IN my house, I have a large cupboard designated to housing all my coaching materials. From coaching books, I have picked up or purchased over the years, to coaching notes, sessions andor drills I have scribbled down throughout my coaching tenure, they are all held within this one cupboard.

Books from coaches such as basketball coach John Wooden, English rugby winning manager Sir Clive Woodward, Tim Grover, Steve Hansen, Alex Ferguson, Bill Belichick and many more. My collection includes a whole multitude of sports like GAA, soccer, rugby, basketball, tennis, golf, athletics and martial arts. I even have several articles about how the acrobats of the Cirque de Soleil.

Last week I was looking for a book in the cupboard. I had a realization that it could do with a good organizing as it was in total disarray. Books and pages just put back into the cupboard without any real coordinated thought.

Sorting through the library of materials I came across a journal. I immediately knew what it was. It was an A4 faux leatherback that I used to record all of my goalkeeping drills into – ones that I picked up over the years and ones I have created myself as well as any variations that derived from other drills.

I knew it was in the cupboard, but it was something that I had not studied in over a year with my last entry being during lockdown when I had entered in a few drills to train break ball.

Looking through the journal I saw drills that I had not used in a while but are still very relevant to the position. I also saw drills that I am still using but without the variations I have since created and I also saw some drills that I had placed into the booked that I forgot were there and have never had the chance of using so was excited at the prospect of getting to finally try them out.

As I explored the journal it became clear to me that over the past 12 months or so, I had gained many more drills that could be added to my drill journal. There could be enough to finish the journal I found as well as filling the guts of a second one. It will be time-consuming filling them into the book but with Christmas coming up I will set aside some time to get a good start at transferring them from memory onto hard copy.

As a goalkeeper, and especially as a coach, it is vitally important that you retain a record of your training sessions and the drills that you use within them. When you are creating a drills journal it is important to give the drill a name that gives a brief description of what the drill is, write the purpose of the drill and what it aims to work on and if you break goalkeeping down into separate areas, like I do, you can code the drill into which area or areas it is relevant to.

By creating a drills journal like this it provides you, goalkeeper andor coach, a fantastic reference point when looking for inspiration when planning out training sessions throughout the season. It will also help you to decide what drills will be best for you to use when you pinpoint what areas of your goalkeeping performance you want to improve.

It is also good practice to record what the source of the drill is whether it be from an online source, visiting a goalkeeping coaching course or if it was a drill shown to you by a previous goalkeeping coach. This will give you another reference point to go and look for more drills when you hit periods of mental block.

I know from my own experience that when I was younger and even now to a certain extent, there are very few GAA resources in regard to goalkeeping, even though it is one of if not the most important positions on the field of play. In this regard, it will be important to adapt drills taken from other sports that have goalkeepers like soccer, and make them more relevant to Gaelic goalkeeping.

Having said that, one of the most important resources any goalkeeper can have is experience. Think of goalkeeping situations andor scenarios that you have either witnessed or have been involved with yourself and then recreate them on the training field by turning it into a drill, after which you can record it into your drill journal.

Alternatively, any experiences you have during the season either in training games or competitive matches, in the next training session turn it into a drill and record it into the journal as well.

As a goalkeeper or goalkeeping coach, no matter your age, you will have experienced or witness a good amount of goalkeeping scenarios, enough to begin creating your own drills journal. It is important to become a student of your craft if you are serious about improving your goalkeeping ability. Ink it, don’t think it and ‘Write It Down!’

Email: pmgoalkeeping@hotmail.com

Facebook: @MSoG11

Twitter: @MorSchGk