WHY? Total Football Player
After years of full-time coaching, I concluded that there was no easy way for coaches to qualify a player’s theoretical understanding of the game’s concepts I was teaching.
This platform is designed to enhance football coaching and player development by providing a more accessible, affordable, and efficient way for players to demonstrate their theoretical understanding of key football concepts. These same lessons also serve as a modular pathway for coach development, working alongside or outside of the “Association Pathway.”
Through years of coaching, I noticed that certain fundamental concepts, like principles of play, attack, and defense, are taught repeatedly. However, not all players fully grasp these concepts, and traditional coaching methods don’t always offer a clear way to assess understanding. Comprehending a concept often paves the way for successful implementation on the pitch; likewise, even recognizing concepts a player already uses effectively can build confidence, leading to quicker reactions, assured performance, and improved communication with teammates.
For many coaches, access to advanced coaching education is restricted by high costs, limited availability, and inconvenience. This platform is designed to help those who face these barriers.
Our goal is to break down these obstacles, empowering players to learn more independently and enabling coaches to more easily assess their team’s understanding of foundational knowledge.
Why This Matters:
- Football principles are timeless and foundational; understanding them is crucial for player and team success.
- Traditional coaching methods often lack a way to measure player comprehension effectively.
- Coaching courses can be expensive, difficult to access, and limited in availability.
- Coaches need a way to quantify player knowledge to move beyond repetitive teaching.
“To watch a football game is to watch the world in miniature. The more you understand, the more you can see the beauty in the game.”
Arsene Wenger
HOW
The platform complements on-field coaching by providing a structured, accessible approach to learning football tactics and strategy:
- Blended Learning Approach: Players engage in online education modules that cover foundational and advanced football concepts, such as tactics, formations, and role-specific strategies. This enables them to learn core principles at their own pace.
- Assessment-Driven Insight: Quizzes and tests help both players and coaches measure understanding of key topics. Players can showcase their comprehension, while coaches gain insight into each player’s grasp of tactical elements.
- Personalized Coaching Feedback: By assessing test results, coaches can pinpoint which players fully understand the concepts and who may need additional guidance. This allows coaches to tailor in-person training sessions to address specific needs, maximizing effectiveness and team cohesion.
- Digestible, Incremental Learning: Complex lessons are broken into smaller, manageable modules, making content easier to retain and review as needed. This format also allows continuous progression, with players advancing as they demonstrate mastery.
- Cost-Effective Accessibility: Unlike traditional and often expensive certifications, the platform offers affordable modules, enabling broader access to high-quality football education for both players and coaches.
WHAT
The platform provides a comprehensive suite of educational resources and tools that elevate both player and coach knowledge:
- Structured Football Curriculum: A range of modules covering football essentials—from principles of play, attack, and defense to in-depth tactics like formations and positional roles—ensuring players and coaches have access to essential and advanced knowledge.
- Interactive Quizzes and Tests: Engaging assessments that allow players to demonstrate their understanding, fostering accountability and readiness to apply concepts on the field.
- Analytical Tools for Coaches: Features that enable coaches to assess both individual and team comprehension of tactics, making it easier to identify gaps in knowledge and ensure everyone is aligned with the game plan.
- Affordable and Inclusive Learning Paths: An accessible alternative to exclusive and costly coaching certifications, providing lessons at a fraction of the cost.
- Expanding Library of Expertise: Future collaborations with recognized coaches will expand the lesson library, establishing the platform as a centralized resource for football knowledge.
- Custom Tactics Testing: A toolset for coaches to test team-specific formations, such as custom plays or unique roles within formations like the 4-2-3-1, enabling tailored strategic preparation.
WHO
I’m Charlie, I had a dream to make a living from football and it led me to work full-time in Hong Kong for 20+ years, where I coached little ones to adults from complete beginners to semi-professional teams.
I’m looking for passionate coaches who are eager to change the way football is taught. If you’re one of the lucky ones to have completed your coaching badges & have a proven track record of success as a coach or manager, we want to talk to you about joining our team. Not only will you be part of an innovative approach to sharing football knowledge on a scale never attempted before, but we’ll also feature and showcase your achievements & expertise.
Understanding the need for "Football intelligence"
Some quotes from some of the greatest minds in world football about learning the game:
Mikel Arteta
Speaking about having an understanding of positional play Mikel Arteta gave an analogy:
“If I am in the kitchen and I know the glasses are always in this cupboard, I get my glass of water more quickly.”
Johan Cruyff
“When you play a match, it is statistically proven that players actually have the ball three minutes on average … So, the most important thing is: what do you do during those 87 minutes when you do not have the ball. That is what determines whether you’re a good player or not.”
Ian Wright
“Teddy [Sheringham] didn’t need pace, he was five yards quicker upstairs. He already knew what was happening before the ball came to him. Dennis Bergkamp was the same. He’d already had a look before receiving the ball. He never wasted a pass, especially when he got into the last third. He’d pass the ball to me in a situation where it negated the defender.”
Michel Bruyninckx
“We need to stop thinking football is only a matter of the body, skillfulness will only grow if we better understand the mental part of developing a player. Cognitive readiness, improved perception, and better mastering of time and space in combination with perfect motor functioning. It’s about letting ‘competition’ go and opting for ‘education and apprenticeship’.”
Chris Ramsey
“Football intelligence is about being mentally versatile to roles and responsibilities quickly someone who moves from team to team and fits in no problem understands the nuances of different systems.”
Gary Neville
“For sportsmen or women who want to be champions, the mind can be as important, if not more important, than any other part of the body.”
Pep Guardiola
“If each person does their job, and they know what it is because I make sure they know, then we are a team that is difficult to beat.”