Redlands Unites With Cleveland High
Words: Staff Writer
Image: Redlands United FC
Redlands United and Cleveland District State High School and are set to launch one of the most comprehensive club-school football partnerships in the country.
From 2015, Redlands coach Graham Fyfe and Redlands Under 13 Girls coach Jo Buckley, also a teacher at Cleveland High, will partner to deliver football development programmes to the school’s grade seven, eight and nine students.
The arrangement is part of a broader partnership that will also see Redlands coaches coaching Cleveland High's teams in the Schools' Premier League - the elite football competition for state schools.
Cleveland High principal Paul Bancroft believes the arrangement is a wonderful development for footballers in the Redlands region looking to take their football seriously in the future.
"It means students get the benefit of high quality coaching in sessions where they get more one to one time, as our student to teacher/coach ratios have been halved," Bancroft said.
Redlands United Senior Men’s coach and Performance Phase Director Matt Chandler said this type of initiative was critical to player development in this country.
"In Asia and Europe, players are getting up to eight sessions a week as a result of joint club-school programs, whereas here they might only get two to three sessions with their club and one session at school if they are in a development program," Chandler explained.
"To make things worse, players end up receiving conflicting messages, overlapping sessions and overcrowded training and game schedules when schools and clubs aren't working in tandem.”
"This approach gives the school and club programs clear roles, as we can target players' individual skill development in school and work on game play at the club," Chandler concluded.
The partnership will also see Cleveland High play games at the Red Devils' Cleveland Showgrounds home grounds, while the club will manage the maintenance of the school’s ovals that will then serve as primary training venues for a number of programmes.
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