The Rangers Youth Development Company hosted a Twitter Q&A with Graeme Murty and Neil Mackintosh from the Rangers Academy recently.
Sporting Director Ross Wilson confirmed an Academy restructure during the summer and supporters enjoyed a series of Q&As with key coaching staff and players throughout the lockdown period.
The Academy is now organised as the Foundation Phase, Youth Development Phase and Professional Development Phase and Graeme has responsibility for overseeing the coaching and development process across the academy.
Neil is a coach and education manager at the club and both men enjoyed their session with fans.
Here are the highlights…
Q – Jamie - Hello Graeme congratulations on your new role, what are you most enjoying about it?
GM – Thanks very much. I’m looking forward to having a greater insight into all of our teams and getting and watching the young players develop in far greater detail than I was able to previously.
Q - How do you reflect on the challenges that the youth teams faced over the last few years such as the games against elite teams across Europe & the Challenge Cup run?
GM – I think that our players, first and foremost, have represented themselves and the club very well in the last few years and they have showed excellent progress. It’s really apparent how much the players like to be tested and that has informed a great deal of our evolving programme going forward.
Q – Jamie - Hello Neil, in terms of player education what problems/opportunities have the last few months given you?
NM - Hi Jamie, thank you for your question. As our business is really about player and coach relationships, the last few months have been really difficult without any face-to-face gatherings.
That has certainly been the biggest problem that we have faced particularly, as we feel that the Rangers youth programme is very strong with relationship building and forming with our young people. I have been very proud to be involved with such a talented group of people within the club that have produced a fantastic remote learning programme over the last four months. This has allowed us to continue developing our young players, supporting them and their families and engaging with them in a really meaningful way.
However, one of the issues that we had early on was learning how to use the technology properly and there has been some upskilling required for the staff. This has enabled our staff to have more skills and the use of webinars, videos and interactive sessions will now be built into our normal programme when it gets reintroduced in the future. I also feel that we have grasped the opportunity to become closer to the families as we have tried to work very closely with them throughout the four month programme.
Q - How easy/difficult is it to ensure young players take academic studies as seriously as they would their football training?
NM - As you can imagine every individual young player will engage with school in different ways. Some are very motivated and enjoy school and some will be less so. However, my experience with Boclair Academy and other performance schools is that a football programme that is embedded into the school curriculum works really well from the football and education perspectives.
Our young players are very motivated, committed and disciplined towards their football and these attributes can also be encouraged and transferred towards their school work. However, there are some young people who will struggle in school and will need more support. And this is where a relationship with the school and the Rangers staff becomes vitally important. Working together with the school staff and parents and a consistent supportive message can be really beneficial for young people in their school journey.
So in answer to your question for some players it is easy to support them in their academic studies but for others I wouldn’t suggest it’s more difficult, it just requires more time and more support to help them achieve their goals. I have certainly found in my experience with the power of football and a close relationship with schools and parents certainly helps young people get the best from their school experience.
Q – James Black - GM: What are the main differences between your new and previous role?
GM – I won’t be responsible for one team as I was last year, I’ll have responsibility for the development of all of them, which is quite daunting but exciting at the same time.
Q – Every Other Saturday – How have the youth teams prepared differently this preseason compared to previous years, given that they've had a much longer break than usual?
GM – It’s been really difficult for the players to retain an elite level of fitness so we will be a lot more patient in our ‘ramp up’ as we want to ensure that they’re being extended at appropriate and safe times.
NM - I think the biggest difference for this pre-season is that the players have been given a lot of individual responsibility for their own preparation. Because of the pandemic they could not come to the training ground and they could not train in groups, so with the excellent support of our sport science team, the players have been given individual training programmes that was shared with them on Instagram. We use the Strava app to help record their activity and to give feedback on their performance.
There has also been individual technical training programmes for our players and interactive sessions where they received feedback from coaches. There have also been tactical webinars which has helped us continue their education and development on that side of the game. We are very hopeful that when the players return to the training ground they will be ready to hit the grass running and will actually have benefited from the lockdown period rather than have any detrimental effect.
Q – Stevie Connery - Who is the next big player to come through the academy and become a Rangers hero to us fans?
GM – A few have come back and been training with the first team which has been great for them. It could be one of a few who have done well, as the likes of Nathan Patterson and Jamie Barjonas have done recently, but we all know that they need to continue impressing the first-team staff on a daily basis if they are going to make that break through.
