The Welsh Way – Inside the ‘Harvard of coaching’

Gael Clichy puts on his virtual reality headset, gets up and walks around the room, the former Arsenal and Manchester City defender careful not to bump into two-time World Cup winner Brandi Chastain, who is wearing the same gear and trying to figure out how best to counter Brighton’s press.

On the other side of the room, where Stoke’s sporting director Jonathan Walters is contemplating his next move, former France and Newcastle midfielder Yohan Cabaye is looking for a solution.

Welcome to the Celtic Manor hotel near Newport, where the Football Association of Wales is holding some of its final sessions for the sport’s highest coaching qualification, the Uefa Pro Licence.

This is the job description of a top-level manager, and graduates like Thierry Henry, Yaya Toure, Roberto Martinez, and Mikel Arteta are a few of the biggest names in the game, as evidenced by a list of graduates.

The current crop are as diverse as they are recognisable, from former Borussia Dortmund and Liverpool midfielder Nuri Sahin to Wales manager Rhian Wilkinson, and from Caernarfon Town boss Richard Davies to his new friend, Nice captain and Brazil international Dante.

This group, which was thrown together two years ago, now “feels like a family,” Dante claims.

Having completed their B and A Licences, the class of 2025 are entering the closing stages of their Pro Licence and ready to take the next step on their burgeoning coaching journeys.

Former Turkish international Sahin feels at home in prestigious football surroundings after managing and playing for Real Madrid and Dortmund.

He also has experience of world-leading educational institutions, having studied sports management at Harvard Business School.

Therefore, Sahin uses a place of authority to evaluate the FAW Pro Licence course.

“I’ve learned so much”, he says. This will help me get ready for both my coaching career and the rest of my life.

” I had this when I was in Harvard, and this is like Harvard for coaching.

Candidates must work long hours, both at home (which could be anywhere in the world) and during their time of contact with the FAW, to pass this rigorous course.

During this extended weekend in May, they are required to do practical tests and training sessions on the pitch at Dragon Park in Newport, while work at the nearby Celtic Manor includes the aforementioned virtual reality seminars, tactical theory tasks and individual presentations.

Sahin claims, “I wrote about the All Blacks in my special report.” “For me it was important to study a team not in football, about the culture and living the culture. I have no idea about rugby, but they are the best illustration of this.

” What I learned is the culture and protecting the country, the jersey, the values, being good people. I want to compete against goodwill.

While the football knowledge required is extensive – and the technical detail granular – candidates are often taken out of their comfort zone on this course.

Clichy, a member of Arsenal’s Invincibles of 2004, says, “We went on a trip to work with the army for three days where they deprived us of sleep and we had to do missions because we were so exhausted.”

” The food we had was in very small portions and you realise that you’re affected by this, how you make a decision related to football.

Tasks such as working with the army are levellers for this group.

There is a striking sense of equality here, whether you have managed semi-professional teams or played at the highest level.

“People like to hear stories about Pep]Guardiola] and Arsene Wenger but I’m aiming to be a top coach”, says Clichy.

“I am aware that I have a good chance of starting somewhere else.” And these guys, who started in amateur football and been in a job for the last 20 years, have got a lot to offer me because what I know, my career, is probably three or 5% of what football is.

Playing for clubs like Arsenal and City for more than 20 years is not real football, they say. It’s rare, and you have to understand it. If I’m lucky to start there one day, that would be fantastic as a coach. But I know I’ll have to start at the bottom and these guys can tell me how it is. “

There are countless valuable lessons that these people can learn from one another in terms of football.

On a more human level, the experience has been profound.

Your four Hs are your history, your heartache, your heroes, and your hopes, according to Adie Harvey, who coaches Wales Under-16 boys, “around the first couple of days, last March or April when we started the course.”

” Everyone had to deliver that to the group, which was quite daunting really, with the level of expertise of people in the group. But it also completely unbalanced any group hierarchy or ego, and it made us feel whole.

The result is that these are more than just working relationships, but real friendships.

As a semi-professional team in Wales’ top flight, Caernarfon, says Davies, “It feels like a family so we’ll definitely keep in touch.”

“We are like a family”, Dante agrees. We practice together, and we pursue joint endeavors.

” Richard is passionate. Every coach needs this emotion inside, in my opinion, and I was surprised by the emotion he expressed.

Stood next to the towering former Bayern Munich defender, Davies adds:” For me, it’s the knowledge Dante has. He is still playing at his best level, and the results he’s seen in the game are astounding.

“To be able to have these conversations and tap into his mindset, how he sees the game, is so valuable for me. We’re talking about a manager of the Welsh Prem who has experience managing the Champions League and World Cup. Without this course, I’d never come across people like Dante”.

Some of the people here are already full-fledged managers, while the majority are just beginning their coaching careers.

One of those, Wales women’s boss Rhian Wilkinson, is juggling her studies with preparations for this summer’s Euros.

“It’s a lot, but I’ll never miss these,” he said. Firstly, catching up with people but, equally, that excitement around learning. You can never stop learning, says Wilkinson.

“Someone will say ‘ Well, Pep used to do this ‘ or ‘ Jurgen Klopp would do this ‘ and then you’ve got Brandi Chastain here as well. We’re moving things with the FAW toward this point.

