ACF FIORENTINA-NORCAL COACHING COURSE AT SCU. LAST MARCH
“The objective of this course is to show the planning over many years and to reveal to you the content we teach each year for the player to reach the top.”
Professor Vergine
From March 17th to March 21st, ACF Fiorentina Director of Youth Vincenzo Vergine presented a one day and two four day coaching course for over 75 participants at Santa Clara University. The one day course gave a glimpse of the ACF Fiorentina Method, while the Basic and Advanced Courses was a much more detailed course.
Top Clubs: The Basic and Advanced courses were focused on those clubs whose mission is to develop players for top level amateur, college or professional soccer although players of all levels would benefit from such training.
“If you do not have a structure and a vision for working over four or five years a coach will do what he wants to train, with an eye on winning the next Saturday, rather than working on what he needs to train and should train given the players age.” Professor Vergine
Organized Coaching Program: From the beginning, the Professor stressed that coaches will, without an organized coaching plan overseen by the director, all too often focus on the next game rather than focusing on developing the areas necessary for a player’s future success. While this may ensure some short term results for the team over time many individual players will find this short term focus leaves them without the technical, physical and tactical development necessary to compete at a higher level. This is his primary focus as ACF Fiorentina Director of Youth – to oversee his coaching staffs development of the club’s individual players.
“For instance you have a U12 team and you have ten coaches. If we ask them to present a plan for a week or a month or a year – we would have ten different plans – it would not matter if you put them in a hat and had a raffle.”
Professor Vergine
Proper Training Content: The ACF Fiorentina Method, born out of 20 years of practical work in Italian Youth and Senior soccer and academic study, places an emphasis on the early development of a child’s motor skills, coordination abilities, technical abilities and tactical development.
“When you look at these players, you must look for five – to six years ahead. Each year you have some aspects which are much more important to develop than others and you must work on these areas when they need to be worked on.“
Professor Vergine
Phases of Growth: It is recognized there are two phases of growth. (They are different with boys and girls - girls growing earlier). The first phase has two phases - ages 11-12 and 12-13. The second phase is the most difficult part. During the 12-13 phase the body first grows rapidly up – during these ages coordination ability is questioned because the bones and the muscles are growing quickly at this time. At this moment ACF Fiorentina places a heavy emphasis on training the coordination abilities. The taller players at 12 years of age are not as coordinated as the players who grow more slowly. A player who is in this time of development will lose their coordination unless a coach increases their coordination training. If they do so the player will come out of this phase even stronger. At the 14-15 age they begin to grow out. At this age it is possible to begin to see what the players potential is for the future.
Individual Player Development Program: Once selected, a player is tested and a four year plan is developed - for each player. Just as a school is focused on developing individual students rather than classes, an ACF Fiorentina coach is expected to concentrate more on developing the individual players abilities rather than their teams. Of course the team development becomes an emphasis later in the players development, once players have acquired the physical and technical skills necessary to compete at a high level.
“at the end....you win the game by developing the good player.”
Professor Vergine
Biological age based training: ACF Fiorentina treats players according to their biological age rather than their chronological age. The necessity to evaluate and train the players based on their biological age - not the chronological age – is especially important given some players mature earlier and some later.
On Saturday, March 20th the final day of the course, ACF Fiorentina First Team Coach Prandelli substituted seventeen year old Babacar into their Serie A match against Genoa. He scored the third goal. The news of the Babacar goal and ACF Fiorentina goal was announced to the 50+ coaches assembled at Santa Clara University by Professor Vergine himself by saying "These are the real wins".
ACF Fiorentinas investment in Professor Vergine and his “scientific method” had begun to pay dividends. The substitution and its significance was not lost on the Italian Soccer World. Not only will the club not have to buy a new attacking player, due to Babacar’s recent ascent, but they also possess a player now valued millions of euros – at age 17.
While Babacar with couple of other players are the first players to reach the first team who can be considered to be developed as a part of the Corvino/Vergine project it is clear more are coming.
The ACF Fiorentina/NorCal Premier Soccer Future: ACF Fiorentina and NorCal Premier Soccer are entering their second year of partnership. The partnership involves cooperation in coaching education program, player identification and player development.
Some components of the program are open to every club in NorCal Premier Soccer while others are open to clubs interested in working with ACF Fiorentina in a closer manner. Presently, these clubs are Sacramento United, San Juan Soccer Club, Diablo Football Club, Cal Odyessy, Santa Rosa United, Sonoma County Alliance, and Rays Soccer Academy.
If your club is interested please contact leaguemanager@norcalpremier.com
