Whatever her motivation was it got me thinking about the value of our children watching sport.  Not just for the role models on show but also the opportunities it provides us as sports parents to spend some quality time with them, a shared passion perhaps and the foundation it can provide for us to have powerful conversations with our children.

I have no data to back up this statement but my gut feeling is we have far less of this generation watching sport on the TV, admittedly they may be seeing plenty in bite sized chunks via social media channels but certainly in my latter years in education and coaching when I asked youngsters if they had watched certain games or competitions at the weekend, the positive responses seemed less than 15-20 years ago.

When Liz McColgan joined us on the Parents in Sport Podcast we talked about the halcyon days of the Diamond League on a Friday evening where parents and children could recognise many of the world’s best athletes as that was standard family fare, however now I often find myself having to look up people to identify them and some youngsters struggle to put names to faces.

Sport on the TV and in the media has changed exponentially in recent times making the variety and choice huge compared to our generation growing up that had to settle for the odd sporting program on the TV each week and if you wanted your sporting fix then you were glued to it, knowing full well it would be a while before the next opportunity.

This probably included tuning into sports that you were not even particularly interested in. That is not the case today with the huge number of sports on offer to watch across different platforms, which gives us a brilliant opportunity as sports parents.

There is no doubting that there can be a real value in encouraging our young people to watch sport, or even better to watch sport with them, either at home on the TV or if possible, get to a local venue for some live action.

Why can it be so valuable? 

• Role-Models – ‘If you can see it, you can be it’.

Watching sport can help provide our children with a huge variety of role models and teach our children about sportsmanship. (DISCLAIMER: We appreciate at times that this is not always the case and can do the opposite, but these are few and far between in comparison to how much sport is being played).

Role models often embody qualities such as determination, perseverance, and teamwork that can inspire us and our children in our own lives.

Take for example the legendary basketball player Michael Jordan. His competitiveness on the court was unmatched, but what truly set him apart was his ability to remain humble in victory and gracious in defeat. Through his actions, he taught us the importance of respecting our opponents and being a good sport no matter the outcome.

Another shining example of a role model is tennis superstar Serena Williams. Throughout her career, she has faced numerous challenges and obstacles, but her resilience and grace under pressure have been truly inspiring. Whether it is giving credit to her opponents after a tough match or using her platform to advocate for important issues like gender equality, Serena shows us that being a good sport goes beyond the game itself. She demonstrates that sportsmanship is about treating others with kindness and respect both on and off the court.

In addition to individual athletes, team sports also provide remarkable role models who teach us invaluable lessons about teamwork and camaraderie. The New Zealand national rugby team, known as the All Blacks, is a prime example of this. They are renowned not only for their exceptional skills on the field but also for their strong sense of unity as a team.  The players are driven by leaving the jersey in a better place than which they found it and always putting the team first above any individual achievements.

We must use the powerful narratives that our children may watch and see as a great opportunity to talk to them about why certain athletes are good role models and how being a good role model is so much more than simply being the best player.

These conversations with our children about identifying what makes these top performers good at their craft as well as what is good about their character can be doubly impactful.

• Help our children to develop critical-thinking, problem-solving and analysis skills

Analysing strategies employed by teams, coaches and athletes during a game can help our children to fosters a deeper understanding of decision-making processes under pressure. This analytical approach allows them to appreciate the intricacies of various sports.

Who can remember the days of watching TV and then going outside to copy what we had just seen and bring it to life with friends in our communities. I cannot recall how many times I was John Barnes, Ian Botham or a member of ‘The A Team’ growing up.

I remember vividly watching live the first ball that Shane Warne ever bowled to Mike Gatting and spending the rest of the day trying to duplicate it, admittedly with not quite as much success.

Watching games and individuals can help our children to paint pictures in their own minds. The more they see these pictures the greater chance of them taking them into their own sporting performances.

We have more analysis and insights into sport than ever before.  By actively listening to commentary and observations, our children can develop their own critical thinking abilities. They learn how to question assumptions made during gameplay and evaluate alternative approaches that could have been taken.  We may need to help them understand a bit around context as not everything will simply ‘copy and paste.’

