Tag: grassroots

It’s been a while since I’ve added any pages on here but I’m hoping to get back up to speed with how Pat’s been getting on…

As mentioned last time out, while Pat was busy amputating the end of his finger (we can laugh about it now), we were having regular meetings with Dean from Evo, about a different matter.

Regardless of the decision of whether or not Pat was to carry on playing football, he’d already said he definitely wanted to carry on with the coaching of the younger keepers at Evo. It had surprised me just how much he was enjoying coaching as he’d never mentioned being interested in it before. I suppose in the back of my mind, I thought if he did finish playing, coaching (particularly with Evo) would be a great way for him to carry on in a football environment.

The Sunday morning meetings at Costa were necessary following a very brief question Dean put to me at Pat’s training one Thursday night. Dean waited until Pat had gone to warm up and then, completely out of the blue, asked me if I thought Pat would be interested in going to South Africa for a week to do some coaching?

I’m fairly sure I laughed out loud.

For the previous few months, Pat had been coaching younger age group keepers on Saturday mornings. The Saturday morning keepers are generally the boys and girls below the Junior Premier League (JPL) age groups that attend Evo training, so up to about 10 years old.

I don’t think I answered for a for a few seconds, just because of how unexpected the question was.

The idea was for Dean and his business partner Steve to go, along with Seb (head of Evo – Brain, Body, Mind), as well as Carter (Dean’s son) who would do some coaching with the outfield players at Evo South Africa in Johannesburg. The final piece in the jigsaw would be Pat going with them to coach the Evo South Africa keepers for the week.

Dean warned me there were a lot of things to put in place to get it off the ground, as you could probably imagine, but that he was also extremely hopeful it would go ahead, so needed to know if Pat would be up for it. In simple terms, the week actually happening or not would depend on the financing of the visit, based on the wider interest generated in Johannesburg.

But what can you say to that? The offer of going to South Africa to coach other keepers at the ripe old age of 16?

Once I’d digested what Dean had told me, I answered on Pat’s behalf. I thought it would be best to give an answer straight away, just to avoid any doubts as to whether he wanted to go.

For a few weeks, no more was said about it and I’d kept my promise not to mention it to Pat until anything further was decided.

Then, one night when I was picking Pat up from training, he said “I might be going to South Africa!” I told him that I’d heard it might be a possibility a few weeks earlier. He was buzzing.

As a 16 year old lad he can be a pain in the arse at times and generally his attitude is similar to Kevin and Perry but this turned him into a different kid. Even if only temporarily.

Once it had been agreed, Dean suggested us meeting up regularly. It was around this time that Pat had said he was thinking of stopping playing, so the other positive about the possibility of him going to South Africa was that we were still firmly in touch with Dean throughout. Costa was the meeting place of choice, every other Sunday morning.

Dean was still feeling his way with his contacts in South Africa but in the meantime he’d said Pat should start getting his coaching programme down on paper. This would be his coaching that he would deliver to the keepers. “No problem.” was his reply.

Generally with new skills or challenges, Pat rarely seems phased which is a brilliant attribute to have, especially as a teenager. My only worry with him being like that, is that he might be being too laid back or he’s not considering all the things that need to be done.

After Dean’s comment about the coaching programme, my brain clicked into gear. As confident as Pat seemed, I thought he might need a bit of help or at least some guidance. On the way home I asked him what his first thoughts were, about the coaching. He rattled off quite a few ideas and even started to develop them, there and then. I told him to write them down straight away. Too often it’s the case that you can have a good idea but then forget part – or all – of it.

He found an old envelope in the glove box and I had a pen in my pocket. He started scribbling. Once he’d finished writing bits down, I said that if he wanted any help or even just my opinion, to give me a shout. The general idea at this point was for him to create a training plan for the visit to South Africa, to cover five days Monday to Friday for two different age groups of keepers, approximately 8-12 years and 13-16 years. This though would depend on the take up of places when the training camp was advertised in Johannesburg.

My guess was that numbers wouldn’t be a problem, as over in Johannesburg Evo have a number of teams from u13′-u15’s, u17’s, as well as a senior team. But in reality, I didn’t have a clue as to what the interest would be.

The training programme was to be designed by Pat and delivered to the two groups of keepers. As this was his first attempt at designing a goalkeeping programme, Dean was wanting to ensure everything was up to scratch – so we made more trips to Costa as the weeks went by.

Another opportunity for Pat, off the back of South Africa but also the coaching he’d already been doing at Evo, was put to him.

“Would you like to be Evo’s Head of Goalkeeping?”

