The Danger of Over Coaching

 In this episode, Lee once again gives a brief overview of his thoughts on the NRL. We look at the danger of over coaching and why coaching is not all about X’s and O’s.

We also share some other tips including answers to your coaching questions as well as our continual raising of issues that impact us in the community game.     

It’s time to level up your coaching game with Episode 125 of the Rugby League Coach Podcast!  

Hosted by Lee Addison, owner of rugbyleaguecoach.com.au  and author of Rugby League Coach - the new book OUT NOW!



Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-rugby-league-coach-podcast--5572032/support.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:55):
How are you doing? Welcome to the Rugby League Coach Podcast,
Episode one hundred and twenty five. I can't believe anybody
has wanted to listen to me for one hundred and
twenty five episodes. And I'll be quite honest, you always
have this constant fear that one day you'll run out
something to say. I mean, that's about one hundred and

(01:18):
twenty five hours we've spent with each other. By to
be quite frank, I was speaking to somebody this week
who said they'd listened to every single one because he
was so nice to me. I gave him something for
free when he bought something, so I'm in a good
made We're in season three of the podcast too, and
that's another thing that I still have to pinch myself

(01:41):
sometimes to believe that is true. My name is Lee Addison.
I'm the owner of Rugby League Coach dot com dot au, which,
if you didn't know, is the biggest online rugby league
coaching resource, and I'm also the author of the recently
released book Rugby League Coach, Thirty Game Changing Conversations to

(02:02):
Transform your coaching. If you want to buy that book,
or if you want to have a look at Rugby
League Coach dot com dot au. I strongly recommend you
just go to Rugby League Coach dot com dot au
or send me an email admin at Rugby League Coach
dot com dot au or find me on socials. In
most places at Rugby League Coach. Tend to reply to

(02:25):
messages on Instagram and Facebook mostly, but you can also
find me on TikTok, LinkedIn YouTube, on x I'm doing
a lot more xing lately. That sounds a bit how's
your father, doesn't it? Tweeting xing? And you can find me.
You could type in Rugby League coach there, but the

(02:47):
actual handle is at RL coach on the net. One
of the reasons I'm a bit worried about running out
of things to say at the moment is because I'm
putting so much out there right now. So I am
going to talk a little bit about the NRL this

(03:08):
week in this podcast, but for more of my thoughts
and comments on the NRL, please listen to the Loose
Carry podcast from Zero Tackle this week. The Loose Carry
podcast from Zero Tackle is a very professionally edited one.
This podcast I was asked about this only this weekend. Again,

(03:34):
I literally do it in one go, so I never
edit it. That said, you may or may not pick
up occasionally when something has happened. So for example, if
my phone goes off and I forgot to put it on,
do not disturb, or like just happened just then an

(03:55):
alarm went off on my phone. So occasionally it does happen,
but I tend to do this in one go okay,
and any mistakes I make, I us try and roll
over the top. Sorry I'm waffling. This week, look out
for my weekly column also on zero tackle dot com.

(04:15):
So I have done three so far and I'll be
doing a fourth this week. The first one I did
was about Canberra's last minute try to beat the Sharks
in round five, and the Angler went in on there
is that what the Sharks suffered in the closing stages

(04:36):
of that game was Canberra playing like their instincts allowed.
Whereas for so much of the game, and for so
much of the NRL games that we see, the Super
League games that we see probably a little bit less
of this, we are playing under so much structure, preordained structure.

(04:59):
I was critical in my tweets in my exes on
Anzac Day about how the roosters and Saint George in particular,
were pre programmed the amount of times the halves had
only two defenders outside them and four attackers with them,

(05:19):
and they decided to pass short rather than long, to
go to the space that blows me away. Still, so
that first article is on there. If you click on
my name on zero Tackle, you'll be able to access
all these articles. The second article I did was about

(05:42):
Lucky Galvin. It was during the time when the news
broke Visa Viva, and I argued that it should be
in reserve grade. And my arguing point there was that
if you want to build a team and somebody doesn't
want to be there, actually no, eighteen months in advance,

(06:04):
they're going to let you down at some point because
the heart probably isn't in it, no matter what they say,
no matter how they gesture, they're probably not in it.
And it's pretty clear that Galvin and his management are
angling for a release, and quite frankly, once it gets

(06:29):
to that point, in my opinion, it's over. So I
stand by that article. There's been people who've criticized me,
there's been people who have had alternative views in the media.
But if Tigers want to break out of this. We're
a club that has talented juniors, or gets talented juniors

(06:52):
and then sells them to other clubs or moves them on.
Should say think to Desko, think Moses, think Aaron Woods
back in the day. Unless they want to keep those people,
they need to break that chain. So to keep those people,

(07:15):
they need to break that chain. If the tail is
wagging the dog, as often happens in these lower graded clubs,
players think they can go elsewhere for better coaching, better
trophy winning opportunities, etc. You're best off just cutting ties

(07:36):
and saying see you later. The third article I did
last week was called Dogs of Draw and it was
about the schedule benefiting the Bulldogs. You may have noticed
that last week the Bulldogs lost their first game. Did
you notice the first time they'd left Sydney this year? Now,

(08:00):
the whole basis of that argument is that Gus Gould,
their director of football or general manager or whatever he is,
mentioned on his podcast last year that he was worried
about a particular game because they'd traveled two weeks previously
to Bunderberg and to Auckland. So if it's good enough

(08:21):
for him, and I think the Bulldogs have got a
really nice draw for much of this year, so I'm
not saying they've not had bad draws in the past,
so maybe they're due one. I'm not criticizing the Dogs.
They've been brilliant, but every single one of us who
watches the game still struggles to see them as Premiership contenders.