• Enhance their Physical and Mental Well-being

Watching sport can greatly contribute to enhancing physical and mental well-being.

We know that engaging in physical activities is essential for maintaining a healthy lifestyle and the watching of sport allows our children to vicariously experience the thrill of competition and athleticism.

As our children watch athletes push themselves to their limits, their own motivation and desire for physical activity may become more ignited. We must try and be ready to jump on these moments and try to facilitate these moments of enthusiasm where we can. Anything that encourages our children away from technology and towards physical activity can only be a positive.

Moreover, watching sport can also have a positive impact on their mental well-being. When they immerse themselves in a sporting event, they experience a range of emotions: excitement, joy, frustration, and even disappointment. These emotional roller coasters stimulate their brains and release endorphins that uplift their mood. The sheer unpredictability of sport keeps them on the edge of our seats, creating an adrenaline rush that can boost their mental alertness.

Encouraging our children to watch sport can be a valuable and enjoyable way for them to learn and grow for a wide variety of reasons. We have covered several in this blog but are sure that you will have several of your own.

My daughter did manage a goal in her game, I am relieved to say the shirt did not come off and she did attempt to hit a shot as hard as Chloe Kelly but on this occasion, it did not find the target. Oh well, I wonder who she will be next week!

We have been chatting ideas around understanding what good coaching looks like for parents and where we might see examples in HP sport for parents to watch and reflect on. This discussion has coincided with the English Premier League concluding for another year; the last weekend seeing Manchester City become champions and the top 4 are now set for Champions League Football next year.

However, the strange part of this conversation is that the most successful team in the Premier League era, Manchester United was part of none of these conversations; not fighting for top four or the league title come the final weekend.

So, Gordon and I shared ideas and opinions and shall follow on with a podcast conversation considering what has gone wrong at this extremely successful club and was their clues along the way?

Late November, Ole Gunnar Solskjær was sacked as Man United head coach after losses in Champions League and 5-0 loss to Liverpool, their worst result to their rivals since 1925. In an interesting move by one of the premier clubs in the soccer world, they announced an interim manager, Ralf Rangnick. Rangnick is regarded as the “godfather” of modern German football and is credited with developing Gegenpressing, whereby the team, after losing possession, immediately attempts to win back possession, rather than falling back to regroup together with evolving player’s spatial coverage by increasing memory space and processing pace. Rangnick has said that a parental seminar about “raising kids with love and consequence” influenced his relationship with people he works with, something that certainly seemed needed at United yet what did he bring and offer to this side for us to consider as coaches or parents?

Possibly ruining this blog post by stealing the ending headline, for me coaching is all about relationships and there was a number of red flags during the year where Rangnick was neither showing compassion or control for the group of players he was working with. Just this week, in preparation for the season’s final league game, he said:

It has got to do with confidence, team spirit and togetherness. This is my biggest disappointment that we didn’t establish that team spirit.

This comes after reports of an internal investigation was launched by the club and it would seem as if they have found the culprit, allowing Manchester United hierarchy to report as confident that dressing room leaks will not be an issue Erik ten Hag has to contend with next season.

My question around that is how safe an environment is this to openly speak your mind as players or leaders to identify areas of improvement? If the players feel they cannot speak up or a sense of unease from their practice environment, are we facilitating an environment to grow and improve?

Following on from this, after another loss by Man United, Rangnick was quoted as saying a few weeks ago:

It’s obvious quite a few players will leave and there is a need for top-quality players. I strongly believe that if everyone works together we can bring Man Utd back to where we need to be.

As parents of athletes or grassroots coaches, what can we see is lacking here?

What areas of concern are flagged by these comments and attitudes from the interim coach?

