Brisbane's Ray of sunshine

It was a tragic week for Welsh football and football in general with the sad passing of Gary Speed. He was found hanged by his own hands in his home by his beautiful wife, another victim of the incomprehensible mental illness of depression.

It happened in the month of Movember, in the midst of raising of awareness of men’s illnesses such as depression.

I remember Gary Speed, he was a great player for Leeds United, and scored some fabulous goals in countless appearances in the Welsh national team.

He went on to become the Welsh manager.

His unfortunate death kicked off another synaptic connection to Ange Postecoglou, the Brisbane Roar, and their record-breaking run of success.

Raymond Verheijen is the Welsh assistant manager to Gary Speed, and Verheijen’s prominence is largely based on his ability as a football fitness and endurance coach, with some associated degree of tactical awareness.

His training methods are well researched and he has written a bestselling book on football coaching.

Ray Verheijen started out as a player, but his career as a professional footballer was cut short by a serious hip injury at the age of just 17.

He immediately began to study exercise physiology and sports psychology at the Free University, Amsterdam and soon after graduating as a ”Master of Sports Science” his research became published in 1997 as Conditioning for Soccer, a work that has become a reference book for football coaches around the world.

Raymond Verheijen’s career as a football coach is very impressive and began with the Dutch Federation. Verheijen worked with managers like Frank Rijkaard, Louis van Gaal, Guus Hiddink and Dick Advocaat, and was employed at five major international tournaments with the Netherlands, South Korea and Russia.

Every national team he has worked with has qualified for every single major tournament they have entered since 1998.

Netherlands (1998 WC) – Guus Hiddink
Netherlands (Euro 2000) – Frank Rijkaard
South Korea (2002 WC) – Guus Hiddink
Netherlands (Euro 2004) – Dick Advocaat
South Korea (2006 WC) – Dick Advocaat
Russia (Euro 2008) – Guus Hiddink
South Korea (2010 WC) – Huh Jung-moo
Wales (Euro 2012) – Gary Speed

Verheijen has also spent time and worked with Ange Postecoglou and Ken Stead at the Brisbane Roar.

Verheijen acted as a coaching consultant with Brisbane Roar FC in Australia during their time of turmoil and their search for a new identity and playing style.

Ken Stead, the Roar’s strength and conditioning coach also went on a professional development trip to Wales to meet up with Raymond Verheijen and spent a week and a half with him.

Ken Stead emigrated to Australia in 1989 after his playing career in his native Scotland with East Fife was also ended prematurely through injury. He has trained and worked with Verheijen and considers him a mentor for his training methods.

Once in Brisbane, Ken did a degree in human movement and worked with all types of sportsmen including tennis players, AFL players and local footballers, designing his own drills using Verheijen’s principles and the movement patterns of the different sports.

He was eventually hired by Ange to revolutionise the Brisbane Roar and their coaching methods.

Verheijen bases his coaching on the periodisation system first promoted by the Russian physiologist Leo Matveyev in the 1960s. The idea is not a new one, but the basic premise is that certain types of players and squads should tailor their training and intensity throughout the pre-season to maintain their dynamic advantage throughout the whole game and stay as fresh as possible for the whole season.

Verheijen’s adaptation of periodisation is simple. Fitness is important, but freshness is key. Freshness dictates the speed of a player’s actions.

There should be many short sharp sessions based on what you actually do in the game. Periodic repetitive drills for skills, possession, passing and scoring in a smaller game which grows to the full-field 11-a-side game.

The intensity of the training sessions builds until it’s greater than the intensity of the actual game itself. The focus is on skill and coordination and teamwork, but is tailored to the individual’s ability to maintain that intensity and freshness.

You schedule training programs to complement each other and the team, and gradually develop the components into the team and system you want.

Players get better because of better training, not because of more training.

Overtrain players and you risk fatigue, which is when most injuries happen. Verheijen claims 80 percent of injuries in football are down to coaches failing to recognise how a player should train and how often.

The other good news is that Verheijen has taken a keen interest in Australia and is employed as a coaching consultant to the FFA. He has already run a number of training courses and spoken at football conventions throughout Australia.

Verheijen aims to bring elite coaching to Australian football grassroots and beyond. The assistant manager of the Welsh national team believes that coaches at all levels of football can benefit from top-flight training and conditioning techniques.

That sounds very promising for the record number of Australian football players and coaches and the future growth of Australian football on the world stage.

If the Socceroos show as much improvement as the Roar has in the last year or so, then Johnny Warren’s dream of one day playing in the final of the FIFA World Cup may yet be realised.