Director of Coaching

I started coaching in Northampton and coached County Boys U14 to U16 (1989-92) and also U21 for Men and Mixed. Since 1998 I have coached in the Surrey area and at junior county level both Girls and Boys at various age groups. I have been head coach of Wimbledon Junior section (Approx 300 kids every Sunday) since 2004, prior to that involved with Spencer Junior coaching. I have also coached Ladies Hockey for clubs such as Spencer, London Edwardians, Wimbledon and currently London Wayfarers, who I managed to get promoted to the South Leagues last season.

In 2008 I headed up the Junior Development Centres for Surrey which had approx 900 participants from U13 to U18 Boys and U13 to U17 Girls.

My ‘day to day’ job is also very much Hockey orientated as I am a partner and Managing Director of The Hockey Centre business which has 3 Hockey shops in the South of England, a Job I have done since 2003. I am lucky enough to have a current England/GB coach as a business partner. This, along side the work I do with England Hockey and my actual coaching work, gives me a good insight in to all levels of hockey. The common factor throughout is that the standard of the ‘Basics’ or ‘Core Skills’ is not high enough, even among our Internationals. The single system implemented by England Hockey may have flaws but I believe the overriding concept of the system is to increase the level of core skills across all ranges of Hockey.

A very big part of getting this right is the coaches. I accept that every coach has a different way of working. It is not my intention to try and make carbon copies of myself, but in my role as Director of Coaching I will work as a mentor to enhance the skills they already possess and to make sure that within those skills is a good foundation of the core skills the players need to make them individually better and this will then make the teams that much better.