The main area we want to learn from this example for our young athletes is the idea of offering and developing a psychologically safe environment. Psychological safety is about removing fear from human interaction and replacing it with respectful and accepting behaviors. Psychologically safe environments in sport and all walks of life, have been identified as group environments where there is a shared belief that team members are safe to take interpersonal risk without fear of being ridiculed, punished or rejected. Research by Prof Sophia Jowett and others recently investigated and found that coaches whom attended athletes concerns and needs, empowering and inspiring athletes to achieve more and encouraged to work towards their identified goals created psychologically safe environments, aided and supported by connected, stable and cooperative relationships. Negatively, the lack of these quality relationships can weaken interpersonal relationships and even augment exploitation, intimidation and humiliation in interactions which can effect the involved athlete’s wellbeing. Taking this into consideration, you can see my confusion around Rangnick’s actions and comments regarding the playing squad versus his philosophy of coaching with love and consequence….

Looking at understanding or creating psychologically safe environments first, there could be a seemingly obvious juggle between balancing performance markers and being a caring and considerate coach. However, when investigating social and task cohesion between sporting team members, research by Prof Sophia Jowett (2003) found a stronger relationship between social cohesion (which is the degree to which team members like each other) to performance markers than task cohesion (cooperation to common goals). This research strengthens the importance of creating a psychologically safe environment in HP sport, to both allow and encourage interpersonal risk taking for athlete well being and subsequently creating an environment to encourage and enhance performance improvements, an area which has possibly been identified by Rangnick too late by his comments around team spirit.

The best predictor of athlete’s positive developmental experiences are transformational behaviors as a coach; these ideas include individual consideration, articulating a vision and individualized support. To gain these ideas, I believe it is achieved and built on by understanding your athletes, understanding them as players and as a unique person standing in front of you.

What ideas could have Rangnick introduced or developed to help create a psychologically safe environment, which in turn would develop into a high performing environment?

We could start by adopting a transformational leadership style, which helps develop effective relationships by focusing on positive developmental relationships. This leadership style (which can also be seen as shared leadership) is defined as where a leader works with teams or followers beyond their immediate self-interests to identify needed change, creating a vision to guide the change through influence, inspiration, and executing the change in tandem with committed members of a group. Again, research shows that this style of leadership reduces conflict, increased learning and develops a psychologically safe environment. The positive relationship properties in 3+1 C’s will offer high levels of team or group cohesion; basically, understanding and acknowledging fellow coaches and players has more correlation to performance than understanding what technical and tactical elements could make up elite performance.

Sticking with the ideas of transformational leadership and using examples from the EPL to help parents or coaches identify positive, effective coaching, is there current examples of coaches at the highest level coaching with care, connection and this focus on relationships for greater impact and success? Interestingly, some of the best examples come form the league’s current top two sides yet Gordon and I shall have a podcast conversation later this year to discuss current and previous examples further. Let’s start with Gordon’s beloved Liverpool and their charismatic leader, Jurgen Klopp. Back in 2020, Klopp outlined his ideas and methodology to his leadership style, where he discussed the importance of relationships and meaningful actions:

All we do in life is about relationships.

As a football team, we have to work really closely together. Each of our players knows the name of each person who works at Melwood.

It’s not for me to create an atmosphere in a room – each person in our team is responsible for that. It’s worked out well. We all win for each other; we do it for (kitchen staff) Carol (Farrell) and Caroline (Guest), because we know how important it is for them.

That makes it more valuable, more worthy. If you have a bigger group to do it for, it feels better for yourself.

Turning out attention to Man City’s manager Pep Guardiola, earlier this year he was interviewed and asked what his best characteristic was as a manager. Even being seen as a tactical genius with current club, Man City and displayed at former clubs, Bayern Munich and Barcelona previously, his response: I’m learning to be more patient. Before, I was too anxious, I was not a good manager. Now, I’m better, more patient.

The Catalan tactician also revealed that he has changed his intense ways during his career as a manager and his knowledge of players and when he discusses a result with the squad in the aftermath of a game. With these comments in mind, I want to focus on the aspects of relatedness that a good coach-athlete relationship offers, supported by comments made by Klopp and Guardiola.

