Thank you all for the support that you have given me during the last 12 months.
I have been coaching for 25 + years and have encountered many challenges - but none as difficult as a worldwide pandemic. Despite these challenges you the players (and your families) retained your strong desire to improve daily and as I have said on many occasions, our players put in the most training effort that I am aware of during the pandemic. I speak regularly to coaches from professional clubs in Europe and they have all been impressed by the dedication of our players during challenging circumstances.
The 2020/2021 season is coming to a close in a few weeks and I wanted to take this opportunity to update my plans for 2021/2022. We will be sending 14 players to Fleetwood Town in the coming weeks and Fleetwood Town have set ambitious targets for their program within the next 12 months.
They have a relentless desire to identify, train and recruit the best international players available and will be aggressively expanding their international programs. To achieve this they have began establishing partnerships with professional clubs in other international countries and this will provide our players with multiple pathways towards a career in professional football.
With more opportunities than ever now available to young Canadian players there is a desire and responsibility by myself to continually raise training standards so that OUR PLAYERS are they one’s who are successfully succeeding at these levels of play. The pandemic has raised my own awareness of what is possible with online training/learning and I can now significantly increase the weekly training hours in all 4 areas of development (technical/tactically/psychologically/physically) through online delivery. This is important as young players in Canada can now match the training hours of academy players at top professional clubs in Europe. Young players in Europe U12+ typically train 12-16 hours/week plus play one game.
A few years ago I completed a Masters study on the main differences between a young player trained at an EPL academy (Wolves) in England versus a private academy program in Canada. There is a significant gap in training hours and my coaching work in Canada has and will remain fully focused on how this gap is reduced so that our players can successfully compete for professional playing opportunities overseas.
Therefore, I will be incorporating the following enhancements to our 2021/2022 programs:
The Prepare to Play Pro Online Program that includes live zoom training, 12+ hours home training content/week plus a monthly zoom meeting with EPL auditor and former Wolves Academy coach Marc Campbell will be included within ALL GOLD AND SILVER training programs for 2021/2022. Last year, players paid $66+HST/month for this program (regular price $120+HST) but I will be including the program for less than last year’s pricing.
We will be filming training sessions (like Fleetwood Town) using a Veo Camera and players will have the same opportunities as Fleetwood Town Academy players to review and make their own analysis clips from training sessions. This functionality will be included within our 360 APP.
Theo Corbeanu at Wolves mentioned in a zoom session with our players that one of the largest differences from his time at Toronto FC academy and the academy at Wolves was the use of video analysis by individual players to improve performance
Fleetwood Town will be merging their 360 App system with ours so that our players receive the same development experiences as their young players in England
I look forward to working with you all again during 2021/2022 and helping you take significant steps towards achieving your soccer goals.
Ian