Post by QPR Report on Nov 5, 2009 8:35:38 GMT
PFA's Give Me Football/Ian Clarkson
Careers after football: Jeremy Healey
The USA is the place to be for top coach Jeremy
By Ian Clarkson October 30, 2009
Jeremy Healey might not be a name you are to familiar with but he is carving out a reputation in the States with Arsenal FC (USA).
He is currently their Director of Coaching and is responsible for over 68 teams and 1,100 players between the ages of 6 and 19, as well as fielding visits from the likes of Arsenal legend Steve Morrow.
Pre-season tournaments saw them face the likes of Manchester United, Sao Paulo, Inter Milan and Paris St Germain, with Healey continuing to push the club forward.
However, it was the PFA who helped put Healey on the track to coaching stardom when they sent him on his very first coaching badge back in England in the early nineties.
His playing career was wrecked by a series of injuries, but this is a heart-warming story and will prove an inspiration to any young players currently worrying about their future in the game. He has been out in California since 1994 and has seen first hand the changes that have seen the MLS grow into the professional organisation it is today.
The former Birmingham City apprentice has a valuable insight on the growth of coaching in the United States and is yet another success story for the PFA as he told Givemefootball’s Ian Clarkson.
Q: You left Birmingham City after your apprenticeship in 1989 - when did you move out to the USA?
A: I moved out to California in 1994. This was the year that the USA hosted the World Cup. There was a huge spike of interest in the game at the youth level and without a real professional league yet to be established there were opportunities for young coaches such as me to earn a living from coaching at the youth level.
Q: How did the PFA help you?
A: At Birmingham City, our PFA Rep was Des Bremner. When I left Birmingham he went out of his way to help me set a path for the future and put everything in perspective. He put me in touch with the right people at the PFA and they helped me get started with my Licensing (Coaching badges).
Q: How did you first get involved with coaching, and where?
A: I left Birmingham after a couple of years and then spent a year at Derby County. During this time I had my first torn anterior cruciate ligament. During my recovery the PFA put me in touch with Tom Stack at the Birmingham County FA. I had done my FA. Preliminary Badge while at Birmingham City, but this was the first time I was the ‘coach’.
Q: How did it develop from there?
A: I spent some time working on camps and school programs before I got a job with Ron Wiley and Warwick Adams at Aston Villa.
I learned a lot from this experience. I had been very lucky to have been coached by some great coaches while at West Ham, Birmingham and Derby, but as a player I never really thought about, or realised how much work, organisation and preparation went in to putting on a session or organizing a team and their season.
I remember Ron would walk his dog around the Villa training ground at Bodymoor Heath scouring the fields for details that weren’t quite right with your session or your appearance. If your cones weren’t in a perfectly straight line or the space you were working in wasn’t right, or your socks weren’t pulled up you had better watch out for a tongue lashing from the Scot.
This was my first experience of professional coaching at least from the coaching side of the fence. I loved it and I wanted to learn more and more but there weren’t that many opportunities to work each day coaching. It was more of a part time job – some evenings and some school holidays at camps. This is why when I got the job opportunity to go to the US and coach, I jumped at the chance.
Q: Has there been a big change over the years in the calibre of coaching in the USA?
A: Undoubtedly! When I first came out here there were not enough coaches that had played the game or even understood the game at a very basic level. We used to train our teams on a spare corner of a baseball field if the baseball coach would let us and even then half the time you were dodging baseball’s that were flying through your session.
Now there are soccer specific facilities in every town and city and with some clubs such as mine having our very own 50 acre, state of the art soccer specific training and game day facility. We have 22 full size grass pitches including a championship Academy pitch and 60 goals to use whenever and where ever we want.
As far as an environment to work, train and play it can’t be beaten. I think the game in general has improved. It has more of a structure to it and from the grass roots all the way to the National team. Each level of development has a well planned and thought out structure. The U.S. Soccer Federation and State organizations do a very good job with their coach education programs in which I am involved.
Q: Are there still areas for improvement?
A: The area that is still a concern is how soccer is integrated into the American culture. The quality of facilities and coaching is improving but that can only go so far in developing players and the game out here.
The piece of the puzzle that is missing is the mentality of the majority of players. The only time a lot of our players play is in a controlled environment with a coach in an “organised practice”. The effects of which can be seen in the style of play over here which in general tends to be very controlled, very predictable and lacking in creativity and problem solving (thinking outside of the box).
At Arsenal we are trying to encourage a mix of instruction and free play, but getting the players to come and play in their own time is like ‘pulling teeth’ sometimes.
www.givemefootball.com/pfa/pfa-news/careers-after-football-jeremy-healey
Jeremy Healey interview: Part II
Coaching in the USA is great but Jeremy Healey does miss English football
By Ian Clarkson November 02, 2009
Ian Clarkson continues his chat with Jeremy Healey who is one of the brightest young coaches in the USA.
The exiled Brummie has been carving out a niche for 15 years in the USA and is now Director of Coaching at Arsenal FC (USA).
Here, in another Givemefootball exclusive, Healey talks about expectation levels rising in the USA and the impact that Major League Soccer has had on the game in Ameica.
Q: How did you end up coaching at Arsenal F.C (USA)?
A: When I first came over here I worked for a rival club coaching a couple of teams and we always got destroyed by Arsenal (at the time I think they may have just won their first National Championship).
Since that time Arsenal F.C. (USA) has been growing in stature year by year to become one of the biggest and best youth soccer clubs in the country with seven National Championships.
Arsenal F.C had always been one of the clubs that I wanted to coach for and get chance to work with its players and teams but circumstances didn’t present themselves until recently for this to become possible.
A club that I was Director of Coaching at merged with Arsenal and pooled our resources both on and off the field.
Q: What is your role at the club?
My role at Arsenal F.C. is Director of Coaching and Assistant Technical Director. In this position my responsibilities include coach education and management of about 20 of our staff coaches and the overseeing and implication of a club wide curriculum for over 60 teams from grass roots teams all the way to National Champions.
Off the field I am responsible for a $1 million budget.
Q: I understand you may have a lot of international players at your club - how many?
A: We have probably got ten US and Mexican National Team players in the club at the moment with numerous players having graduated from Arsenal to the MLS (Major League Soccer) and other professional leagues throughout Europe and the world.
Q: Are expectation levels rising in the States?
A: Expectations are rising all of the time in the U.S. It is an extremely ambitious and competitive country in all aspects of life and soccer is no exception.
I think that US. Soccer’s expectations and goals reflect that, but are also realistic with the time frame in which these goals can be achieved.
Soccer has taken huge steps forward in the last 15 years since the World Cup was staged in the U.S but it is still in its infant stages as far as soccer culture is concerned. This is the piece of the puzzle that only time can fix.
Q: Has MLS had a positive impact on the game?
A: The MLS has had a great impact on the game out here. I would say that the players who play in the English Premier League are still the superstars that kids out here want to emulate but the stars playing in the MLS give the players a more realistic and tangible goal to reach.
The MLS has provided a more readily available group of role models that players can go and watch and meet perhaps.
Q: Do you ever see yourself coming back to Britain to coach?
A: I love my life out here, but I would be lying if I said I didn’t miss English football and all that is associated with it. I would love the opportunity to ‘give back’ to the game in England especially at a top club. Never say never!
www.givemefootball.com/pfa/pfa-news/jeremy-healey-interview-part-ii