Four ways of showing players that you care

Ensuring our athletes’ physical and psychological wellbeing is one of a coach’s most important tasks.

In a full-contact sport like rugby, we have a legal responsibility to protect our athletes from all sorts of physical injuries, but we also have a moral responsibility to show our athletes that we care about, and for, them.  

As coaches, we regularly demonstrate this care through small acts, such as an arm around the shoulder, arranging lifts to enable athletes to get to matches and meticulously planning matchday squads to ensure that every player gets equal game time.

As a by-product, our athletes learn to trust us and they recognise that we are committed to them. In turn, this could potentially result in increased effort during training sessions and increased performance in matches.

Importantly, demonstrations of care help sow the seeds for a lifelong love for rugby - something all coaches should strive for.

Here are four tips for showing players you have their best interests at heart...

1. Find time for your players

During training sessions, our focus is often on trying to get across our technical and tactical points. This can leave us blind to those in front of us and make us preoccupied with trying to get our message across.  

There often seems to be little time to get to know our athletes beyond their playing position, shirt number or competencies as rugby players.

This, however, is a non-negotiable aspect of our quest to care for our athletes. Just as a doctor cannot adequately care without knowing the patient’s disease, so a coach cannot adequately care for their athlete without knowing them as a person.

Even if time is scarce during sessions, we must find a window. One way to do this is by planning two or three interactions with different squad members each week.

Interact with a range of players - that includes the more inward and reserved players, not just the loud ones.

Demonstrating to athletes that you care about them as people, not just rugby players, will help leave a lasting lifelong impression.

TOP TAKEAWAY: Plan time during a session to learn about your athletes’ interests or beliefs. Make it your quest to find out three facts about three different players during every session.

2. Listen to your players

We must pay attention to our athletes in order to get to know them.

I must admit this is something I previously seldom considered. As a developing sports coach, I was guilty of hearing what my athletes wanted to do during training, but I rarely listened to, or acted upon, these ideas.  

I attempted to give the impression that I gave athletes a voice by asking hollow questions such as “Any thoughts?” or “Any opinions?”. On reflection, I asked these questions with my answers already formulated.

However, genuinely listening to our athletes demonstrates that we value what they say. Although we might not always agree, ensuring that we hear the voice of our athletes, particularly those who are very young, is important.

TOP TAKEAWAY: Listening to our athletes and acting on what they say help demonstrate that we value our players’ opinions and care about them.