PORT ELIZABETH – Aspiring coaches in Pretoria and Port Elizabeth have received expert coaching advice from the Springbok coaching staff over the past two weeks.
More than 150 coaches from the provincial, clubs and schools ranks attended a coaching seminar in Pretoria on Wednesday. The group rubbed shoulders with the Springbok assistant coaches Mzwandile Stick, Matt Proudfoot, Swys de Bruin and Jacques Nienaber.
Last week, the same Springbok coaching staff hosted a similar seminar at the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium in Port Elizabeth, where more than 200 coaches attended the two-hour long session. On each occasion, the Bok coaches shared their practical experiences with the group of coaches, and they were also on hand to answers a number of questions.
The seminars, hosted on Wednesdays when the Springboks had their resting days, were arranged in collaboration with the Education and Education sector of the SA Rugby’s Rugby Department, spearheaded by Hilton Adonis (Manager: Coaching Education). In recent years SA Rugby and the Springbok coaches have hosted similar coaching seminars in Welkom and Bloemfontein.
“The coaching seminar is the perfect platform for the promising coaches to experience first-hand what the coaching philosophy is of our national coaches, and they can see how these coaches implement their coaching strategies,” said Adonis.
“Those practical observation sessions and interaction with the national coaches are priceless, really. Because the young coaches take so much away from these experienced then merely taking notes. We’ve now managed to spread these seminars across a few places and my next aim is to give the coaches of the Western Cape a similar opportunity.”
On Thursday the Pretoria coaches attended the Springbok training session at Loftus Versfeld, an exercise which they thoroughly enjoyed at the famous stadium.