Saturday Spotlight: Positive message is a heady brew at The White House

HYLTON Road Recreation Ground, Sunderland.

Durham Sunday Cup, second preliminary round, Sunderland Jollies v Hartlepool White House.

11.18am.

It’s half-time and, despite being on top, the visitors haven’t scored. It’s 0-0.

You need all your fingers and toes – and someone else’s as well – to count the number of times a White House forward has been caught offside.

Jollies have rarely threatened.

The message and talk from the White House manager is simple. Whatever the scoreline after 45 minutes it’s going to be sane. None of the usual ranting, shouting or raving.

It is going to be Arsene Wenger cool rather than Alex Ferguson hairdryer.

Calm and quiet is the manner of Stephen Gofton.

Probably for the first time in eight seasons in charge.

He has three things to say, three quiet and positive things. Normally it’s the opposite. Too much talk, too much ranting, too much to say, too negative.

Point one: “Lads, this is good stuff,’’ he starts. “We are defending well, strong at the back – they’ve not had a sniff.’’ Point two: “The football we are playing is first class, we are working hard, closing down and stopping them getting anything.’’ Point three: “And strikers, keep working at it. Just try and hold your runs a bit more, you’ve got the beating of the defenders every time.’’ Normally it would be more like Mike Bassett: Point one: “How the hell aren’t youse three-up? Can’t believe we aren’t five-up, it’s not good enough is it?’’ Point two: “If you don’t keep chasing and closing down ys’ll lerrem into it and I can see what’s coming. It’s happened before hasn’t it? HASN’T IT?’’ Point three: “Ow many times are you gunna be offside? Don’t yano’ the rules?

Clueless the lorra yas. Get out there and get it sorted.’’ So in the second-half, White House get out there. They defend in the stout manner they had been, the high work ethic remains the same.

And the strikers get their heads around the offside rule, as they win 2-0 to progress to the third round.

THE change in outlook came after a session with Richard Nugent.

He runs Success In Football, a consultancy service providing programmes and training in mental fitness.

Nugent has worked, and achieved results, with a number of leading Premier League players, as well as Football League professionals and those at Academy level.

Not only players, but coaches and backroom staff have benefited from his mantra.

Perhaps turning Hartlepool Sunday League second division side The White House into a team of winners in just a couple of hours is a big task, but he managed an immediate impact in the Durham County Cup game three days after the session.

It’s fair to say convincing a bunch of pub footballers whose main concern on a Sunday morning is running off a hangover and turning up on time isn’t his easiest job.

His CV includes work with a number of leading players and clubs. Client confidentiality means individual names aren’t divulged, but Nugent’s clubs include Liverpool, Newcastle, Sunderland and LA Galaxy.

Now add The White House to that illustrious manifest.

There’s a danger that sports mind coaches are viewed with a bit of scepticism. Outsiders looking in from afar.

“Players out there who have psychologists say they are very much on the periphery of things,’’ he said.

“Clubs have players who are multi, multi-million pound assets and they have great nutrition plans, tactics, fitness, everything. Ask how much of their work is mental and they would say 50, 60, 70, 80, 90 per cent.

“But ask them how much training is of the mental side and they would say next to nothing.

“Some players remain sceptical, but in the last 18 months or so there has been a change.

“Players tend to say to me that they don’t think the rest of the lads at the club would be interested. They say it’s good for me, but the others wouldn’t want to get involved.

“So yes, it’s still a bit on the outside, but when you sit and talk about it they are fairly quick to come around. Maybe the exception is the really big names, and I’m not just talking about Premier League players, bigger.

“But it’s all confidential, we sign confidentiality contracts, so no-one knows about the work we do and the benefits are there.

“The majority of my clients are by word of mouth or recommendation within the game.’’ Once in with a player or club, there’s often a marked improvement.

A lot of the work, by it’s nature, is one to one. Maybe it’s down to a player being seen as weak by his teammates in seeking assistance.

It’s not long before others are converted, once they have witnessed the results.

“The mental side of the game is a big thing,’’ said Nugent. “The FA run psychology programmes, an on-line course. I tested it and it compares well.

“I don’t contact clubs directly because a lot of the time the mental side of the game is seen as something different. A lot of clubs don’t like to think about it.

“Unless you are in with a player, it’s very difficult. The challenge is if you are a psychologist at a club, employed by the club or part of the coaching staff, then it’s very difficult for players to come to you, to trust you.

“The vast majority of things I do are with players who are affected by bad man management.

“That’s why I think there is an advantage in me staying outside. My dream is eventually there isn’t much of a place for people like me because the managers can do it themselves.