All coaching environments need to adopt and offer players ingredients for genuine motivation; mastery, autonomy and purpose. These ingredients are echoed within research conducted in sports coaching involving study of self-determination theory, which addresses innate psychological needs of autonomy, competence and relatedness. Amorose supported that “the more athletes felt autonomous, competent and have sense of relatedness, the more reasons for participating were self-determined in future” (Amorose, 2007); tying in the point of psychological safety, it would be safe to suggest that the environment created by Rangnick did not allow players to feel connected or building competency due to his actions and comments. Prof Cliff Mallet researched and explained that “self-determination theory underscores the role of environment in fuelling people’s perceptions of (autonomy, competence and relatedness) in contexts of sport” (Mallett, 2005).

We understand drive in most sporting participants is found from intrinsic motives; their internal desire to master their sports and challenge themselves through committed engagement in highly repetitive activities.

So parents, do we understand where coaches fit within developing these motives and keep perspective in a culture where performance and winning are seemingly the most important outcomes?

The challenge of successful coaching is acknowledging social interactive dilemmas within individual and team goal setting and development, offering suitable scenarios and choices with all members’ involvement and collaboratively dealing with matters as opposed to eradicating them. Klopp’s understanding of Mane’s decision and Pep’s acknowledgement of Sergio’s influence on the club speaks volumes of the players as people as opposed to solely athletes. Past research by Mageau and Vallerand regards the “actions of coaches as (possibly) the most critical motivational influences within sport setting”. Coaching should be recognized as an educational dynamic relationship, where the coach can satisfy player’s goals and development but both sides have an investment of will capital, where human initiative and intentionality are both dedicated to show commitment towards goals and relationships.

The role of performance coach for age grade athletes is highly important; coaches are “preparing athletes for consistent high-level competitive performance” (Côté, 2009a) through effective tactics such as integration of professional, interpersonal, and intrapersonal knowledge and developing player’s specific competence, confidence, connection, and character needs on regular basis. Both Klopp and Guardiola have openly discussed their roles in developing the player as a person and not solely as an athlete.

These autonomy supportive practices allows coaches to act as mentors for instances highlighted by Klopp and Guardiola, focusing on relationships between coach and athlete while supporting players to develop meta cognitive skills where the athletes are aware of and take responsibility of appropriate practices and thinking strategies.

This method positions coaches as mentors where they shift from knowledge expert for athlete as in early stages of development to learning manager or facilitator (Carnell and Lodge, 2002), offering constructive feedback for the player to investigate further. Understanding, not ignoring, the importance of a coach’s role in the wellbeing of their athletes as people as well as players is crucially important to create positive developmental experiences.

I feel asking the right questions can both build relationships and close the gap through understanding athlete’s motivations, areas of importance for their development and how can the environment be structured to suit their needs. I believe sports coaches of athletes of all ages should adopt comprehensive and holistic roles in the moral development of their athletes through their adopted and shared practices, languages and beliefs.

Like described by Klopp, if coaches are to develop wholesome, knowledgeable athletes who are willing and able to make decisions, capable of performing learned tasks when under pressure and not under direct instructions, I believe this shall require collaborative transfer of knowledge or greater ownership by athletes of their development, with support from the coaches as “more capable other” in an involved yet scaffolding style approach to their athlete’s development. Research by Kidman (2001) addressed ideas such as coaches developing player’s complex skills and tactical knowledge through encouraging abstract thought processes by asking high order questions, which require athletes to apply, analyze and synthesize information.

Parents should be aware of and encourage this transformational style of leadership where the coach is steering as opposed to controlling decisions and actions, encouraging player discovery through evolutionary planning and organising of tasks whilst keeping sight of overall objectives and showing empathy to get the best from the athletes. This may require some transparency from coaches to offer rationale for processes. It may also require negotiation of processes with players to meet individual and collective performance measures of those being coached whilst matching evolving circumstances for learning and development against attempting keeping sight of overall objectives but shall eradicate many of the areas of athlete burnout and develop strong interpersonal relationships for development.

Coaches: asking questions using the linked document as a start, understanding the answers and whom they’re coming from will give you a snapshot for your athlete’s needs today yet this needs to be continually addressed and worked on, understanding people, personalities and environments shall change. The art of coaching is knowing how and when to communicate, and how this varies for each individual. Work on empathetic relationships and having a better understanding of your athletes or players as this will allow you to modify your environment or approaches for greater impact and understanding. As suggested, this focus on empathy and close, meaningful relationships between coaches, players and parents alike offers meaningful impact and actions by the players. Players drive their own development and reflect on personal and collective performance to allow the coach to offer closeness and desired commitment to their relationships through autonomy supportive practices.

