The concept of a specialist strength and conditioning (S&C) coach is still a relatively new one. The first cohort of coaches with an S&C job title didn’t emerge in the UK until the early 2000s. Of course, professional football has utilised S&C for decades – it just wasn’t called that. This came in many forms and was delivered from all kinds of sources. Most commonly it would have come from the fitness coach, who has become known as the sports scientist in recent years. However, physios, coaches and even players with some degree of gym experience have all been known to deliver. The genesis of the fitness coach into a sports scientist is key to the emergence of the S&C specialist. Many years ago the fitness coach, typically an ex-player, would be responsible for the warm-up and ‘running the lads’. As a Jack-of-alltrades he would also dispense casual dietary advice and maybe even spot the odd set of bench press. As sports science has grown, the range of responsibilities simply makes genuine expertise in each of these areas impossible. The processing and interpretation of the mass of data generated by heart-rate and GPS data, both now standard practice in the professional game, is practically a full-time job alone. The basics of nutrition can be covered but again, a specialist is required to solve individual support at the highest level. And finally S&C. Providing bespoke, precise and expert programming and coaching to achieve targeted goals in an elite player requires a specialist. It is for this reason that I despair when I see jobs advertised as Sports Scientist/S&C Coach – using the term simply due to its fashionable status. In many ways, the job title of the person delivering S&C is irrelevant. After all, job titles and
CHAPTER 001 introduction
1.1 A History of Strength and Conditioning in Football – A Rocky Relationship
qualifications are neither proof of quality, nor are their absence proof of inadequacy. What is more of a problem is the lack of consensus as to exactly what S&C can offer or what it is there to achieve. I have never been a big fan of the term ‘strength and conditioning’, and have personally found that it is frequently a barrier to understanding with coaches from a variety of sports. Specifically, the word ‘strength’ tends to subconsciously induce a fear that the aim is to produce muscle-bound powerhouses. This is compounded by decades of misconceptions as to the purpose of weights as a training tool. The association with body-building is still an issue today. What’s more, there are many routes to success on the football pitch. While some players rely on strength and speed to dominate the opponent, others rely on technique and ability to read the game. Sceptics of gym training are all too quick to point out examples of excellent players who rely on the latter (e.g. Iniesta and Xavi), or even those who are blessed with a physique that allows them to be physically dominant without additional work (e.g. Lukaku and Drogba). Of course, common sense tells us that this simply means that we can only state that S&C may help your game, rather than insisting that it will. Sadly, the subtleties of such arguments are rarely given much airtime when discussing with a coach or player who has decided they don’t want to walk through the door. In fairness it should be acknowledged that S&C coaches in almost every sport have had to overcome these issues. We have all had to prove our worth as the profession becomes more established and the understanding of the full breadth of what good S&C can offer emerges. One of my key aims in this book is to lay down a philosophy as to how I believe S&C can add 3
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