It was a question he didn’t need long to think about. The South Africa training programme would therefore be the blueprint for his future venture as Head of Goalkeeping. Dean and Pat were bouncing ideas off each other while I listened to their thoughts – and drank coffee. I made a few notes – fairly general things based on what Pat was saying. As much as anything, it was to help him or at least give him extra ideas about what could go into his training plan.

In equal parts – as delighted as I was for him, I was also nervous for him. I really wanted his week in South Africa to go as well as possible. I’ve always remembered an old work manager of mine had a favourite saying and it’s stuck with me.

“Fail to prepare, prepare to fail.”

I wanted Pat to be as well prepared as possible for what was going to be an unforgettable but also, extremely busy week. In the back of my mind, it went back to him being really laid back. I wanted him to put maximum effort in while he was still in Sheffield because that’s when I could help. Once he was on the plane, I couldn’t really do much to support him.

So the training plan would be put into practice in South Africa and then after returning to Sheffield, Pat would use his plan to train the JPL Evo keepers at their weeknight training sessions. As the weeks progressed, Pat could amend the plan adding things that he thought would be beneficial, or likewise remove parts if he wasn’t happy with them or if he didn’t think they were working.

The main things I wanted to make sure Pat was thinking about were how to develop the drills he’d got, from fairly basic to more advanced as each session progressed. For a start, he had no idea what level the South African keepers he’d be coaching were at. So he might have to move things on quickly if they were a decent standard, as the last thing you want to do is have keepers not being pushed enough as they’ll get bored easily and not be motivated. Alternatively, the keepers might take a bit of time getting used to the drills or techniques, in which case he’d have to be careful not to move them on to more advanced drills too quickly.

I became aware of this myself when I first started coaching Pat. The other keeper in the team, Jack was a great lad but his attention span wasn’t quite as long as Pat’s. More or less straight away I realised that I needed to keep Jack involved, while it was Pat’s turn in goal, otherwise he’d become distracted or bored. Simple things like pairing them up for drills – so serving to each other, or using them for a secondary part of the drill for example, me serving directly to Pat, then in the same drill Jack serving for Pat to make a diving save.

Pat had already been thinking about this. We put our ideas together and wrote down different scenarios, the positives and negatives. We crossed bits out and wrote new ideas in. I was there to help him but the content and ideas were all his.

As the training plan came together, Pat spoke with Dean and he put all the separate sections into a spreadsheet, in the same format he already had for the outfield camp. This was obviously for Pat’s benefit but also to show the coaches at Evo South Africa in advance, what to expect when the coaches arrived from England.

Over the weeks while the plan was being compiled, there was plenty of other paperwork to consider. As Pat was only 16 and not travelling with either of his parents (unfortunately) into South Africa, we had to make sure all the i’s were dotted and t’s crossed. His passport had recently been renewed, so that wasn’t an issue. As it was new territory for all of us though, we wanted to be 100% certain that there wouldn’t be any nasty surprises, for example, at the airport when it would almost certainly be too late to sort out any problems.

Apart from paperwork, there were other things to consider. Compulsory vaccinations. Pat was able to go for his second Covid vaccination, so I booked him in. We also had to consider; Diphtheria, Tetanus, Polio, Hepatitis A and Typhoid. – the first three of these were all covered by his jabs that he’d had at school.

I contacted our doctors to book him in for Hepatitis A and Typhoid. They told me to contact the hospital as they wouldn’t do them. I contacted the relevant department at the hospital. They could book him in for the vaccinations in August. Great. Except they were travelling to South Africa on 8th July.

They gave me a number for a private clinic in Sheffield city centre, so I rang them and got him booked in for the two jabs on the following Saturday morning.

It was all really professional at the clinic, apart from there apparently being a worldwide shortage of the typhoid vaccines, so he wasn’t able to have it but they put him on a waiting list, in case. The nurse said she thought it was very unlikely that we’d get a call before he was due to travel but also didn’t seem particularly concerned. But then again, it wasn’t her that was travelling was it?

So his jabs were all (sort of) up to date. The health concern that was still lingering, was his finger. He was still having to go and get it checked out. We were basically just hoping the scab would fall off before he was due to travel and that it would therefore be healed, meaning no chance of infection. Fingers crossed so to speak.

Back to the paperwork.

Dean asked me to put a letter together confirming that he would be Pat’s guardian for the week, in our absence. I put all the details into the letter; flight details and times, Pat’s passport number, Dean’s passport number, dates of birth, addresses – both at home and where they’d be staying in Johannesburg – contact numbers etc. For all the hard work everybody had put in, both in the UK and South Africa to get the camp organised, we needed to make sure Pat would actually be able to travel.