(08:45):
Have you noticed that there's several people who've said they
might not have enough strike power to win the competition.
So when you see a team like that, you need
them to answer questions, and the first question that they
had to answer this week they failed miserably and also

(09:05):
had three players suspended for a long time. If you
looked at their game against South Sydney the week before,
they played after a bye, so the Bulldogs had a
bye and also South Sydney had to travel to Perth
the week before and had five days turnaround. So they

(09:26):
have been very, very lucky so far. And it's a
key stage coming up for the Bulldogs now. They've traveled
to sunk Hope again this week for Magic Round and
then they go to Canberra, So let's see where the
Dogs are in a couple of weeks. Then let's look

(09:47):
at some other issues the Broncos. Have you noticed that
they struggled with favoritism. So when you look at their
recent history, whenever they've been pray favorites, whenever they've been
talked aboutotential premiership candidates, they tend to fluff their line somewhat.

(10:07):
Last Thursday against the Bulldogs, they played fantastically because they
were underdogs, and that tells everybody how important mentality is.
And there'll be more of that letter later. Somebody sent
me a note pertaining to these Bulldogs. Highly you have
my permission. I have supported the cronel of Sharks since
nineteen seventy two. Tommy Bishop and Cliff Watson I think

(10:30):
played in those games. It pains me to see how
many times they have been cheated, because I remember every one.
Phil Gould does not like cloneller and says that in
a roundabout way, you will notice when they are up
against his preferred teams like Penrith East or Canterbury. For
the uninitiated East to Sydney Roosters. Now, the number of

(10:53):
penalties and six A games that go against the Sharks
a crucial moments. Yet I was there in twenty six
to witness their great victory and saw how they were
robbed against the Cowboys the following year. Even the hatchet
job to get rid of Shane Flanagan at a crucial
time sticks in my throat. I believe there was political

(11:13):
interference in that and can explain further. I remember so
many bad decisions that they have endured for over fifty years.
Regards Michael. Anybody agree with that, Please get in touch
to admin at Rugbiley coach dot com dot au or
send me a message on socials. The article I'm going

(11:33):
to do this week is about all about the Newcastle
Knights and I'm going to in depth going to talk
about the tactics. I think they need to win to
score more points because they actually defended quite well for
the first five rounds, but now the confidence or lack

(11:54):
of is kicking in as well. They also have a
player called Jackson Hastings in reserve great who's not being
touched for some reason. I don't know what it is,
but please keep an eye on zero Tackle dot com,
where I'm writing weekly and also doing the Loose Carry podcast.

(12:15):
There's some big issues facing coaches in the community right now,
because even though that's all about the NRL, they've just
been talking about this podcast focus as much, if not more,
on the community and the junior reps and any lower grade.
Really in Southeast Queensland, it's a rain disrupting so much
of our training in gains. In other places, it's lack

(12:38):
of playing numbers and it's more common than we think,
and it's actually an advantage, or you can turn it
into an advantage because players will dig deep in many cases,
or or they'll disappear in others. Depends. And I'll give
you one example. One of the coaches that I have
mentored this year. He came to a lot of myself

(13:00):
and ours last year, my online seminars, and he came
on the Coach Mentor program this year, so I mentor
him as a coach. He got in at a good
deal time. And I'll tell you about one that's open
right now. He's coached a team that haven't won for
seven hundred days. They got to win at the weekend

(13:24):
and he rang me on the way home from the
game and it was great to hear. I said, mate,
this isn't the time to analyze now. You need to
enjoy this one. He said, I'm going to watch another
game and then I'm going to crack open some beers,
and that I know what he's been through with that side.
His side. At one point he was worried he wasn't
going to have one. He's been worried a couple of

(13:44):
times that they were going to fold. It seems that
they're digging deep rather than disappearing. And also one of
the big things we've been doing with him and another coach,
he's getting the players to recruit, so get their mates
into play. So there's more strength in our current generation
of children than we like to think us all the ones,

(14:07):
or we like to listen to the negatives rather than
the positives, and many of them will rise to the
occasion when they are backs against the wall in other places.
And another coach I'm working with in particular, but in
several places, I'm talking squads of twenty five or more.
And the advantages to having something like that are when

(14:31):
you've got twenty five players, it can basically be your
way or the highway. You've just got to get your
criteria down and be clear about it, make your rules,
be clear and stick to it. And if you waiver
on them rules, they'll eat you alive. So I'll give
you an example when you've got your squad of twenty five,
if you say, if you don't train, even if you

(14:52):
call me, you're going to be dropped to the bench.
If you don't drop that person to the bench, regard
of who they are, you're starting to lose your team.
So if you've got that many players, you're in a
good place. Make your rules, be clear and stick to them.

