case that a few players will drop their effort at training, leading others astray. In a club senior team they can easily be dropped to the reserves. When I was in junior association coaching a rep team, it was my decision completely to axe a player from the squad. Higher up in the FFA structure I still did it, but It seemed it the decision was clearer cut with the former TD in charge.

TJ, I'd clarify this with your committee before you start next year.

Generally parents who opt for coaching staff positions, own kids are pretty diligent trainers. The worst aspect is when the coaches' kids performances decline relative to other players. After the first tournament it was clarified from FFT that players should receive equal time on the pitch, which is consistent with my principles.

Initial selection trials are interesting. We expected about 20 triallists, but close to 40 turned up. It was no big deal for me as a trained teacher, but the state TD, the other selector, said that it would have frightened the life out of most coaches he knew.

It is probably anathema to my set of values to omit kids from squads. I like to see all kids willing to make the commitment , get extra coaching. Most experienced coaches don't think twice about it. Football God, a 442 member, an experienced rep coach, always has four selectors. I thought we got it right with two. Or did we?

One poor unsuccessful triallist received an email that he had been selected, when he hadn't. We still had two successful applicants who hadn't turned up for training. This poor kid arrived with me telling him and his parents the email was a mistake.#-o

I asked him to come out and train anyway. This kid was just as good as half the other players selected ! #-o How could we have missed him? In rep groups, a lot of the kids and parents have been together for years. Later in the season other members of the coaching staff said he had simply underperformed at the trials.

I went home from training and pushed the parents/kids who hadn't turned up for an immediate commitment. With vacillation from the parties, the kid who had turned up was immediately instated in the squad. He became co-captain by the middle of the season! At one stage he was pushing for state selection. I couldn't have lived with myself, if I couldn't have put him in the squad, when we would have had a player who should have been in, not selected.

Another parent was pretty angry, ringing me about why I hadn't selected his child from the initial trials. I went through the new FFA criteria for selection. As the season progressed at different times, many of the parents, all football coaches, mentioned his playing ability.

One kid I booted out, because of disrespect. I immediately went out to have a look at the non-selected kid from the initial trials at club game, where they were many players from our rep team on both club teams. He played very well with his club. How could we have missed him? Again, he underperformed at trials. He came to the next training session with my rep team and really put pressure on some incumbents, by training the house down for the rest of the season. He would have made another good captain.

Both the guys we missed from the initial selection trials, were in the starting eleven by the end of the season. One was a co-captain, the other would also have been an excellent co-captain too.

Some of the initial 'stars', who had been in more elite squads, faded, or plateaued during the year. The talent across the squad was very, very even by the end of the season.

Again though, initial selection trials , may have no relation to the players in another 6 months. Even if we had had four selectors, the players still underperformed at trials. I don't have an answer to remedy this issue. It is a reason to be back in the club scenario. However, the rep job helped my CV to get the ultimate club position I wanted.

I once saw Craig Foster given an excellent speech to a lot of kids at a holiday soccer clinic. He said all players at some stage will be overlooked for selection trials. The point he made was how one responded to non-selection. I knew one kid, one of the top players in his age group, who within a few years, gave up. A number of kids seem to drop out of elite programs and simply retire.

Trials are another issue coaches taking on rep programs face.










Edited by Decentric: 7/10/2013 08:41:39 AM

A further issue in rep coaching, is that FFA now, are looking completely at the way teams play - not results.

Teams are evaluated on proactive play. For instance the number of chances created by playing out from the back , through the midfield, ultimately with an attempt on goal.

Coaches are criticised by FFA staff for having keepers boot the ball out with big punts. They want to see keepers play as sweepers on the e deck with feet and roll and throw balls out instead.

The main objective is to have players playing in positions that will meet state coaches requirements/vacancies for players in certain positions. This may also weaken one's team.

That is, if there are already one of two players higher up in the pecking order in a certain position, a coach can be advised it is in a specific player's best intents to play in a different position in order to be selected for a higher level rep team. State or NTC coaches may also criticise a rep coach if they see a players not playing in the positions they want them to play in rep tournaments.

I'm quite comfortable with being part of a system of trying to produce players with a certain skill set to play a prescribed way that will lead to national success at senior level. However, all players and their parents are desperate to win.

Even though it is not as closely monitored, and FFA Tech Departments have far less influence, teams are supposed to play a certain way at clubs, but there is more scope for trying to win games.




Edited by Decentric: 7/10/2013 08:56:07 AM

Edited by Decentric: 7/10/2013 08:57:08 AM

Thanks Decentric, some interesting points there, especially on selection which I have never been involved in before.

Decentric, what would you have changed if you had your time again rep coaching, from what
I see that is somewhere along the journey you lost your credibility.

I never lost credibility as a rep coach. I've ended up as one of two TDs in a NPL club, from a NPL team watching me coach the rep team before their seniors trained on the same ground, which is a big move upwards in coaching terms. There may also be a better opportunity to get more migrants playing, as we are in a central location.

I was most confident at the end of the rep season, particularly after learning a lot about playing out from the back from the state coach.

I'd change nothing. I've learnt a lot about football this year from staff FFT coaches. The biggest disappointment I had was when the state TD resigned in March. I met with him very regularly and missed a good mentor. There was nobody to fill the vacuum. It is only in the last few weeks a replacement has been found as state TD.

As far as selection trials go, I don't like excluding players. I don't think I'll ever have to do that again. No matter how many selectors we could've had, some good players underperformed at trials. Thankfully, they ended up in the rep team and doing well. Arthur may be able to substantiate this, but I don't think Ange Postecoglou likes selection trials either.

I hope any other rep coach on 442, like TJ Whalan, has an experienced mentor on hand. In a way, I've found rep players' parents more challenging, than any parent group I've had in 30 years teaching. I'm very confident in handling parents in my professional life too.





Edited by Decentric: 9/10/2013 11:01:40 PM