A few days before they were due to fly, we completed a health questionnaire for Pat to take with him but then another document that he’d potentially need was mentioned.

The South African Home Affairs department have a document entitled ‘South African requirements for minors travelling internationally’. It looked as though we should complete it (again, being careful not to miss anything important) and then it needed to be signed by a ‘Commissioner of Oaths’ – whatever that is?

After making enquiries, I found out that a solicitor should be able to sign the document for us, for a small fee. But not just any solicitor, so I needed to check beforehand to make sure. So on the Monday afternoon before their flight, Ciara and I went to the solicitors. Dean met us there, in case the solicitor needed him to countersign the document. The solicitor looked a little confused with the document but signed it anyway. And took the money.

As it turned out, we later found out that this document was for South African minors travelling into, or out of South Africa without their parents, such is the problem of trafficking in that part of the world. Once again, from the point of view of Pat being able to go Johannesburg, better to be safe than sorry.

So, apart from packing his cases, everything else was now sorted.

Paperwork, jabs and training plan all finalised. As was his injured finger – the scab came off, although the skin was still very weak, so we bought some tubular bandages for him to take, just to give a bit more protection when he had his gloves on.

On the Friday morning that they travelled, Ciara was working from home and I nipped back from work to see him off. Later that evening we both said it was strange without him at home. A lot quieter at least and for the next week the food bill dropped dramatically.

Over the next week or so, there was very limited contact with the travellers due to power blackouts, which are quite common in the evenings, apart from the fact that it was very much a working trip while they were away, with not much time to relax.

Apart from the weekday coaching sessions, the UK Evo group were working closely with Evo South Africa, who were going to show them round Johannesburg and Carter and Pat would also play in a couple of games for the South African Evo u18’s. Just to add to all the other documents and paperwork that were needed, Pat had to get an ID card to allow him to play in the games.

Ultimately, the week was a great success from a coaching point of view, but just as importantly, the UK Evo group were able to meet up and properly get to know their South African Evo counterparts.

As a bit of a treat, I’d bought him some new goalkeeper gloves before he went to South Africa. His other gloves were showing a bit of wear and as he was going in a professional role, I thought it would be for the best. So when he travelled, he took 2 pairs of boots and 2 pairs of gloves. He only came home with a pair of each. He’d given away the newest pair of boots and the new gloves to two of the lads he had been coaching.

He apologised to me when he came back home because of giving the gloves and boots away but he needn’t have. I was pleased that he had. It really did surprise him just how little the lads from Johannesburg had got.

Pat was lucky enough to have been given the opportunity for a once in a lifetime trip to Johannesburg, to coach other keepers and broaden his horizons but it also opened his eyes to the lives that others have. Some much less fortunate than himself.

The second and final game was a league game for the Evo SA team. Carter and Pat played. Apparently Pat made a great 1v1 save late on that the manager was pretty pleased with.

Sadly there was no footage of the game or the save but I believe Dean’s version (more than if Pat had told me!). The success of the week was enough for me to keep the faith.

WARNING: contains graphic images.

Within next to no time of the Clegg Shield celebrations wearing off, Pat dropped the bombshell – he wanted to stop playing football.

We were stunned. Dean was too.

Off the back of the Clegg Shield, as well as the Evo defeat against South Liverpool where the opposition parents were congratulating Pat on his performance, it was totally unexpected. In fact, Dean had said in all the years of coaching players, he’d almost got a sixth sense about how they’re feeling about their football.

Dean said it looked like Pat was the exception to the rule, in that he had no idea he was feeling that way. No inkling at all. He said that in training sessions, Pat’s face still lit up when he made a good save and that he’d never known a lad want to keep the ball out of the goal with as much determination.

He’d also said that he was training and playing really well, so not likely to be suffering from a lack of confidence, which in turn can have you doubting yourself or your ability. Whenever I asked Pat, he just said he was enjoying coaching the other younger keepers but not the playing side of things. I asked Dean if he could have a word with him – maybe get to the bottom of it and hopefully change his mind about packing it in.

Independently of each other, Ciara, Dean and me had all used exactly the same phrase when we found out about him wanting to stop playing.

“What a waste.”

As a parent, you just want the best for your kids. When they take up a new sport or interest, you help however you can. I’ve never been much good at a lot of the things I’ve tried, but I was a goalie as a kid and I loved it. In the (many) years since then, I’ve seen how football has changed, specifically the role of the keeper and 10 or 11 years ago when Pat said he wanted to be a keeper, I’ve tried to help him however I could, even if it meant relearning a few things because goalkeeping was one of the few things I knew how to do.