(15:13):
And again going back to this current generation of youngsters,
they like boundaries, and if they agree to those boundaries beforehand,
you've got to stick to them because if they don't,
they'll eat your life right. Another issue I've seen plenty

(15:34):
of times, virtually with every coach I'll work with at
times is over coaching. And I asked one coach last week.
I said, if you missed a session this Thursday, after
all that you've done in the whole pre season, I said,
how long has it been? He said eleven weeks, so

(15:56):
this is session twenty two. I said, can you imagine
if you missed a session on Thursday because your car
breaks down or something, will it make that much difference
to the weekend? And that he agreed, probably not. And
I think that what that speaks to is the pressure

(16:18):
we put on ourselves as coaches. We think we are
the fountain of all knowledge and that we're the only
one that can do it. And I've got news for you,
we're not. And I'll give you a really extreme example.
If all you did was teach your team defense and

(16:38):
let them do what they wanted to in attack, as
long as there was some football like you there, they
would come up with something. If you left them to
do defense and only taught them attack, which a lot
of coaches do, they will struggle to come up with
something and on us. Sometimes players just need to work

(17:02):
it out themselves. And don't be fooled coaches. If you
over complicate the game plan, certain players will get together
and plan to play in exactly the opposite way as
you're asking them. That happens at the NRL level and
international level and at levels from that level down. So

(17:28):
don't be fooled to think that is not happening on
your field if you're over coaching. It's a fine balance
we have to consider all the time. I know when
I coach, there's always a time in my coaching when
I know I have to pull back, when I know
the players can't take any more information and At that point,

(17:51):
I say to myself, let's just go with what we
have and be as good as we can be with that.
Some coaches I've been working with on this coach Mentor
program and I do have a very good discount now

(18:12):
if you want to join it for the rest of
this season. So a lot of the coach mentor work
we do is in pre season planning sessions and getting
teams ready. But then of course we've got the in
season and I tend to pick up some coaches who
want me to look at their game tape with them,
or have some problems that need fixing them. They need
some advice on how to fix those programs. And there's

(18:36):
a discount for the rest of the season, which includes
website access to Rugby League coach dot com dot au
and the courses web page. But also I'm happy to
talk about monthly price, weekly price anyway, people who are
on the program. There's a one coach I've been speaking
to or sorry, two coaches this week. I have literally

(19:00):
said forget the opposition this week, because we have a
subculture in the game where coaches think, okay, we need
to review the game and look at our tape and
then we have to preview the opposition. Let's give our
players as much information as possible so that it looks
like we're coaching, so that the committee and the president

(19:22):
and everyone else is looking at me thinks, Yep, he's
doing everything he can or she's doing everything she can
to coach this team. And that's how we're steered as coaches.
So some coaches think that they're not doing enough if

(19:43):
they don't do all those things. Well, I have literally
said to two coaches at quite a high level, one
of them at a very high level than the other,
one junior level but older junior level. I have literally said,
forget the opposition, focus on yourselves. One coach said, if
you don't play physically, you're screwed. If you do, everything

(20:04):
else will fall into place. Another coach I have said,
and he loves to plan until he's blue in the face,
and he knows who he is and he knows I
love him. But he plans to the nth degree. I
mean it's like he needs that. And he's worked in
a REP system and that fits perfectly. But now he's

(20:27):
working with the community team and half of his team
are REP players that are returning from that REP scene,
and they've done no pre season with him, so he's
basically got a new team. So I'll let you think
about this, the listener. If you've got half your team

(20:47):
arriving to your preseason two weeks into the season and
they've done no work with you, they may have stood
on the sidelines watching, but they've done no work with
you because they've been in a REP scenario. Well, didn't
your previous three months mean something? So those new REP

(21:13):
players have to learn something, don't they? So if you
were to put even more information into them about the opposition,
would that work or do they need to focus on
getting their job Bran? In other words, have they mastered
what they need to do yet? And I would argue

(21:35):
very strongly that they haven't. There's been enough instances of
great coaches and great teams who didn't look at the
opposition told their players, we just need to worry about ourselves.
If we sort ourselves out, the opposition won't be able
to live with us. And they've won premierships. And by

(21:59):
the way, the coach talking about who's only just got
his REP players, they're undefeated anyway, two from two, So
tell me, is he in a perfect place or what
two from two without half his team ish and they're
all rep players and it's two from two And the

(22:21):
only thing that can damage a situation that is over analysis,
paralysis by analysis and some over coaching, I think. And
to be honest, it's great working with coaches like that
because a lot of coaches I work with I have
to get them to plan. Others are great planners, and

(22:43):
I'm just tinkering with the plan. Which one are you?
If you want to be on the coach mentor program,
hit me up admin at Rugby League Coach dot com
dot au or any of the social media channels at
Rugby League Coach. This week a message for players really,
and it's about one of my bug bears in coaching,

(23:05):
which is how players, in particularly young ones, are taught
to do what I call beach weights, or do it
themselves despite advice to the contrary. So this this applies
to coaches very much too, who were thinking about encouraging
their players to do weights. I believe most of the injuries,

(23:30):
or many of the injuries that players get are because
of the weight training they do and did as juniors.
So something that happens in the NRL now might have
been because of something that a junior did when they
were sixteen for six months. But they don't get the
injuries in the gym, they get them on the training
or playing field because their body is slightly out of

(23:50):
line and all that. Personally, doing all my bench press
as a kid with no instruction from many people, my
rights eye became too dominant because I was right sideed
dominant as a kid, and then without any correction, the
bar was constantly tilting down to the left because I