As mentioned, Klopp and Guardiola focus on relationships, empathy and player-centered approaches led them to strong finishes this year but has set behaviours which shall strengthen and develop their squads for years to come.

Likewise, we as coaches should reflect and build our interpersonal skills to allow us to take time in future to better know and understand our athletes to gain a holistic view of involved players and we as parents should understand and appreciate this shall be a long, “messy” process in building these connections.

The art of coaching is knowing how and when to communicate, and how this varies from individual. Work on empathetic relationships and having a better understanding of your athletes or players as this will allow you to modify your environment or approaches for greater impact and understanding. Know your players, know their story, know their context and then put it into practice and parents can certainly help you with this.

Jonny McMurtry has been involved in high performance age grade rugby programs across Australia for over 10 years and has recently completed research in conjunction with University of QLD and Rugby Australia, investigating age grade player’s engagement and understanding what motivates, engages and drives players’ participation.

He is also working on sharing coaching concepts and findings in written format via blog and practical format directly with coaches in other sports such as soccer, swimming and golf.

In this episode sports psychologist, author, podcaster and former professional golfer Dan Abrahams and Gordon MacLelland discuss match-day and competition, what that means for our children and how we can best support the process as parents.

During the conversation they discuss amongst other things:

• Learning to sit back, watch and enjoy the experience of seeing our children compete
• Learning simple techniques and strategies to help manage the competition environment
• Having a parent face – borrow from memory, imagination and perception
• Having a stretch and support dial for our children both in and out of sport
• Allowing children to take sport seriously if they wish to in a healthy and safe way
• Use a scaling technique with our children to talk about their sport, strip away the emotion and then be able to follow up with great questions
• Asking our children how we can best support them?
• Working together to co-collaborate and work in partnership with our children
• Stripping away performance indicators that are out of our control
• Game outcomes, performance outcomes and performance processes and focussing as parents on the latter
• Creating a ‘match script’ with our children around tasks that are specific, controllable and positive
• Following up the ‘match script’ with healthy conversations and stretching and supporting our children
• The difference between ‘mastery oriented’ and ‘ego oriented’ environments and the huge benefits of the former
• Becoming comfortable with disappointment and allowing our children the space to work through it
• Not rushing to have dialogue immediately after training and competition
• Co-collaborating with our children around the environment they want for the ‘Car Journey Home’

Dan Abrahams is a sport and performance psychologist. A former professional golfer, Dan has 25 years experience in high performance sport, and has spent the last 15 years as a qualified sport psychologist working with some of the best sports competitors in the world. He has held several senior positions in British sport including Lead Psychologist for England Golf and for England Rugby (working alongside Eddie Jones in the lead up to the 2019 Rugby World Cup). He has held contracts with a number of Premier League football teams, and is regarded as one of the go-to sport psychologists for elite athletes globally. He is the author of four best-selling books, one of which, ‘Soccer Tough’, was named by Gareth Bale as a book that changed his life. Dan also has a podcast (The Sport Psych Show) which has one million downloads, making it one of the leading sport psychology podcasts globally. 

In this episode Gavin Grenville-Wood and Gordon MacLelland discuss sports parenting, the unique challenges that it provides as well as some elements around coaching and the importance of building positive relationships between coaches and parents.

Being the father of a professional golfer Gavin shares amazing insight into his journey with real life stories delivered with a good dose of realism and humour.

During the conversation they discuss amongst other things:

• Acknowledging that there is no such thing as being a perfect sports parent
• Life in lockdown
• Challenges of parental peer pressure
• Giving feedback in conversations inspired by our children
• Getting the timing right for crucial conversations
• The importance of parents and coaches being on the same page
• Parents recognising they have the privilege of having the most influential role
• Ensuring our children are intrinsically motivated and they truly want to play the sport
• The challenges of parenting sporting teenagers
• Learning and evolving throughout the journey together, finding out what works best for you and your children
• Being aware that our children will not be immune from failure and how we can handle those moments as parents

Most coaches and teachers can set tasks that allow children to make no mistakes or score 100%, however, the level of challenge should be questioned if this is happening too frequently.

