A thread on what elite level sport 'coaching' is, what makes a good coach, and what people mistakenly think coaching is. There seems to be a lot of conjecture about what good coaching is, specifically in football. My sport is tennis, but what follows applies to any sport coaching

At an elite level of sport coaching, the criteria that make up what high quality coaching can be separated into 4 sections. All as important as the others. These are:

1. Knowledge of the sport;
2. Knowledge of coaching;
3. Leadership skills;
4. Coaching philosophy.

1. Knowledge of the Sport

This is obvious. Does a coach know what the sport looks like at the elite level? Do they know standards, tactics and strategies? Are they aware of the trends emerging in the game, do they know how players think, do they know the pressure points?

2. Knowledge of Coaching

Does a coach know about "how" to coach. Do they know the research behind how people learn and how people develop? Do they know how to communicate their knowledge of the sport and can they get their message across concisely to the players?

Do they know about various coaching methodologies? Do they know the benefits / drawbacks of, for example, Constraint Led Coaching and Model Led Coaching? Are they using blocked or open practice? Do they segment and isolate or are they more keen on perception action couplings?

3. Leadership Skills

Can the coach build effective relationships? Can they use different communication skills to interact with different personality types? Can they inspire their players? Would they rather control everything or would they rather develop independent thinkers?

4. Coaching Philosophy

How does a coach want their players to play and what types of development tools and coaching methodologies are they using to achieve that?

And for me the most important aspect of coaching - Feedback. A great coach knows when to intervene, how often to talk, to be concise, how much to say, and how to go about saying it. There could be a whole thread just on feedback - but its what defines a good coach.

So, the above is what makes up great coaching. However, what people seem to think good coaching is, is different. People think good coaching is shouting a lot, pointing a lot, and most important: telling players what to do all the time.

Particularly in football, in the media and some fans, there seems to be an understanding that good coaching is: telling players where to pass to, and where to run to. And that's it. If you do that then it's good coaching, if you don't then it's bad coaching.

I heard a someone on a podcast earlier today say that the manager who currently sits top of the Premier League "lacks coaching ability". I read another journalist 2 days ago say that the same manager mocking the same manager for "not having a cohesive plan".

I'd like to know what they know about coaching, how often they've seen a full training session with this coach, or with what they'd consider a great coach. Do they know what constraint led coaching is? What do they know about types of feedback.

When they refer to "coaching ability" are they talking about leadership and communication skills, ways of developing skilful decision makers, forming effective relationships, how and when the coach feeds back, types of feedback? Or is it just are they telling them where to run?

In closing - It should be the ultimate aim of any coach to make themselves irrelevant. To develop players to think for themselves, and to become problem solvers in their own right. Thats good coaching. Not pointing a lot and talking a lot.