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In the latest edition of the world’s leading football publication, FourFourTwo magazine, Liverpool & England striker, Daniel Sturridge (see below image), explains how the Coerver® Coaching programme helped him to develop his technical skills as a young player.
The twenty four year old Birmingham born forward, has had a fantastic season to date for Liverpool and England and is currently the second top goal scorer in the Barclays Premier League with 16 goals, which also makes him the highest scoring English player in the league.
The below extract is taken from an interview from the March 2014 edition of the magazine within the Performance section titled “Daniel Sturridge Masterclass – Run Rings Around The Opposition”.
Sturridge explains “My dad made me watch old Betamax video tapes that focused on skill and technique.
It involved a Dutch coach called Wiel Coerver. He was in charge of Feyenoord in the 1970’s and he created the Coerver Coaching technique”.
“In terms of dribbling, it focused on mis-direction, so the defender moved one way and you would go the other. its things like the Matthews move, the Rivelino move and the Maradona move, I used to practice it all the time in the front garden”.
Sturridge goes on to explain the importance that he places on working hard to continually develop his skills and said “If you want to be a great dribbler, or great at any aspect of the game, you have to work hard.
It doesn’t just happen overnight, you have to work at it and train hard. Even when I was six years old playing at Cadbury Athletic, the coach worked me on my skills”.
“I still do that to this day, I want to develop every part of my game. It’s important to realise you can always get better. You should never feel you are the finished article, because that is a backwards step”.
Liverpool manager, Brendan Rogers (see below image with Daniel Sturridge with the Barclays Premier League Manager/Player of the month awards for August 2013) has been delighted with the development made by Sturridge this season and said “Daniel’s form has been terrific, he has a natural instinct for the goal. I’ve seen that in him since he was a young player. He is outstanding in one v one situations, and he’s up there with Luis Suarez as the best finisher in the league”.
Coerver® UK Director Scott Wright said “It is fantastic to hear a current top player such as Daniel Sturridge talking so positively about how Coerver training helped him to develop as a young player. Having listened to Daniel’s comments about his early development and then observing him in action now, it is clear to see that he is very proficient in many of the technical skills that we focus on within the Coerver programme”.
“Although he seems to prefer his left foot, Daniel is very able on his right side too. Having the ability to use both feet is a key attribute in the modern game and gives you many more options in game play which has been highlighted by the many different types of goals he has scored this season”.
“This is certainly a problem area for English players and can only be achieved through thousands of hours of focused repetition, working your right and left foot equally. This is something that we are very focused on when working with young players, especially in the “golden” development years between U7-U12″.
“It is clear from Daniel’s own experience as a young player that he has gone through that development process and is now reaping the benefits of the technical foundation he has worked hard to develop since an early age”.
“He is also fantastic at manipulating the ball and his excellence in 1 v 1 situations was highlighted as a key attribute by Brendan Rogers. Both are fundamental development priorities within the Coerver programme and when you add his athletic ability and his finishing prowess, he has all of the attributes to get to the very top of the game”.
“He has many years of development and improvement ahead of him which bodes well for Liverpool and England and he is one of the few current English players that can perform these skills effectively in the game with both feet, at speed, under pressure and often in tight spaces. With teams being so organised now, having individual players that can create something for themselves out of nothing is vital”.
“Daniel definitely has that in his locker and I hope he gets the chance to showcase his obvious talent for England during this Summer’s World Cup in Brazil”.
“I also particularly like his comments on working hard with the ball and never being satisfied with your current level of ability. No matter the level you are at, you can always improve. That is the exact focus and mind-set that we try to instil in the young players that come to us at Coerver and added with hard work and dedication, the sky really is the limit, both on and off the pitch as Daniel has proved”.
“He is certainly a great role model for all young players to follow and I’m delighted that he feels Coerver training has been beneficial to his development”.
You can read the full Daniel Sturridge interview in the March 2014 edition of FourFourTwo magazine.
