Watching and Learning
When my classmates and I set out for South America in June, a part of me knew they would leave long before I did. Our Andes Adventure lasted around a month, and with graduate schemes, new jobs, and future study all beckoning, they were heading home, while I was headed inland, ready to explore South American football
Over the summer, I spent weeks bouncing between local teams in a few different countries, offering to help with training, carry the water, run the odd training session…anything that would help me get my foot in the door.
The real turning point for me though, was Social Media. I started posting content to any site I could think of, showing clips from training, clips of me explaining ideas, showing the thought process behind tactics, shapes and drills…again, anything I could think of which proved I knew what I was doing. It was accessible, relateable, and it started gaining traction quite quickly
But, despite the social media growth, and positive results at most of the local session and teams I’d worked with, an actual opportunity at management was still pie-in-the-sky thinking. I didn’t know what else I could do…I’d helped coach a local Under 20s side to a regional cup final and 3rd in their league, showing every major step on social media, opening up a new channel for young players and coaches to interact with each other, and still the phone lay silent. I figured it was almost time to pack up and head home, and try for a job somewhere in Scotland
December 12th, 2023 — Cimarrones de Sonora
That was, until my phone pinged an email in the middle of December, offering me the manager’s job at Mexican Expansion League side Cimarrones de Sonora. The 2013 club (yes, formed in 2013) had finished 11th in the Opening Stage of the league, and the board were looking for change. They’d seen the tape from the sides i’d been coaching on social media, and, apparently, figured I was worth taking a punt on.
Expectations at the club are pretty low; mid-table finishes, grow the reputation (I kind of assumed I could do this through just winning games and getting fans through the doors), and basically, don’t mess it up…simple enough, right?
With the squad on their mid-season break, I had some time to spend with my coaches, working on the tactical vision for the rest of the league season. My initial focus had to be on maximising the abilities of the players I already have — there was a short transfer window available to me, however the squad registration rules meant that we had the maximum of Over-24 players, and not enough time to understand who was good enough for the system and who wasn’t.
With just 3 days of training before our first competitive match, I tried to keep it as simple as possible; the previous coach had played a 4–4–2, but I didn’t feel that this allowed the standout players to do their best work:
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Jose Peralta — Winger
He’s not the quickest on earth, but Jose’s work rate and ability to beat a man stood out very early in training. He’s not really one for cutting inside to take a shot, but he gets himself into decent positions for crosses and to get on the end of crosses from the left. In the 4–4–2, his pace had meant he had difficulty playing both sides of the ball, so I wanted to get him into a more advanced position.
Aldo Arellano — Defensive Midfielder
This man, is an absolute monster. He’s not the hardest worker, but his ability both on and off the ball covers him in glory anyway. Playing in a midfield 2 was leaving him exposed under the previous manager, but I think if we drop him a little deeper and give him some protection, he’s got the ability to really shine.
In order to let these two do their best work, I wanted to play a 4–3–3; Plenty of numbers in the middle of the pitch, scope for the wide players to shine, and enough options in attack to cause the opposition problems.
Now, it’s not strictly a 4–3–3 in possession, mainly because our fullbacks are all slowwwww, so asking them to get up and down the wing to provide wide overlaps just wasn’t working: if we can build up in a 3–2 shape, with the right back tucking into a back 3, and the left back tucking into midfield, then I think we can create enough central overloads to spring some space in behind for the front 3 to do their work.
There’s 14 games of the closing stage; 14 games to see if I’d learnt anything from my badges and 6 months supporting community teams…and maybe a little from all the books I'd read about tactics…
