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Who do you see as the major
threats?
In our pool, we’ve got Argentina, New
Zealand and Germany who are all
ranked above us, so those 3 nations
in our pool are the 3 nations that we
need to get over before we get to the
semi-finals phase. I think probably the
two in-form teams of 2012 outside of
Argentina are the Netherlands and
Great Britain. They are in the other pool
and I’d be anticipating that they would
be in the semi-finals, leaving any of the
4 nations that I spoke about in our pool
to join them.
I think these top 6 nations are all
coached by very experienced coaches
and they all have quite a number of very
experienced players. We’re probably
bringing the most inexperienced group
to the Olympics but to offset that we
have some exciting young talent.
These players are unpredictable and
not many other teams know too much
about those players.
There was a bit of controversy
when you took over as
coach, when you dropped 5
experienced players. You talk
about the inexperience of the
squad; presumably you felt that
it was time to bring in the new
blood. How do you think that is
working?
Yeah, it’s always a difficult one as a
coach – I’m not an ageist – I picked
the players that I believe are playing
the best. I also don’t close the door on
older players. If they are performing
and performing better than the younger
players they will be selected. We
pick the team that we feel has all the
players that will fill out the attributes
that we require. In this case some of the
younger players have stepped up and
were in fact performing better than the
older players, and that has continued
over the last 18 months. We’ve just
had someone like Jordyn Holzberger
who has just recently turned 18, here
in NZ playing well, so I think we’ve got
some young ones coming through. In
regards to experience, I think we have
enough, we have the likes of Madonna
Blyth, Kobie McGurk, Teneal Attard
and Casey Eastham, that all were
in Beijing. I think they can bring that
experience. Not to forget Toni Cronk
in the back, and I think they can guide
some of these younger players that we
have.
I think we’ll find that over the next 3-4
years, thedepth inAustralianhockeywill
only increase. There are some younger
players that are performing well in our
training environment in Perth and we
have some players around 24 and 25
years of age who are also performing
very well in Perth, so we have that
depth that we are trying to create and I
think you’ll find in the next 3-4 years the
Hockeyroos team will start to climb up
the rankings again.
Quite a lot of the squad are
fairly young and I guess that
must bring it’s own issues and
problems. I assume the parents
sometimes get involved and
give you some advice. How do
you handle the parents?
I think certainly, that with the younger
athletes that you have contact with the
parents. They’re quite concerned at
times because their daughters or sons
are moving from one side of the country
to the other at aged 17 or 18 years.
One of the things that we have recently
done as part of our Athlete Wellbeing
Plan and Programme that we have, is
to invite the parents, partners and peers
to a workshop in Perth. They came over
for 3 days to see how we train, what a
regular day is like, to see our facilities
and our training environment, they
witnessed a game and we had a dinner
with all of them. We go through how
we prepare, what support mechanisms
the players have available to them,
and I think that certainly helps to build
those relationships and put their minds
at ease. What I also did over those
particular 3 days was to talk about
selection, how difficult it is for us and
how we are developing the athletes.
We want everybody to succeed, but
unfortunately only 16 can go to the
Olympic Games. I think when you speak
with honesty and show that there’s a
real process in everything that you do,
I think that you begin to develop some
trust between the programme and the
parents, partners and peers, and that’s
what we try to do.
For you personally, what would
you see as your ultimate
achievement?
I think that my goal is to get the
Hockeyroos back to the number 1
ranking in the world, and I think that will
take some time. However we have our
short term goal of achieving a podium
performance at the Olympic games
and I think to be on the podium you
need to be aiming for gold, and if we
were able to win the gold at London
that would be a crowning achievement
in my career. If we were to fall short,
it would not change the desire to stay
with this team and to guide them back
to the top of world hockey and a gold
medal at the Rio Olympic Games.
Is there any advice that you
have been given or that you
could give that you think is
crucial to somebody who is
considering coaching?
I think that if you want to be a coach, you
need to be always attempting to develop
yourself and to learn, not only about
your sport but also about managing
people. When you’re managing people
at a top level, it’s not only the players,
but it’s the staff that you use as well. To
learn about individual personalities and
characteristics of people, I think that
gone are the days that a “one size fits
all” approach. You need to understand
the people that you’re working with
and manage them accordingly, and
that’s something that I’ve worked very
hard on throughout my career and I’m
still trying to understand how to better
manage the people that I’m working
with and how to get the best out of
them, because ultimately that your job
as a coach.
Good luck in London.
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