To start with, it was giving him pointers before and after games – and encouragement during. Nothing too heavy, just bits I thought would help him improve his game and enjoy it more.

Then it was helping with his training and doing my coaching badge. I’d spend time thinking about how to push him a bit more by thinking up new drills. He’s had GK specific training with Chesterfield FC Development and then CYG Goalkeeping, as well as 1-2-1 sessions all at extra expense.

But let’s not confuse matters, for all the effort, we as his parents have put in, Pat has put endless hours of work in, week in week out. He’s always wanted to improve and be as good as he can be, so we’ve done what we can to help him.

The first time I saw him play I thought he had at least a little ‘natural ability’, just in the way he dived and how he landed. So if he enjoyed playing, why not help. In the same breath, I would hate anyone to think we’re pushy parents, or the types to make our kids do something they didn’t want to do. I suppose what I’m trying to say is, that for all the effort we’ve put in and the miles we’ve clocked up, that doesn’t have a bearing on him stopping playing.

His ability should do though.

I’ve seen him make great saves time and time again. I’ve seen forwards hold their head in their hands when they think they’ve scored but he’s made a save. I’ve heard parents and opposition coaches celebrating too prematurely because it’s looked a certain goal and he’s made an unbelievable save.

I think he could play to a decent level – but maybe I haven’t told him that enough? As his coach, I’ve always tried to help him with the shot that got away but should I have heaped more praise on him for the almost certain goals that he’s kept out?

Dean spoke to Pat to see if he could work out what the issue was. Having spoken to him, Dean thought it might be a combination of things which made him think he had too much on his plate and so had to drop something. They reached an agreement – Pat would stop playing and training with Evo while he was doing his GCSE exams and have a complete rest from football until he’d done his last exam. After that he’d see how he was feeling.

Dean’s only condition was that Pat and me would stay in touch with him while he was taking a break. Almost straight away it seemed like a weight had been lifted from him. He was more relaxed and had a smile back on his face (sometimes).

For the next few weeks, I made a point of not mentioning football or Evo. I didn’t want him to feel any sort of pressure from me. I also sort of came to terms with the idea of him not carrying on playing, preparing my head in advance. I honestly thought when he finished his exams, his decision could go either way. I couldn’t have called it.

As promised, we kept in touch with Dean. I kept forcing myself not to ask Pat what his thoughts were and everything just kept ticking over. Then, one Sunday morning, at a meeting with Dean (more of that at a later date), he just came out with it,

“What are your thoughts on next season Pat?” I held my breath.

“Yeah, I’m carrying on playing”, was his matter of fact reply.

Obviously, I was chuffed to bits. As much as I’d tried to prepare myself for him not playing any more, I wanted him to carry on. He was still going to stay away from Evo and football while he finished his exams but then he’d be back into it.

On the way home after the meeting, it was like a huge relief for both of us. When we got home, I had a list of jobs as long as your arm and Pat got changed and went to the gym. As I got on with my jobs around the house, the sense of relief stayed with me.

About an hour into dismantling furniture and shifting it from one room to another, my phone rang. It was Pat. “I think I need to go to hospital. Can you take me?” I didn’t get the full story there and then, I just went to pick him up but it sounded like he’d managed to trap his finger and his nail had come off. When he came out of the gym, it was obvious that it was the ring finger on his right hand, as the gym people had dressed it for him.

As he got into the car, conscious of all the jobs I still had to do, I asked him if it was definitely a ‘hospital job’? Pat replied that the guy in the gym who’d put the dressing on it said he 100% needed to get it looked at. So off we went to A&E.

I parked the car and we walked up to the entrance, at which point I realised we only had one face mask between us – at this point Covid restrictions were still in place – I told Pat to go and get checked in while I walked back to the car to get another mask. Before I’d even got back to the A&E entrance, Pat rang me to say he’d been told to go next door to the Fracture Clinic. So I met him there. I was sat in the waiting room, when he came out with his finger freshly dressed but with tears in his eyes. I told him not to be too upset and that it would just take a little while for the nail to start growing back.

As it turned out, the tears were because it wasn’t just the nail that he’d lost but also the tip of his finger.

Rewind a couple of hours. At the gym he’d been doing squats with a bar and weights on his shoulders. Then his leg had cramped up and he’d stumbled backwards, trapping his finger between the bar and the rack. As he’d fallen back, he’d pulled his hand away but not quite in time to avoid his finger being trapped.

I didn’t know what to say. Any thoughts of some comforting words felt very hollow as they went round in my head. When we got home, he went for a lie down on his bed. Ciara and me kept checking on him to make sure he was ok. At the hospital he’d been given some strong painkillers and antibiotics for any infection, so as we were checking on him, we were also checking the times he was due to take his tablets.