NM - I always find it difficult to name players who might be the next big star as they are all in different parts of their journey with so many experiences still to come. However, there will be players who are familiar to fans at the moment that I would suggest they certainly keep an eye on in the coming years – Nathan Patterson obviously, Lewis Mayo, Charlie Lindsay and Leon King are all names that will be familiar to the fans. However our B team and under 18 team are full of players who have real potential and that’s why they are at Rangers Football Club.
Any of those players can come through and I have seen it throughout my career when players towards their late teens improve dramatically and take the opportunities that are provided to them with both hands and I would certainly see some of our players coming through like this. I would urge Rangers fans to follow our young players progress on our website or come to the training ground when games (and supporters) are allowed to return.
Q – Topsy Turvy - For GM - was there any particular void that your new role will fill and what will be the key aspects of your new role?
GM – We were missing a dedicated Head of Coaching, which is a mandatory position in EPPP Academies in England, so I’ll be fulfilling that role alongside some other roles that we think are necessary to accelerate our programme.
Q – Topsy Turvy - For NM - with regards to combining football and education at Boclair within the academy, how has the success of this been measured over the last few years regarding education? Do you have any comparison on exam pass rates compared to non Boclair attendees?
NM – The education provision at Rangers is very extensive and does not just include Boclair Academy. The success of our education programme is measured by successful destinations either with ourselves or with others and also exam results. Our exam pass rates over the last three years have been well above the national average for Nat 5’s and higher by our players either at Boclair or other educational institutions.
We also have players studying on a part-time basis higher education awards and in some cases even at degree level and we see this is a measure of success not only for those individuals but also for our programme and the support that we provide. We obviously work very closely with Boclair as our educational partner but also all the other secondary schools and primary schools that our players go to. As an example last year we introduced a Nat 4 and Nat 5 award which our players can achieve during their day release programme at the training ground and this was in partnership with New College Lanarkshire.
We also provide tutorials at the training ground after school and this is available for any of our young players and not just Boclair pupils, and we feel this additional support has been very helpful for all our young people.
Q – Topsy Turvy - For GM - Does your new role remove you from direct player interaction or will you still be involved with them day to day and on match days?
GM – I’ll still be interacting with them on a daily basis.
Q – Topsy Turvy – For GM - Will you be advising coaching staff on overall OR individual coaching methods and player development? Also will you influence team selections or is this left to the coaches?
GM – One of my roles will be managing the development of the coaches as well as the players, so I’ll have an overview of all technical aspects of football development. Team selection will be left to the coaches but I will be there to ask questions as to the selection and be prepared to challenge the coaches if we think that certain aspects of development need more consideration.
Tom - Hi Neil. How important is it for you to coordinate with a young player’s school & how helpful has the partnership with schools of excellence like Boclair Academy been?
NM - Hi Tom, many thanks for your question. It is vitally important for us at the academy to liaise and coordinate with our players schools. It is a fact of all academies that it is a very small number of players that will make a professional living out of the game and therefore, academic work is so important for our young people.
As a general rule of thumb if there is ever a clash between football and school we would try and make sure that school is given the priority. This is even more important during exam years where players need to have more time for study and preparation for exams and it is something that we try to do in the academy every year.
Our partnership with Boclair Academy and our continuing relationship with all our school partners has been extremely helpful for the academy in understanding the schools requirements and how best we can support our players. In turn, it also helps the schools understand our priorities and the school has been extremely helpful in assisting Rangers, and the players, balance their commitments between school and football. I strongly feel in the last 10 years the partnerships between football clubs and schools has been a real strength in youth development and has proven that you can be both successful in football and education and it is something that we strive for every day in our work at the academy and with her partner schools.
Q - Tom – Hi Graeme. Rolling back to your playing days and winning the Kirin Cup with Scotland. What was your first and most lasting impressions of Walter Smith who was Scotland boss at the time?
GM – My first impression of Walter was the presence of him when you met him for the 1st time, the way he held the attention of the players and staff so easily. Meeting him since I’ve been struck by how open and easy to talk to he is.
Q - Colin - Graeme: What motivates you at the start of each season? What are you looking forward to this season?
GM – I’m motivated by loads of things each season but I think that this season I will mainly be looking forward to getting back on the grass and working with the players as we try to safely return to training.
