Rapid Vienna recently hosted two Coerver® Coaching events at the club, who have finished second in the Austrian Bundesliga this season, and are one of Europe’s Oldest Clubs having been established in 1898. Both clinics were presented by Alfred Galustian, co-founder of Coerver® Coaching, along with Rafael Wieczorek, Coerver® Director for Germany and Austria.

The first event was a clinic for Rapid Vienna coaching staff (see below image with Rapid Vienna Academy players in action), including the First Team and Academy. Rapid’s staff include former first Team and National team player Muhammed Akagunduz. Muhammed said of the clinic, “I wish I had this sort of individual training when I was a young player, it would certainly have made me a better player”.

The Clinic was held at the Team’s Gerhard Hanappi Stadium, which also includes the First Team training ground. Rapid Vienna Academy Director, Peter Grechtshammer (see below image with Alf Galustian), said “I was particularly impressed in the detail in teaching Technical Skills to talented players. Rapid wanted to make the Coerver Program part of their young players education.”

The Second Event hosted by Rapid at the Stadium, was the Coerver® Coaching Youth Diploma Course. Almost 100 Coaches from all over Austria together with coaches from Germany, Romania, Slovenia and Czech Republic attended (see below image). The next Coerver® Coaching Youth Diploma in main land Europe will be at FC Schalke 04 on the 7th & 8th July.

The English Coerver® Coaching Youth Diploma begins this weekend at Fulham FC (19th & 20th May 2012) with further dates at Premier League Champions Manchester City (2nd & 3rd June) and Birmingham City (9th & 10th June 2012), for more information and to book your place click www.coerver.co.uk/youthdiploma

For more information on the Coerver® Coaching Youth Diploma at FC Schalke 04 http://bit.ly/KmiZ0s
For more information on Coerver® Coaching Youth Diplomas in the USA, U.K & Ireland http://tiny.cc/s86bew

Fantastic,

It’s the only word to describe my old team Chelsea’s performance in beating Barcelona last week in the Champions League Semi Final 2nd leg at the Nou Camp. Yes, Barca won all the statistical contests. More shots, more corners, more saves and overwhelmingly more possession and passes completed.

And yes Messi missed a penalty and the post saved Chelsea late in the game, but let’s not underestimate how tough a team Chelsea are to beat these days. For all their attacking brilliance Barca have not beaten the Blues in the last 7 games they’ve played, so maybe we shouldn’t be so shocked after all at Chelsea’s resilience and the result.

No question Barca have played some sublime football these last few years and we salute them for it, but there’s a new Champion to be crowned and I’m betting it’s going to be “Blue Is The Color” that is being sung all around Bayern’s Alliance Arena on May 19th.

To read the UEFA.com preview of the 2011/12 Champions League Final, click here

About Charlie Cooke:

Charlie played for Aberdeen and Dundee in the Scottish First Division before joining Chelsea in the English First Division in 1966 where he played for the next 11 years. He made 380 league and Cup appearances for the Blues and played in four Cup Finals, winning the English F.A. Cup in 1970 against Leeds and the European Cup Winners Cup in 1971 against Real Madrid. He shares the Chelsea club record of three Player of The Year awards with Gianfranco Zola and in 2005 Chelsea’s Centenary celebration year he was selected for the Chelsea All Time XI.

With only three weeks remaining to the launch of the Coerver® Coaching Youth Diploma 2012 in England, final preparations are being made to ensure that this is the best course yet. Over 400 coaches from across the world attended the Youth Diploma Course in 2011 (see below image – Fulham FC 2011) and was the first time in Coerver® Coaching’s 28 year history that an authorised Coach Education course has been made available to external coaches.

The 2012 Coerver® Coaching Youth Diploma, in association with FourFourTwo Performance & UEFA Tact-X, will be available in only 3 locations in England this year with all courses being hosted at Professional Football club training facilities. First stop is Fulham FC on 19th & 20th May 2012 then it is on to Manchester City FC (see below image) on 2nd & 3rd June 2012 and finally arriving at Birmingham City FC on 9th & 10th June 2012.