The problem we often face as parents is that watching our children struggle and fail can be a really tough process.  Our natural tendency as parents is to try and step in the moments that we see our children struggle yet the bravest thing for us to do is to allow the process to unfold and then be there to support them positively afterwards through healthy conversations and maintaining a balanced perspective.

Stood watching training sessions where children are learning new skills and are being challenged by different problems can be a nightmare for parents as they watch their child make mistake after mistake after mistake.  Stood with other parents at this stage also does not help as sometimes we perhaps become hot under the collar and feel like we are being judged as a parent on our child’s performance.

I stood recently with a group of parents watching a session as described above and the unrest as the session went on was interesting to see.  More and more frustration for parents, more gesticulation towards their children and a growing sense that the after session debrief was not going to be a positive or healthy one.

I did intervene at this stage and asked the questions to the parents I was stood with:

How many of them have done this before?

How many times have you seen this particular session?

Is every child making lots of mistakes?

On reflection most acknowledged that there were a lot of mistakes from everybody but then immediately assumed that it was a really bad training session.  Of course it was not but it once again highlights the disconnect that sometimes occurs from pitch to parent.

From a young age, children are essentially brainwashed and conditioned to fear losing and failure. Parents, coaches, teammates, friends convince them that failure is some kind of awful thing, creating environments where children are unable to express themselves, try new things and be creative.

The reality is that the most successful, happy, emotionally balanced athletes don’t fear failure. It’s not something that scares them.  They are merely playing the game, have it all in perspective and are enjoying the process (whatever that means to them).

Cognitive psychologists believe that learning itself is best done slowly to accumulate lasting knowledge, even when that means performing poorly on tests of immediate progress. That is, that the most effective learning looks inefficient, it looks like our children may be falling behind, when in fact they are merely learning.

Learning is most efficient in the long run when it is can be really inefficient in the short run.

It can be really difficult for parents to get their heads around this.  In society today, there is a real demand for instant gratification and wanting to see our children succeed.  Why wouldn’t we?  Of course, we want our children to succeed, we make our decisions because we love them!

However, this can often cause conflict and does not always lend itself to creating amazing learning environments.  Just think back to how many times your child fell over before they learnt to walk and how our patience never exceeded our expectation.  Do you take this approach whilst watching your child develop in their sport?

One of the areas of learning and sport that may not be recognised as parents is that of the learning pit.  An area in coaching that challenges players to help make them better performers.  Without understanding the ‘learning pit’ parents may become disillusioned, frustrated and may have conversations with their children that may not be the most productive.

Here is a small video to help you as sporting parents make sense of what may be happening with your child when they enter a learning pit and some ideas to share with your children for how they can bring themselves out of the other side.

If we clearly understand how our children learn then we have a far greater chance of being able to support them effectively.

Often coaches and parents are not aligned on this and it once again highlights the need for pro-active and effective communication.

What is the coach role in this?

• Be prepared and plan for failure.
• Understand all of your players so you can best support them.
• Make the parents aware of the process.
• Have more success than ‘failure’.
• Ensure all the other coaches involved with the group are aware.

What is the parental role in this?

• Work on changing your child’s overall mindset towards failure – stop them fearing it.
• Don’t allow them to create a false narrative in their mind.
• Try your best to support your child in turning negatives into positives.
• Encourage your child to be compassionate towards themselves

For more information on the parental role and helping your children manage failure please click here.

Be aware that learning is individual, non-linear and can take time.  Your child is on their own unique journey and making mistakes are a crucial part of the process.

So, the next time you are watching your child struggle, be aware of the ‘learning pit’, ask yourself some of the questions above during the training session or match and then arm yourself with some tips and strategies to pick up healthy conversations after the event.

Failure should only been seen by parents as an opportunity for children to learn.  If you approach it with that frame of mind, using some of the tips above, you will be well on the way to turning negatives into positives with your sporting children.