A couple of hours passed and we asked if he wanted anything to eat. Standard response from him and he made his way downstairs. The dressing on his finger was soaked in blood.

Before we’d left the hospital, they’d asked us to make an appointment for the following day at the Hand Clinic but with the state of the dressing we decided he couldn’t wait until then, so I took him to A&E again. On the first visit, everything had been really well organised, seemed to take no time at all and without too much fuss, we were on our way home.

The second trip was almost the opposite. As we were only going for the dressing changing, I thought it wouldn’t take long. How wrong can you be?

As before, Pat went to the desk, explained the problem and was directed next door to the Fracture Clinic. So, round we went. We sat in exactly the same seats as I’d been waiting in a few hours earlier. There was nobody else around. I could just hear a couple of voices. They were discussing ‘Stranger Things’. At length.

We waited. And waited.

As you do, when your kids aren’t well, I was getting a bit fidgety and frustrated. With the amount of chatting they were doing, it was obvious they weren’t particularly busy and they could be sorting Pat’s dressing out.

I walked round to see where the voices were coming from. It was almost 8pm. I explained why we were there, just to get his dressing replaced.

“We can’t do that. We’re closing now.”

I explained we’d be sat waiting nearly half an hour after being sent from A&E.

“Yes, that’s where you need to go back to. A&E.”

Brilliant.

We walked back round to A&E and sat at the reception desk. “You all sorted?” Pat raised his hand. The girl looked surprised. “Oh. Right. You’ll have to take a seat then.” So we did. And we waited. And waited.

After an hour, I went back to the desk to ask if they had any idea how long we were likely to be waiting. I hadn’t finished my sentence when a nurse came through a side door and shouted Pat’s name. When we got through the door and into the cubicle, the nurse asked what the problem was. I explained. She looked confused.

“So you’ve been here all that time?”

“Since about 7.15.”

“7.15 tonight? I don’t understand.” She looked confused.

I repeated that we’d simply come for his dressing to be changed. She was under the impression that Pat must have needed to see other doctors or nurses and couldn’t understand why he hadn’t just been sent through earlier for such a simple process. I shrugged my shoulders. “You and me both.”

She was very apologetic. I was just happy she was going to sort the dressing out. It turned out to be quite a bit of messing about because the amount of dry blood meant that she couldn’t get the dressing away from his finger. I waited in the cubicle while she took Pat away to soak the dressing, to allow it to come away from his skin.

He came and sat back down while the nurse was getting some scissors.

“Don’t look at it Dad. Don’t look at my finger when she gets the dressing off. It doesn’t look very good.”

The nurse came back in with the scissors and all I could think about was looking at his finger. If he’d not said anything, I probably wouldn’t have looked. Right on cue, the nurse managed to cut the dressing off, then disappeared again to find a bandage. She’d covered his hand with a large gauze dressing. I was sat at the side of him.

“Let’s have a look.”

“Are you sure?”

“Err. Yes. I think so.”

He lifted the gauze up. Straight away I went all warm and clammy. I even felt a bit dizzy. There’s no denying it, it didn’t look good. As the nurse reappeared, I just about managed to compose myself and not throw up.

Once the clean dressing had been applied, the nurse explained that she was working until 6am the following morning and that if Pat had any more issues between now and then and we needed to go back to A&E, we should ask for her specifically and she’d make sure she saw him straight away. We thanked her and left. We got home at about five to ten.

Apart from the obvious worry about his finger and how it would heal, the next concern was that he would be sitting his GCSE’s in just over a week. With it being his writing hand, we were worried if he’d be ok writing. Thankfully, he just about managed.

Over the next 6 weeks or so, Pat went to the Hand Clinic every Monday for them to check on how his hand was healing. From the second visit onwards, it felt like progress was being made because the end of his finger was stitched up and then the surgeon did some repair to the nail bed of his finger.

Throughout all the visits to hospital, Ciara went with Pat. My Dad revived his last job before retirement, taxi driver. In my job, I’m often away from our yard and quite often I’m on sites, especially on Monday mornings, so Ciara and my Dad were running here, there and everywhere to get Pat to his appointments.

As his finger healed more and more, Pat was helping it along the way by pulling away dry blood and dead skin. At the Hand Clinic he was given exercises to do to make sure the skin stayed flexible. In the last few weeks, the healing came on really well. He said the finger still felt sore if he bumped it, even slightly, but other than that, everything seemed to be going ok.

So, if your own young goalkeeper suffers some freak minor accident, it’s not that easy at times but try to keep the faith.