(24:16):
was taking more weight with the right, so my upper
body was slightly out of balance. I've also seen so
many players get poor advice and counsel from strength and
conditioning coaches who don't work to that game specific rule.
Because the world is full of advice on how to

(24:37):
do gym work and resistance training, it should be called
resistance training because you can do resistance training covers everything. Basically,
it's about having a force working against you. So the
force could be the floor when you're doing push up
right bressels. But the world's full of advice, YouTube and

(25:00):
TikTok and everything else. And if you can't get to
a gym because of geography, you can't go wrong with
body weight workouts anyway. But if players are serious about
their football, they need to do functional, game specific resistance

(25:20):
training rather than activities that are simply going to make
them look good on a beach. And you know how
it is every day's chest day. Don't do the legs,
chest and shoulders. You have an upper body and a
lower body. Don't forget your legs. You have a front
of the body and you have the back of the body.
So this week's message really is about functional resistance training,

(25:42):
functional weights training, and you know where to come if
you want that advice. I'm now going to show you
something that was popular this week. Show you you're listening,
aren't you all like the historical videos. This one is
from twenty twenty one. I'm asking, I'm answering two questions
in this video. The questions how do you build up
a team quickly for a short term representative environment? And

(26:05):
how do you transition from playing on a wing to
playing at hooker? So this is from twenty twenty one.
I'll see you when you've listened, be about ten minutes?
Are you doing in the call out I did the
other week for questions. One of the great questions I
got from from a coach was how do you build

(26:27):
team spirit get players together during a short term REP program.
I think one of the keys to a short term
REP program or even any short term program is some
things you're going to have to put in the would
like to do column but not essential. And the key

(26:49):
to REP coaching is focusing on the things that you
need to focus on and just brushing over the things
that aren't quite as important. So, for example, in a
short term REP program, you're probably not going to improve
players course skills that much. You're probably not going to
improve their lines have run that much. However, you can
get them into a team tactical position, a team strategy position,

(27:12):
and all that kind of thing, and have some principles
that flow through the way you're going to play. The
question was related to how you'd get those players to
I suppose not form cliques and all that kind of thing. Well,
the way I always approach it, Darren who said the
question is that I think people are naturally inclined to

(27:37):
spend time with people that they want to spend time
with and people that they feel comfortable with. And if
you're in a tour situation or a camp situation or
you've got literally just a few sessions to blend your team.

(27:57):
I think one of the best ways of doing that
is to just say, listen, guys, girls, I know that
you've got friends that you are closer to. It might
be that school, that school, that school, or that club,
that club, that club, or whatever it may be. But
when we are working, when we are together, we have
to throw all them away. I always remember when I

(28:19):
work with Matthew Elliot, who's now the assistant coach of
the Dragons, the former Canberra Penrith Bradford Warriors coach. When
we were away with America in twenty eleven, he actually
got the boys in a meeting room before we did
any training and he said the words you are now brothers,

(28:39):
and that's not an option. And he explained that you know,
brothers sometimes upset each other, but they always come down
on the side of the brother kind of thing. They
forgive them for things, etc. Etc. And what Matt did,
and I learned this from him, was he just took
away any reason or any inclination for anybody to hold

(29:03):
a grudge against someone or decide not to like them.
And he said, for the duration of this fourteen days
or ten days or wherever he was. You must put
that to one side for the good of the group.
I thought that was a great approach and that's something
I've used since. There is obviously things you can do
to blend the team together while you are training, or

(29:23):
one thing I always do. I tell the players if
I'm going to ask you somebody's name in a minute,
and if you don't know it, you've got to do
five push ups and that kind of thing, And always
encourage them to know the person's name on their left
and on their right. Encourage them to get into groups
with people they don't know. One tactic one trig is

(29:44):
to get them in a meeting room and ask them
to ask each other a series of questions. I did
this on a recent aim Higher camp. I asked them
the players to ask each other name, age, club, school,
and then the second person that they went to, they

(30:05):
had to ask them different questions such as, who do
you live with, who's in your family, what positions you play?
And then somebody else had to ask some different questions
and the last one was something funny. I mean, obviously,
what you do with young kids is a bit different
to what you do with adults. You can imagine some
of the things that have come out of adults mouths
when I've asked these kind of questions. Ricky Stewart once

(30:29):
told a group of mine that he came to visit.
He got them all to read out to each other,
had to pick someone and say one thing I like
about you as a player, and one thing or wish
you'd improve, and it just built respect up amongst the group.
He did that in an origin camp, I believe. So
there's a few little tips there, and I think ultimately

(30:51):
the big one, the absolute big one, is just taken
away that to bo Just accept that they might be clicks,
accept that people might want to spend some time with
people they feel comfortable with, and just disarm it. Just
take away the problem. Just say you're more than welcome
to spend time with people that you socially feel more
comfortable with. At the end of the day, you want

(31:12):
your place to be happy, don't you. But yeah, just
don't don't allow that to creep into your training. Don't
let them train with each other and no one else.
Don't let them pass to each other and no one else.
That's when it becomes a problem. And once you disarm it.
I think you'll find it will quickly go away. I'm
gonna answer another question now while I'm here, because I

(31:32):
remember I did miss a week. One young fellow asked
me he wants to transition from a wing to a hooker.
So let's assume that. Let's make some big assumptions. Right.
Let's suggest that by going into the middle of the field, mate,
you've got to improve your cardiovascular fitness. You're gonna go