Q - Neil - In terms of youth education. How do you feel it has progressed in recent years? And do you feel off-field education helps players on the field? NM - Hi Colin, thanks for the very interesting question. I feel the off field education that has been provided by Rangers to the young players has been a fantastic addition to the development of our youngsters. I sometimes feel that we underestimate the knowledge that our young players have, use of playing computer games, YouTube and Internet research. This was clearly seen over the lockdown period when we did our tactical webinars for our young players and the knowledge that they showed and shared with us was fantastic and is an indication of their ability to understand and in turn use on the pitch. We are lucky to have so much expertise in the academy from the likes of our analysis department, sport science department, medical department and of course the coaches that we can provide an extensive range of education programmes for our players.
I think in recent years the off field provision has really increased and improved with the use of social media, technology and encouraging young players to take responsibility for parts of their own program. We use Instagram to communicate and share programmes with the players and we also use an online system that our players can tap into to see analysis of their games, match videos and other resources that they can use to develop their game. Of course the proof of the pudding is when we come to games and I have certainly seen young players demonstrating their knowledge by producing movements and skills in the game that they have learnt off the pitch. Their decision-making is influenced by the game analysis, their fitness is influenced by their knowledge of the body and diet, their mental skills are influenced by our psychology program and these are just some small examples of how our of field development program can help support, improve and develop the young players’ performances.
Q – Andy – During lockdown, how did you guys help the Academy players to stay positive and motivated?
GM – I have to say our staff have been unbelievably positive in finding solutions to keeping our young players engaged – from online masterclasses with the likes of Ally McCoist to interactive sessions with their team mates – the staff have really delivered an outstanding programme to the players. NM – Hi Andy, your question was one of the questions we asked ourselves right at the beginning of lockdown. Our young players are motivated by playing football, by being with their friends and by practising and getting better. Obviously many of these things cannot be done in lockdown particularly not in groups. What we tried to do was to continue to have a relationship with our young players through phone calls, zoom meetings, webinars etc. This really helped us to know how the boys and girls were feeling and of course we had our Player Care Team on hand to support anybody who felt they needed extra help.
However, the remote learning program that we put together was challenging and competitive for our players and this certainly helped them to be motivated and to stay positive. We also found the families to be very helpful in this and they helped to encourage the boys and girls during this time as well. I also think that the group zoom meetings and webinars were very helpful for the boys and girls to talk with her friends in a group and to feel less isolated and I think this helped over the long period of time of lockdown. Another key component of our remote learning program was the introduction of master classes which everybody, including the parents found really motivating and exciting. Particularly to have Jermaine Defoe, Steven Davis, Filip Helander, Gary McAllister and Ally McCoist host webinar meetings on a regular basis was fantastic for our young players and certainly gave them extra encouragement during this difficult time.
Q – Robert Ryan - How important to you is it/are the youth teams playing the same systems as the first team? or not so much ? Do you use different systems or a mixture of the two?
NM – Hi Robert, your question is a question that many academies wrestle with across the game. At Rangers it is clear that our B team needs to align closely with the first team style of play and system as the players will need to be comfortable and knowledgeable on the first teams requirements.
However, in the younger age groups our Academy has a clear style of play that is based on development and we are clear on how we want to play the game, as we feel this is the best way in which to develop individual players. With a consistent style of play throughout the academy we feel this will allow consistent coaching of key concepts across the age groups.
If you watch a Rangers team at any age you should see similarities in how we play, how’s the players move in relation to each other and a clear Rangers style of play. However, depending on what we want to teach at certain developmental stages we may experiment with a different style to ensure that we get the learning outcome that we are after. This is only done on occasion as we feel strongly that the consistent style of play is the best way to develop players.
GM – As the young players start their journey we want encourage development of fundamental skills and ensuring that they have fun when they get here. As we progress further through the academy there will be a greater emphasis on tactical development. We have a few things up our sleeves for this season that the players don’t even know about yet! As they reach the final part of the academy it then becomes more important that they align more closely with the 1st team in terms of shape.
Q – Douglas. Hi all, are you able to tell us more about the additional layer that has added to the academy youth programme that Graeme shall oversee for your very best players and how you feel this shall benefit those players selected?
GM – Certainly. It means that I’ll be able to take a longer term, more strategic view of our player development model, ensuring that we can individualise player development to a far greater degree. It could be as simple as detailing a certain player’s ‘game within the game’ which means they’ll get far greater learning opportunities.
NM – The additional layer will allow Graeme to coordinate specific individual learning programmes for these players. It will be a very forensic approach utilising all our expertise in the Academy to contribute to the development plans. Using this multi-disciplinary model will require close monitoring and management to ensure the players get the full benefit and Graeme will be ideally placed to run and oversee this development.