The purpose of the Coerver® Coaching Youth Diploma is to give attendees from all levels of the game a greater understanding of how to plan & deliver more effective coaching sessions. The focus of the course is the Coerver® Coaching Session Planner which provides a quick & easy solution for coaches who would like to construct weekly, monthly or even season long programmes using proven, high quality drills & games developed over 28 years by Coerver® Coaching.

The course will be delivered by Alf Galustian (see above image), Co-founder of Coerver® Coaching who said of the course “We’ve never had an authorized Coerver® pathway for Coaches until the last year, and we’ve been around 28 years, and we’re in 23 countries. Our new Diploma course is designed for Coaches who work with young players from 8-15 years old. We designed the diploma asking the question, how can we help coaches construct sessions for the week or the whole season?. The new Coerver® DVD’s and books Charlie Cooke and myself have devised, which is called the Coerver® Coaching Session Planner; is a formula that any coach can use to construct their season’s sessions, we have built the diploma course around this new material”.

The 2011 Youth Diploma course was attended by a range of people working at various levels of the game from parents who wanted to help their kids at home to coaches working with senior international players:

“These last two days on the Coerver® Coaching Youth Diploma course certainly made me a better coach, I have been a fan of Coerver® for many years”.
Jose Morais, First Team Coach – Real Madrid CF (see above image)

“The foundations of great teaching have always been championed by Coerver® who have taken football and created a system by which any child, through hard work and good teaching can master the basic ball skills, that then lead onto their application in skilful play.

We are passionate about our football and the belief that we must develop our players to be the best they can be. The Coerver® Coaching Youth Diploma Course has just made this whole job so much easier.”
Carl Lander, Assistant Head Teacher – St Aubyns School, Essex

“I enjoyed the Coerver® Coaching Youth Diploma course immensely, I feel the course did show me some variations on familiar themes and I enjoyed how both Alf and Scott presented the course”.
David Connolly, Southampton FC Striker

“I thought the Youth Diploma course was excellent, Coerver® is the building block on which all football should be taught. I thoroughly enjoyed the course and it has really encouraged me towant to become a better coach”.
Mark Williams, Grassroots Coach – Birmingham

“I thoroughly enjoyed the Coerver® Coaching Youth Diploma course, and would recommend that all coaches working with young players should attend”.
Richard Beale, Reserve Team Manager – Birmingham City FC

At the time of writing, 75% of all places for the 2012 Coerver® Coaching Youth Diploma have been booked, to find out more information and to book, log-on to www.coerver.co.uk/youthdiploma

Coerver® Coaching UK have agreed a new partnership with French motoring giant Citroen to supply vehicles to their franchise network and existing customer base.

The deal will involve existing and new franchisee’s being provided with the latest, Coerver® branded, Citroen Berlingo Enterprise van as part of their franchise package (see below image, Scott Wright, UK Director Coerver® Coaching with Steve Hayden Grant, Citroen business manager). Citroen will also provide a lease/purchase scheme for Coerver® Coaching UK staff and members of the Performance Academy and Partner Club programmes.

Scott Wright, UK Director Coerver® Coaching said of the partnership “We are delighted to have agreed a new deal with Citroen to provide our franchise network and customer base with high quality vehicles. Citroen are a perfect partner for us in the UK and have a long history of involvement in sport through their highly successful rally teams and long term partnerships with a number of football clubs including Arsenal FC. Everybody connected with our business, whether it be franchisee’s, staff members, parents, players or clubs that we work with, will be able to access the benefits that this partnership will provide. We are looking to align ourselves with high quality partners in every area of our business and Citroen certainly come into that category.”

In addition to the new partnership, Coerver® Coaching UK and Citroen have worked together previously at the Grassroots Football Show at the NEC in Birmingham (see below image). The innovative DS3 model went on to win the “Small Car” and “Car of The Year” awards. Look out for Coerver® Coaching UK and Citroen at the 2012 Grassroots Football Show, that runs 25th – 27th May 2012.

To view the latest range of Citroen vehicles, log-on to www.citroen.co.uk