(31:54):
from maybe ten to fifteen involvements in a game to
forty to fifty maybe or something like that. So you've
got to get ready to make more tackles, get ready
to be at virtually every play the ball. Off the
physical side of it as something else on the physical
side of it, I would work massively on speed off

(32:14):
the mark, because if you want to run from dummy half,
it's going to be very hard for you to get
a run up. From a technical aspect, you have got
to get your passing down right. I've worked with a
lot of hookers over the years, and one of the
things I tell them to I remember, I'm going to
use a name here. Luke Veschio used to play for
Manly Seagles at sixteens eighteens and twenties, and when I

(32:36):
had him as a Matthew's kid, he came to me
as a wing and I transitioned him to hooker. I
actually saw him run from dummy half once in a
small sided game and I thought he's a hooker. But
he could not pass. He could not pass water, right,
So I sent him home And this was all credit
to him, right, I said, May, you're going to have
to pass five hundred times a day, and that's just

(32:59):
to your left, because you've got to do your right
as well. You've got to get your passing down part.
If you want to be a hooker. Your pass has
got to be sweet off the floor, and your pass
has to be so consistent, so you go from having
the ability to pass under me half to then having
the ability to be consistent with it so it lands
on the same spot all the time. And there's no

(33:20):
shortcut to that. It's practice, practice, practice, practice practice. Imagine
you're passing the ball to the left, put your right
foot close to the ball, go heel to toe and
your left foot crouch as far as you can and
always think it's very hard to describe, but keep your
head straight a bit like a batsman who's playing cricket.

(33:41):
You keep your head straight so that you can actually
see the target, and always follow through your hands so
that you see where the ball is going, and the
ball will go where your hands telling to. And then
I think, once you've got those things down paths, so
your physical fitness, you speed off the mark and you're passing.
And that's going to take you a while. You're not
going to turn that around in two weeks. It's going

(34:01):
to be a If you want to switch to hooker, mate,
you've got a big job ahead of here because you've
got to really work on that passing. Well. Once you've
done that, and once you're consistent with you're passing, I
think then you start to think about the vision. And
one tip I always give to my hookers is to
walk to the play the ball and while you walk,

(34:22):
you're scanning and you're having a look around. And then
once you've done all that, then you start to think
about disguising in a set of six, all the passes
that you're doing. So if I look that way, which
way I'm I passing you A, I'm passing that way.
If I look that way and passing that way, if
I look that way now, and I don't be that
way and pass that way. That's just a little bit

(34:42):
of variety. And I think in a set of six
you can have six different varieties if you want. You
can face one way, turn the other, don't be one
way past the other, all that kind of thing. Roll out,
et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. I do think there's
been an outbreak of kids rolling out have done me half.
And one thing I always encourage them to do is
to remember that when they saw Cameron Smith doing that,

(35:04):
when they saw other hookers in the game doing that.
They're training with people day in, day out, week in
week out, for hours on end, so their combinations are
really schmick. I always instruct my hookers the two g's
give or go once you've done that or the other.
And what that means is, if you're going to give
the ball, give it straight away. If you're going to go,

(35:25):
just go straight away. Once you've got that dawn pat
your players around you will pick up the rhythm off you,
and then when you've spent a few weeks getting your
combinations right, then you can start nipping out of the
player the ball because the other thing is you need
to look at rout recognition and make sure that you're
choosing the right ruck to go backward. Tom So, as

(35:48):
best as I can, I've run through that for you, mate.
Thanks to the player who sent that question. Okay, you're
back with Lee now on episode one hundred and twenty
five In twenty twenty five. I Ashes Rugby League podcast
will drop this week, the second episode. We've been speaking

(36:08):
to potential interviewees. I have sent messages to Adrian Marley,
Bobby Goulding, Steve Renoff, John Someone's Terry O'Connor happens to
be a good mate of mine. We will get guests right,
He's just getting them at the right time. Hopefully we

(36:29):
get one for Wednesday. If not, we'll still have a
great podcast for you. We're all about building up to
the Ashes, which is about six months away. On that note,
I am very very very very very very very very
very close to releasing the tour details. I'm taking twenty
two people to the UK. Can you see yourself on

(36:51):
the Rugby League Coach Tour. There's been people that have
emailed me, Dez, I know you're interested, Nathan Damian and others.
Byron So I could go on right as soon as
I get the details, you'll be the first time. Now
I'm just waiting for this travel agent. So yeah, you'll

(37:15):
also see this week that part two, or the first
chapter of part two of my book has been made
available as a free read, and it was a chapter
on the game being about more than x'es and o's.
It's five thousand words, so I'm not going to read
them all here obviously, but the first of all, you

(37:38):
can read them online. So if you go to my
socials or if you send me a message leave you've
got that free read thing, I'll send it to you.
That was thanks to John Davidson, who does the Ashes
podcast with me. The key points in this chapter in
chapter two of part oh no chapter one of part two.
Number one, players don't care how much you know until

(37:58):
they know how much you care. Yeah, so one coach
I've been privy too recently who's left a role. The
feedback from the players was that he didn't seem to
spend much time to get to know them, and he

(38:22):
was a little bit abrasive as a coach, so that
was interesting, and none of them questioned his technical expertise
or the quality of training, but they did feel like
he didn't particularly care about them, and that can only

(38:47):
get you so far. As a coach, You've got to
have that care factor, and I don't think it's something
you can fake. If I'm honest, I know that a
lot of the players who've gone on to the NRL,
who get interviewed by the media, if they ever talk
about their school days, they talk about me as a

(39:08):
caring coach. And I just didn't know I was doing
it at the time, but I genuinely did care. It
just it came from a place that wasn't premeditated or fake.
I did care. I didn't want them to suffer or fail.

