Nick Davies leaves

[Icecream Snow 761]

http://www.pinkun.com/norwich-city/head-of-sport-science-nick-davies-leaves-norwich-city-1-5068786Honestly had never heard of the guy before.I knew a Nick Davies, but he was ginger.

[lake district canary 4,531]

I''ll get shot down for this, but that day in the life of RM at Colney resembled more of a day at a laboratory than a sports complex.   Now I get all the wizardry there is around and how useful it can be, but there is a balance to be had........

[Greavsy 2,412]

It''s all down to very fine margins LDC, and anything you can do to get an extra 1-2% from each player is worth it.

Problem is all the others are doing it too!

[Lessingham Canary 99]

Quite right Greavsy, Dave Carolan was excellent doing that role a few years ago, i know Swansea''s equivalent quite well Rich Buchanan and would expect there to be a similar here very soon. Conditioning and education can gain those extra margins where it matters most, between the players ears.

[lake district canary 4,531]

I think there is a real danger of stifling natural ability with too much clinical stuff.  You see it all the time in different work situations, where reliance on statistics, data and routines leads to a lack of spontaneity and creativity.   We seem to expect the players these days to be sports machines - and yes all clubs are doing all this high tech stuff, but the ones that do the best will be the ones that don''t allow the sports science to take a too large slice of the preparation cake.  Weren''t people complaining earlier in the season our players seemed to run out of steam too easily?  Why would that be if our sports science was so effective?

[Icecream Snow 761]

[quote user="Greavsy"]It''s all down to very fine margins LDC, and anything you can do to get an extra 1-2% from each player is worth it.

Problem is all the others are doing it too![/quote]But in Lafferty''s case an extra 1% of nothing is still nothing :P

[Nuff Said 5,088]

Maybe it wasn''t that effective, and that''s why he''s gone?

[Bill 1,788]

[quote user="Lessingham Canary"]Quite right Greavsy, Dave Carolan was excellent doing that role a few years ago, i know Swansea''s equivalent quite well Rich Buchanan and would expect there to be a similar here very soon. Conditioning and education can gain those extra margins where it matters most, between the players ears.[/quote]agreemaybe we are spending too much time trying to make good athletes footballerswhereas previously we were more concerned with making good footballers into athletesso much is down to motivation, team spirit etcsomething that was clearly missing (defence) last seasonremember the games with Lambert when we ''knew'' that we would win, when somehow last minute goals came, when we seemed unstoppableI suspect there was far more ''unrest'' among certain players that has not been fully revealed and that we will go in next season firing on all cylinderssports scientist or not

[Woodman 92]

Given he was here for 4 years, he would have been around in the playoff year and the prem season that followed. Doesn''t he deserve credit for that? But that also begs the question, what went wrong last year? A general malaise set in around the club.

[Jim Smith 2,314]

What credit does he get for a rubbish prem season where we got relegated and also conceded plenty of late goals?

[Tumbleweed 106]

If its 4 years thats 2 pretty rubbish relegations, one poor Champs and one promotion in which arguably we still slightly underperformed at key times. Not great and all 4 seasons we did seem to be less fit than the oppo and run out of steam quicker.

[The Great Mass Debater 1,076]

[quote user="lake district canary"]I think there is a real danger of stifling natural ability with too much clinical stuff.  You see it all the time in different work situations, where reliance on statistics, data and routines leads to a lack of spontaneity and creativity.   We seem to expect the players these days to be sports machines - and yes all clubs are doing all this high tech stuff, but the ones that do the best will be the ones that don''t allow the sports science to take a too large slice of the preparation cake.  Weren''t people complaining earlier in the season our players seemed to run out of steam too easily?  Why would that be if our sports science was so effective?

[/quote]

I think this is definitely something that needs to be recognised. You can definitely over-coach some players.

I suppose all you can do is provide the opportunity and some players will have the ability and capacity to take it on, others wont.

Massive generalisation, but English players have always seemed behind some of their continental peers in this respect, more one-dimensional in terms of their play. Perhaps this is due to coaching, but with so many foreign coaching influences these days its perhaps more to do with the players and the mentalities themselves.

I think you can take a talented player and coach their ability out of them by accident by making them overthink things, teaching them to inhibit their natural instints in trying to develop the weaker areas of their games. Consider Huckerby, it was accepted that he just didnt defend, imagine sticking him in a Hughton team and making him track back, all you''d probably achieve is making him an ineffective attacker.

In too many walks of life people have their natural ability trained or coached out of them in the hope of making them more rounded. For a lot of players this will perhaps prove detrimental - of course those players who really do have what it takes will be able to take it on board - just look how Ronaldo turned from frustrating potential with no end product to a phenomenon with the right coaching.

The skill I guess is identifying who has the capacity to grow through such techniques and coaching, and who should perhaps just be left alone to develop in their own way

[Woodman 92]

Didn''t Hughton and Calderwood ask Holt to play a different role - wider and more along the lines of how Jerome plays? Clearly not to his strengths and ultimately led to him leaving.

I think you can carry one luxury player and enable the others to cover for him. Huckerby, Redmond, Wes (to some extent) and a Murphy. The problem comes when you''ve got 2 or 3 in the same team.

Equally, there''s a lot to be said for a sports psychologist helping with the mental side of the game. I''ve said before that we had one in our promotion season right up to the win at Wembley and then, for some reason, they were told that they weren''t needed when we were in the Premiership. Interesting that England U21s have one with them at their tournament.