SIMON’S TRIP TO URUGUAY
Simon with Jorge Giordano (Technical Director of Uruguayan FA) and Andy Gray
I first set foot in South America 28 years ago this summer. As I was a teacher at the time, I was there for a whole six week summer holidays, and went back a few times after that learning, researching and growing.
But earlier this year was my first time back in a while, this time visiting Uruguay, where we were very kindly allowed into national team training for the week by Marcelo Bielsa and my friend Diego Reyes, who's been Marcelo's assistant for 16 years. I cannot talk on the sessions with Marcelo, the work there or our chats as they were preparing for the World Cup qualifiers so that would all be private. I have of course had experience of Marcelo's work from the professional players I support at Leeds United and from the friendship with Diego that's grown over the years, and also have got an idea of him through reading various books. However, to be with him for a week and to be there in La Casa de La Celeste was just incredible from morning till night, even sometimes for double sessions with the team. Learning from all of that was an extraordinary experience.
Over the course of the week I took more notes than I've ever made before. One of Marcelo's staff at one point said "you've got enough for a book". It was an unbelievable experience to see the detail of Marcelo's philosophy and witness it in practice. It was something I'll treasure for all my coaching life. It was absolutely perfect.
Aside from that, I went off into Uruguay itself, in between national team sessions, so I had a very full schedule. The Uruguay Football Federation National Team Director Jorge Guardiano provided me with a fantastic person, Gaston, to both translate and drive me around. It opened every door for me in Uruguay. I went to Defensor, one of the most successful clubs in the world for producing talent - being ranked in the top 6 for this worldwide - and also went to Montevideo City Torque. We visited all age groups, from U20s down to U11s, which is the youngest they are taken there. it was very interesting to visit Montevideo City Torque, who are part of the City group. My friend Brian Marwood is behind all of the City Group clubs abroad. You could see it was following very much the City model and structure
For a country of around 3.5 million population, Uruguay has a fantastic record and I was interested to explore why. Why such success and great players are developed? Suarez, Cavani, Godin. Although he did have some problems, I very much like Suarez as a player. He combined both sides of the game; going forward and also defensively. Twenty years ago, I would say to people in my talks and lectures that football is going to change. It's going to be not players who can just attack or players who defend, but you'd have to be able to play multiple positions. I also spoke about the the body type of a footballer is changing; it is no longer the squat bow legged type, bit more athletic, possibly resembling a middle or long distance runner, which is what it has become.
Whilst we didn't have the word transition in those days, I I took turnover from rugby. I used to say the turnover is going to be the key thing. How quickly you switch from one mentality to another, almost one type of person as an animal off the ball, but then an artist on it. Switching between those two very quick would be the key. Suarez could do that on the pitch.
So I wanted to explore the land of Suarez and these other players and early World Cup winners. A big thing that came out of it to me and talking with others was baby football; a type of seven-a-side/small sided game (baby referring to the the size of the pitch). The key thing is that it has a massive uptake, with maybe 90% of the kids who are at school are playing on a weekend, so there is massive participation from the 3.5 million population.
A lot of the places are highly concentrated, however a lot of the players come from the outside too. No matter where you are though, they all seem to be playing baby football. As a game it's rough and tough. It is a stressful game really; there might be fighting, with added chaos on the sidelines with parents and coaches shouting. It's sort of the opposite of what we'd have here today. And a lot of it would not in essence be good in isolation and we wouldn't have it here for a good reason, but a performance benefit is that almost everybody we saw in Uruguay says that Uruguayan players end up being very resilient and tough. They can make multiple moves abroad and settle in different environments because they've just got used to this idea of overcoming unfcomfortability and tough environments. This character building and resilience built from an early age through such football culture is one of the reasons for this. You cope with that, you cope with anything.
Simon pictured in the very first gym in which futsal was played.
It was amazing to go to the first gym where futsal was played. I couldn't believe it; it was one of the best moments of my sporting life to walk into that 'gym one' as it is known. I didn't know the building was still going to be there. We found the building, but then I could not believe the court still existed - other than the flooring, the court was the same. To be able to see a piece of the original court flooring was an incredibly special moment for me after the work I did in bringing futsal to the English speaking world.
It has had a great benefit to Uruguay, but I from what I learnt, they have largely stopped playing futsal because of some reported negative impact it can have on the legs (which I'm not sure is true). Possibly they could look to bring it back as the younger players there seem to be quite a way off the same age in England, however when you look at the U20s they are probably slightly better, so something interesting is going on. Uruguay could maybe learn from Europe in some ways with more going back to football, which I'm going to share with Jorge and some thoughts on that. Maybe they need a mix of both the football (as we would maybe see here) and the baby football; or possibly just toned down a little. In our country now we've got silence in matches and parents not talking, which is possibly to a complete other extreme.
Simon with a piece of the original flooring from ‘gym one’.
One of the most fascinating men I met was a man called Marcelo Luis, who was the Head of the Amateur Football for the whole of Uruguay. Because they don't have academies at ages under 10, it is run by Luis and his team. In England where if you get in an Academy, you stop playing grassroots, in Uruguay the grassroots scene continues. There are maybe some lessons to learn from the importance that is placed on grassroots football there in terms of development. Luis was such a fantastic person and totally knew football inside out. He explained to me that you get different styles in Uruguay: in the centre, closer to major cities like Montevideo, the style can be very 'Scottish' he said, due to the Scottish rail workers that moved to Uruguay to help build the infrastructure. In other parts, closer to the Brazilian border, they play more with a Brazilian style. Another part of the country can be seen to be more Argentinian in style. He said if you watch a player from Uruguay, you can tell what area of Uruguay is from by his football style, which I thought was fascinating. I'm going to see if we can keep a dialogue with him and hopefully be able to visit him again.
The trip was really helped by Andy Gray, who came out for the second half of the week, and it was great to be able to experience the trip and our friendship, so a big thank you to Andy.
A massive thank you must go to the Uruguayan people, who I loved. Such welcoming, passionate, open and friendly people. And also of course to Diego and Marcelo for having me with the national team, Diego for getting me in touch with Jorge and opening my doors everywhere I went in with the wonderful help of Gaston.
It was one of the best learning experiences of my life.
Thank you.