(39:30):
I wanted them to succeed and be happy. I bumped
into one of my players, who my ex players, who
in many people's eyes, was one of the best of
my time in the Queensland school system. He got signed
by an NRL club not close to home. Well as

(39:53):
a Brisbane boy, but he was Newcastle Knights. He got
homesick after a year, wanted to come home, played some
Q Cup, got an injury that meant he had to
stop for a while. He's got two kids, lovely partner
who he met at school. When I met him, he'd

(40:14):
just come out of juvenile prison. In his life was
all over the show. God knows what he used to
do at weekends, but he used to be vomiting every
Monday at training. I always say that's the player I'm
the most proud of, and you can't fake that. The

(40:39):
second point from this chapter is when players play, it
does not pay to fill their heads with too many
TACTICALI told you didn't edit it tactical or technical things.
I'll repeat that. When the players play, doesn't pay to
fill their heads with too many tactical or technical things.

(41:02):
My rationale for that is that we play a really
tough sport, so you need some real clear messages that
cut through when the players are tired, when their body
is starving for oxygen, when they're a little bit fearful,

(41:23):
when they're in flight or fight mode and the marbles
are going around the head. And I always say this,
the best coach in the world right now is Donald J. Trump.
Give yourself a little test if you happen to be
in Australia right now and you listen to this podcast

(41:46):
on time. There is a federal election coming up in
the next week. Do you know what alban Easy and
Dutton are suggesting to happen in Australia. The answer is
probably not, But I bet you know some of what
Donald Trump wants to do. I'm sure I've said this before,

(42:08):
but I'm sure I said it last week. But it's
a perfect real life example of what messaging can do
for a movement. So your team is a movement, and
if you get those messages right, they will move in

(42:29):
the direction you want them to. I'll suggest you read
this free chapter or do some studying on messaging. The
third part is the key to coaching is a simplicity
of instructions for players so that they can carry them
out under pressure, which obviously links to part two number four.

(42:51):
If you lose, say nothing, If you win, say even less.
Don't put a target on your own head. I talked
in the story about one coaching job I did that
was quite high profile, and when I left, they visibly
changed a principle that I worked to, which was I

(43:13):
tried to fly under the radar a little bit. I
never we were in the local papers, we were on
the internet. But apart from maybe the first month or
two to pump the program out, I did everything we
could to keep our messages safe from spiking the opposition

(43:41):
in any way. And I tell a story from that time.
I tell two stories from that time. When I left,
it completely changed the team and the players were popping
up more than Ellen de Generous or Taylor Swift everywhere,

(44:03):
and they went from being one of the top place
teams to being at the bottom and fighting relegation the
year after the cart had come before the horse. I
tell another tale when in one cup competition, I was
just struggling, you know, you struggle sometimes to think about

(44:25):
something to say. And the morning of the game, I
opened well, I didn't need to open out, so it
was a backpage. I got the local paper. On the
back page of the opposition coach had been quoted about

(44:46):
saying how much his team was going to take it
to My boys said some well, in the cold light
of day, they probably weren't that too bad, but we
certainly turned them into bad things. But in other words,
it was just foolish. It was I could not believe

(45:09):
what had been written. And he was sort of saying,
how they were going to do this to us and
do that to us. They need to be worried about
us and whatever else. So I literally just photo copied
that back page eighteen times, one for me and seventeen

(45:34):
for the players. The assistants had the paper and were
passing it around, and I gave the whole the players
some blue tack so they could put them up on
the above the pegs. I just said always, all we're

(45:55):
doing today is we're reading this back page, and a
couple of the players, one of them is in the
NRL now very prominent. He did the rest. We won
that game by one hundred. It was the most one
sided game I have ever coached in in my life,

(46:18):
and I thank the opposition coach for the help. Part
five of this chapter is about with social media these days,
your opposition will be giving you fuel every day if
you take some time to look for it. So a
lot of clubs and teams don't have control over what

(46:39):
their players post. And if you really want to find
out about your opposition, and I do. In six, I
suggest studying your opposition as much as you can, which
is counterproductive to what I said earlier on in this podcast,
but as a rule, we should study our opposition as
much as we can. Doesn't mean you have to get

(47:00):
it to your players. You can guide your coaching so
that it exploits the weaknesses in your opposition without letting
them know that that's a weakness in the opposition. You
can say to your team, if you do X, why

(47:20):
will happen? That's still that still has come from you
studying the opposition. But the other thing, and the other
part about studying your opposition is if you study social media,
if you look at players Instagrams or Facebook. So even
the clubs. I mean, obviously there's rules that the younger

(47:43):
you are coaching, so be careful, but and don't start
following accounts of thirteen year olds or something. But there
is stuff out there, and all some of the clubs
I've involved with, they put things out there, and oh
but I'm one of those who's paranoid about that stuff.

