My thoughts on a recent interview between John Spencer and Canzano

Click on this link http://www.stumptownfooty.com/ and scroll down the screen to click on the John Spencer interview with Canzano – look for a light green shaded box. The blogger says “there is a slight undercurrent of “get off my lawn, you damn kids!” between Spencer and Canzano…

Here’s my posted comments to what the blogger thoughts were and my own thoughts about that interview…

1. Let’s not forget that last week Canzano was the local reporter who ‘socialized’ sacking John Spencer – if there was an undercurrent there maybe it was a personal undercurrent in a professional kind of way?

2. I’m not sure I have seen evidence yet that shows me Canzano fully understands the intricate details of soccer. Perhaps I have missed it – if so I welcome additional thoughts or articles to review that may help me better understand how well Canzano really knows the game of Soccer.

3. For now though I would offer these thoughts from my part of the pitch… Football (Soccer) is not one of those namby-pamby let’s call a timeout every 5 seconds sport – football is a 100% full speed, full contact, full time moving, full time thinking game – with 11 different players thinking about playing one ‘system’ of play while adjusting to 11 other players playing and thinking about adjusting based upon their ‘system’ of play. Gimme another game in the US where you play a full 90 minutes with only one short break to ‘think’ about what is happening; thinking and reacting on your feet, IMHO “IS” the single most critical part of in this game.

4. If players have difficulty thinking on the pitch it makes it really hard to have consistency. And if players have ‘lived off of skills’ to get to this point in their career it is no surprise that they need more coaching on thinking in the game. Maybe that might help understand why John Spencer paces the sidelines during games? We do, after all, have a very young squad – I have not compared our average age to any other teams in MLS; perhaps someone already knows this and can share?

5. Perhaps another undercurrent to that discussion is the developing Football Academy approach for U-16 and U-18 youth – the approach is very much like Europe and the rest of the world – those youth playing in the ‘travel leagues’ for the Academy will not be playing High School soccer – if they do they lose their place on the Academy team; as mentioned yesterday I sense there will be more to this as time passes.

6. As for the training discussion Spencer has some valid points – I have coached youth in both England and the US — I would offer that there are many differences not only in styles of coaching but in ‘what gets coached’ at what age levels. I am not saying one approach is better than another – there can be goodness to learn from diversity.

7. What I personally “picked out” of that interview is Spencer referencing the importance of getting 1 point or 3 points from a game – Spencer has always advocated in the past that when his side takes the pitch against an opponent he lines them up and expects them to take 3 points – and he never – ever plays for a draw. With this three week lay-off I sense that Spencer has begun to change his expectations somewhat – I see that as being a good thing…

8. Many of you may already know this but John Spencer was a very passionate and very energetic midfielder for Chelsea in the 90’s. So it’s reasonable to believe those quality traits of his would carry over to how he manages.

Discussion and deliberation usually lead to good decisions…