“The England women’s team has a very good set of psychologists. They all know their role and it works really well for them.’’ And while he hopes for a change in his own side of things, his vision is for sweeping alterations to be made throughout the game – starting at the top with the FA.

Will Carling spoke of the rugby rulers when he spoke of “57 old farts”. While the FA has tried to modernise in the last decade, the old problems and difficulties remain.

“The overall structure of the game in England will have to change,’’ insisted Nugent.

“And that goes down to simple things like grass roots level. I took a coaching badge, prelim level, about 12 years ago.

“I then didn’t do any onpitch coaching for a while, but I wanted to take my badges again, at the same level. Yet the content of the learning was exactly the same as it was years previously.

“Why are we coaching the same way now as ten years ago when the game has changed so much? The game is largely run by people who don’t understand the overall picture. It’s scary.’’ There’s some lack of direction at the very top as well. Fabio Capello, for all his glittering array of club honours, fell woefully short in the World Cup.

The environment and his strict ways were not good for England. Yes, it works in qualifying when he has the players for a short time, but confining them to camp for over a month proved a disaster.

But then what? The talk from the FA is of an English coach to replace the Italian.

Are we any closer to finding one?

“Had we got rid of Capello after the World Cup, where do we go from there?’’ asked Nugent. “At the moment Harry Redknapp is touted as a replacement.

“The in thing the other year was to bring a foreign manager in who had won things all over Europe. Now it’s talk about getting a 66- year-old English manager in who has very little experience of European club level.

“He comes in, say he does disastrously, fails to qualify for the World Cup. Then he goes, leaves the job and where to do we go from there?

“It just goes on and on and on. There’s a small number of forward thinking people out there who need more influence in the game.’’ And, in the week he returned to our TV screens, the main man in the Apprentice should be considered.

“I’m not a huge fan of Alan Sugar, but he put himself forward for a key role in the FA and never seemed to get a mention,’’ said Nugent. “Yet there is someone who knows football, a hugely successful businessman who wants to get involved. Why don’t we use him?

“I heard Stuart Pearce, I’m a massive fan of his, a great fella. He didn’t come out and say he wouldn’t do it (the England job) but he said he needed more experience.

“He’s a first-rate coach, who is willing to learn all aspects of the game.

“A lot was made of his role in the World Cup, when the video footage came out of him and Capello on the bench. I have to say, Stuart Pearce wouldn’t be bullied by anyone – and I don’t just mean that because of how he was as a player.

“An example of his professional outlook is that on the back seat of his car when I was with him was a load of CDs and books on learning Italian. He is intelligent and there’s a lot of people like that who need to be utilised.

“I don’t like to get into the money distribution side of it all, but look at the top end of the Premier League, who get the deals from Sky and keep it separate from the overall game.

“Until football is all part of the same big picture instead of separate factions there will be problems.

“It’s all short term, there’s no long-term picture.’’ THE White House, Wooler Road, Hartlepool. Thursday, 6.28pm.

“The mental side of the game can make you all better players,’’ says Nugent. It’s quite a statement to a team which has just started the season reformed with a raft of new players who are rather unfamiliar with each other.

He uses a couple of examples of how the state of mind can affect performance.

Andrew Shaw has the biggest physique within the squad. Snapper only plays in emergencies, but does all the paperwork and organising.

Six foot four and 19 stone, he’s a big, strong unit.

So Nugent picks him out and gets him to the front.

With Shaw flexing his right arm tense, Nugent tries to force it down. He can’t.

Put a couple of words in his head to divert focus and it’s a different story.

First, a positive thought.

Nugent asks him to repeat a word out loud which inspires: he picks money.

Shaw repeats the phrase over and over again as Nugent presses down in the same manner he tried before.

There’s a bit of movement, the arm flexes a bit.

Now for a negative. A word that riles. He opts for insurance.

Insurance, insurance, insurance, he repeats. Nugent presses down again. Shaw’s arm collapses.

Negative thoughts mean a negative response. A simple display of why you should think positive during a game.

Made a bad pass? Think next ball. Missed a header?

Think next ball. Block the last one out, focus on your next involvement and make it a positive one.

It’s a strategy Nugent has used regularly with a player who broke into the Liverpool team as a teenager and made a big difference to his game.

Gofton’s half-time outbursts are mentioned, brought up by all and sundry in the room.

It’s been a bane for years.

“In those few minutes you have with them, tell them what you want them to do – not what you don’t want them to do,’’ is Nugent’s solution.

“It’s no good bollocking people, that will only get their heads down. Think of three good points, three positives.

“Three things they can all improve on and do better with in the second-half.’’ It’s a notion that worked first-time out, now he’s got until the season ends in May to keep it going. Then promotion may beckon.

■ For contact details go to www.successinfootball.com