(48:06):
Don't put a target on your head. And I speak
about many cases from my history, from my working history.
I don't forget. I was a media manager at a
couple of the biggest Super League clubs and working with
some of the biggest players and as a kid, so

(48:27):
I've been around this all my life. Clubs and coaches.
I want to come out and speak to you and
your coaches. I've got two presentations I really want to give.
One is on building outstanding defense. The other is on
thirteen things that coaches do wrong and how to make
them right. And I'm also doing some online versions of
that in May. About the tour to England, I think

(48:53):
the deal is going to be roughly about six K.
If it goes to seven or five, don't shout at me,
but I'm telling you how it's going to be the
best value for money tour out there. Right, So flights, transfers, tickets,
accommodation and that will be the basic packaging you can

(49:13):
add on to that. I've had one person text me
this morning and say, can we go business class? Well, yes,
you get the flight, you get on the plane, you
get on that, you get the ticket, so you've got
your place on the plane. If you want to upgrade,
you can, right. So one thing about going overseas or
traveling anywhere, the last thing I want is for people

(49:33):
to tell me what to do. I want to do
my thing. And the other thing I want to get
across is families are absolutely welcome. This ain't going to
be a hey, lad's hate or don't get me wrong,
there will be groups of males. I'm hoping we get
some coaches and we can do some coaching intensives over
there too, but families are absolutely welcome as well. I'm

(49:57):
keeping it around twenty two because I really want us
to have a fulfilling experience and I want you to
have the freedom to do what you want. So I'll
be doing certain things each day. You're welcome to come
with me, but you're under no pressure, and all of
this is put together. I am confident we will be

(50:19):
releasing this this week. If you are listening to this,
So Dez, you don't need to send me another message.
I've got your back mate and all the other guys, Damien, Nathan, etcetera.
I know you're keen, you'll get that. But if you're keen,
if you're you've not been in touch yet and you're keen,
please just get in touch. I'dmin at Rugby League Coach
dot com dot au. There seems to be an increasing

(50:41):
number of schools that don't value sport. Have you noticed that?
And historically if a school leader didn't like sport or
pigeonholed the sport as a gender specific thing. So you know,
girls playing netball, boys play soccer that was normally enough

(51:05):
reason to have less sport or remove it entirely at schools.
Now on top of that, it can be the excessively
complicated and lengthy administrative procedures that can be used as
an excuse. But also rugby league seems to have a
bad rap in some places I've noticed, but to me,

(51:26):
school bosses that don't provide sport provision of severely failing
their kids. As we know, participation in sports can give
us a focus and keep us away from the bad
things in life. And of course, right now female participation
in rugby league is booming, but in other sports as well,
so any school that doesn't do this is failing every

(51:50):
student in a big way. And to me, schools should
be a place where kids discover things they are good at.
So even if there's only one rugby league player in
the school, they should be helped to find a club
or find some kind of trials that they can compete in.

(52:14):
And also, many of these school bosses don't realize the
failing teachers too, because there's many out there who would
gladly give up their time to run school teams and
events because it helps teachers get a better relationship with
their students. And I've not even mentioned yet the health
and well being benefits that can be brought to a community.
So I can't emphasize this enough. If your kids or

(52:38):
kids you know here at a school like this, I'm
a qualified teacher by trade and I do provide these services,
so I can help, Okay, So please get in touch.
I am getting significant male from a few places that
the Australian Kangaroos aren't getting what they want for the Ashes.
So think Rugby League Player Association and their demands in

(53:02):
terms of and the agreement basically in terms of how
much players can and can't do. I think in terms
of logistics. So one tour I've seen there's not that
many tours this year. I've seen one team that's one
tour that's going to be far more expensive than the

(53:25):
one I'm putting together. And you're going to land and
you're going straight to somewhere and then straight to somewhere
and straight. So for anybody who's done this trip, you
can maybe go hard for a couple of days in
terms of doing things, but then you probably you're probably
going to hit a wall right and you will need

(53:46):
days of respite and you can't pre program nature. Sometimes
sometimes your body just decides. So if you think about Australia, Ropa,
everything else, they probably need to get to Europe or
England two weeks in advance. If you look at the
history of World Club Challenges and Ashes, tours and things

(54:10):
like that, if any team doesn't get that right, so
some come over late and spend a few days on
the drink, some come over early, spend a few days
on the drink. Or if you don't get that right,
you're at severe risk of losing the first Test or

(54:33):
the World Club Challenge or anything else. In the last
two decades in particular, there's been a lot more cases
of Australian teams coming to England than vice versa. And
trust me, the flight to Australia is even worse because
you're going against the timeline. So Australia are having a
battle with the powers that be to get what they

(54:54):
want to prepare properly. Now, I want you to think
back to the twenty twenty two World Cup, which was
the one World Cup Cup Cup. A year later. Sarmoa
got absolutely battered by England in the opening fixture, but
by the semi Final when they've been in the country

(55:15):
for three weeks they ruled England. A bit of digging
suggested Samoa didn't really take their preparation that seriously. Leading
up to the England game. You see a lot of
players want to relax a little bit when they get

(55:38):
to the end of their NRL season. In particular, younger
players aren't big drinkers like US older players. They do
look after themselves better. But even so it's a fine balance.
So I'm getting big male that Australia ain't getting what
they want for the Ashes. The first Test is at
Wembley in London. Wembley of huge significance to English people.