” This is an environment where top men in the game want to come and learn but equally this has to be something that we start looking more seriously at with the women. This is a fantastic development for women’s soccer.

“We can’t lie. This career and sport are dominated by men. It is what it is. It’s my responsibility to ensure that I continue to try to forge a path or provide examples of women who can succeed in the game. And I can only do that because of women like Brandi Chastain, who did it before me”.

Chastain’s presence is a true par-pass. With two World Cups and two Olympic gold medals to her name, the 192-cap former United States international is one of the most recognisable faces in the women’s game.

Chastain participates in the Pro Licence sessions along with those on the course in addition to giving a speech at the FAW National Coaching Conference.

“I’ve been in football for 50 years and I know the lessons and the learnings that go out to young girls and women”, she says.

Young girls can find their voice, strength, and potential thanks to sport, and we are aware that young girls who play become women who lead.

” The statistics say that they go on to be executives and they become decision-makers and that’s truly impactful for the world.

Craig Bellamy, the head coach of Wales’ men’s soccer team, and Russell Martin, the new manager of the Rangers, give their footballing philosophies to a crowded hall of 100s at the Celtic Manor.

“This is my life”, says Bellamy. “I’m always open to views from everyone, and this game connects you with so many people.” I look at everything like a puzzle and I try to steal ideas from other people to fit into a puzzle.

Can you speak passionately? I was lucky I had a manager like Sir Bobby Robson who gave me that. You would follow him regardless of whether he was correct or incorrect, and you would play with that enthusiasm.

Bellamy and Martin represent the progressive trends of modern football in their own unique ways: possession-based play and back-building strategies.

Most young coaches want to follow that path, as you can see when watching this year’s crop of FAW Pro Licence candidates working on and off the field.

On this course, the old-fashioned spirit still exists.

On the final day, former Stoke manager Tony Pulis is invited to host a masterclass on set-pieces. Tuesday is wet and windy. This is meant to be.

He presents his career to the Pro Licence group before his practical session on the pitch in a rain-lashed Dragon Park, which is pure gold.

Pulis is in his element as he reels off stories about his humble beginnings as a player and coach, before getting on to his various managerial tenures, complementing each piece of advice with at least a couple of entertaining anecdotes that could earn him a second career on the after dinner speaking circuit.

As he tries to understand Pulis’ broad Newport accent and industrial language, the 67-year-old Welshman frequently requests a little translation assistance from those next to him. The room is howling with laughter.

Among the jokes are a number of useful lessons, as Pulis answers questions on various topics, from the help he got from his peers (Sir Alex Ferguson and Carlo Ancelotti get a mention) to balancing family life with the exhaustive travelling that comes with management.

Then he ventures onto the field to participate in the practical session while a group of young players are soaked in the rain as Pulis orders them to prepare for a Rory Delap long-throw.

“It’s always nice to come back to Wales and Newport. This is my town, Pulis says, and it’s special.

“I loved playing football for my local club, or just on the streets. It’s always nice to come and play football, helping newcomers in their careers.

” Set-plays have always been an important part of football and I think they’ve been undervalued. It has been revived by Mikel [Arteta] doing it with Arsenal, a sizable club both domestically and internationally.

“I’ve had such a tremendous career and the world’s changed, the game’s changed. We had to take the goals off the main pitch for our first training session at Gillingham, travel there with people and their dogs, and practice there while they were passing. Then you look at this and the facilities we’ve got today… it’s the greatest sport in the world and it’s our sport”.

At the back of the room is Dave Adams, the instructor who oversees the course, with whom you can listen as intently as the young coaches and laugh just as hard at the jokes.

As the FAW’s chief football officer, Adams is responsible for the men’s and women’s game at all levels in Wales.

He served as the head coach of the senior national team last year, and he also serves as the head coach of the Pro Licence program.

“I’m standing on the work of other people in some respects. According to Adams, the former FAW technical director, Olympia Roberts did a fantastic job of developing a top-notch program.

“What I tried to do with it when I started in 2019 was to go into the market and speak to head coaches because, fundamentally, you want a course that reflects the needs of head coaches, which are really complex and multi-faceted. It is primarily based on actual experience learning. We don’t want things to be abstract because coaching is a vocational skill.

Every two years, we receive about 400 applications for [Pro Licence] positions. It’s highly competitive. We must support Welsh coaches like Chris Gunter and those who work for our national association. But equally, we recognise that by having people like Nuri Sahin and Mikel Arteta, Chris Wilder, Roberto Martinez, Steve Cooper before that – the names are extensive – they bring a different lens and, as much as we help them, they actually help us as well.

They have engaged in the best training and experience. There’s a recognition on our side that when we bring people like that, it’s also about taking from them, and that helps us grows an association. We gain new knowledge that we can use to improve our programs or our national teams, and that also aids in our development.

At the heart of the FAW’s work is the concept of the Welsh Way, an ethos underpinning everything from the elite level to grassroots – a vision for football in Wales, how to develop the game and foster its sense of national pride.

Together Stronger is our company motto. In any department, being small, being agile, being dynamic and everyone feeling a part of something is really important”, Adams adds.

That sense of togetherness is “really important” in any high-performance coaching environment. Whether you’re the head coach or the masseur or the chef, you’ve all got a vital part to play and got to buy into the vision of the head coach.