(56:05):
I don't think you truly have an equivalent in Australia.
If I'm honest. We've got Lords and Wembley and Wimbledon.
They are all the significant venues Wimbledon for tennis size
and English people raise their game when they play there,
as do foreigners. But if you look at this, Australia

(56:29):
ain't getting what they want England ready at Wembley first Test.
England and Great Britain do not have a bad record
against Australia when they play at Wembley. If you look
at the history of Wembley in the last two three
decades comparatively. Bear in mind England and Great Britain have

(56:52):
not done well at all really over the years in
these series, well them anyway, the Wembley record comparatively sticks out.
So watch this space. We've got a really bad message
about transfers again and I'm waiting for more info. But

(57:14):
here's another one, hi, mate, great job in exposing all
the bs. So for those who are only just joining
U as I am been a big campaigner about the
junior transfer system and the way our parents and kids
are getting ripped off and their futures in the game destroyed.
I commented on one of your posts the other day.

(57:36):
Our club girls have also been denied entry to a comp.
Although we had more numbers than a club that was
allocated a spot. We were told that we had to
permit our players to this club or our girls wouldn't
play at all. Now, if we don't permit our girls
into this team, they wouldn't have enough players to take

(57:57):
the field when the comp kicks off this weekend with
our number. That would include players taking advantage of the
eighteen month window, which were denied only because I believe
it was given more numbers. Every time we have put
something in front of the people running the show, we
get denied only because we decided to take a stand

(58:19):
for our girls. As a manager and a coach, we
want to keep our girls together, so we will probably
end up at the other club only because our girls
have trained hard, some of them since September October last
year and deserved to be out on the paddock. I'm
a huge advocate for grassroots football. It's where our future

(58:40):
stars come from. But after this, I'm starting to lose
faith in the people who are in control. We have
also been told in not so many words that if
we don't comply, it will affect our chances in twenty
twenty six. To be added to the compoles are the
governing bodies running some kind of cult that if you're

(59:01):
not running in line with their ideals and it's over
the side of the boat for you. We just want
to see these girls take the field, but they won't
get a chance to represent their club colors, the colors
that they have trained so hard for and so long
for the girls. I devastated, as you would imagine, anyway, mate,
I just wanted to make you aware of another BS

(59:23):
handling of junior female teens in this state. I don't
want to get any backlash from this. I just thought
you should know and don't want any names or club
info given out as I don't want to jeopardize the
girl's opportunity to play. I need a drink of water
before her. The administrators that are doing this are absolutely disgusting.

(59:57):
I am disgusted in you. Let the girls play. Stop
being a Nazis, Stop being a dictator, go in with
a can do approach. You are ruining the game and

(01:00:20):
for parents and coaches and managers to write to me
and are desperate to hide their identities because of fear
of the backlash. You should be disgusted it has got
that far highly. I've recently moved over from New Zealand,

(01:00:44):
where I played rugby union primarily as a running ten
or fifteen. Since making the switch to league and joining
war Hope, I've been aiming to transition into playing in
the halves or at fullback. At the moment, I've been
put on the wing and I've been asked to cover
all back line positions as part of my development. While

(01:01:04):
I understand the value in learning multiple roles. I want
to make sure I'm continuing to grow in the areas
needed to eventually succeed or in the halves or at fullback.
Would you happen to have any drills you'd recommend for
ball playing, attacking structure, or kicking that I could work
on individually? Also, or are there any cues or things
to watch when studying NRL halves or full back fullbacks

(01:01:27):
that could help speed up my understanding and development. Appreciate
any advice or direction you can give, and I'm keen
to keep improving and make the most of this opportunity
I may war hope of. Actually their coaches have gout
access to my website, and on there you will see
all that advice you need. Tell them to tell your

(01:01:48):
coach to help you look at the website, tell him
borrow his password. Have a look. Okay, I'm running ten
or fifteen now. I think the big adjustment you need
to make, mate, is that in rugby league you get

(01:02:11):
six tackles. So in union where you get the ball
and you sort of think kick or run because you
have to do something on that playing league, you can
actually stay in the game for a while. You can
half can do nothing for twenty minutes and just organize.

(01:02:31):
Where you will be suffering at the moment is you
probably don't know the ins and outs of league. In
terms of your development of fullback. I think that will
help your development at the half, and I think it's
easier to start at fullback and then go into the halves.
In your scenario, at fullback, you just need to push

(01:02:56):
up in support as much as you can throughout wherever
the all goes, you go, and then in the other
half of the field you become an attacking option outside
the hearts and that will give you a perfect standpoint
in which to study the game. Now, if this was

(01:03:17):
something I could get through quickly on a podcast, everybody
had been doing it. So what I need you to do,
mate is get your coach and study the videos in
the skills section in particular and the what to coach section,
and your coach will know exactly what you're talking about
when you've listened to this. Please feel free to get

(01:03:39):
in touch again. Also, I told you about the YouTube
channel which has coach playlists, and play a playlist that's
Rugby League coach on YouTube. I don't feel like i've
done that justice on the podcast because I was running
out of time, and also it's very hard to coach

(01:04:01):
somebody who I have not seen play as well. So
hopefully this is the start of the conversation my friend. Guys,
that's the end of the podcast. Coaches out there, Officials
out there, managers out there, I love your work. Administrators

(01:04:21):
in some areas, stop being Nazis. Take care, s S

(01:05:05):
s ST