Anckaitis Attends Symposium in Portugal
While many spent their spring break relaxing away from campus, Swarthmore women's soccer coach Todd Anckaitis spent his time working overseas gaining exposure to the highest levels of training and play for his sport. From March 7 to March 16, he attended a coaching symposium in the Algarve region of Portugal with 25 other coaches from around the United States. Led by former US National Team coach and current Team Leader with the US Olympic Committee, April Heinrichs, the coaches were privy to National Team training and competitions in preparation for the 2007 World Cup.
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| Current USA head coach Greg Ryan talking to a collection of coaches. |
"It was an amazing experience," Anckaitis said, "The access we had to the highest level of the game from all over the world was phenomenal. We listened to over 10 current or former National Team coaches present just to our group of 25 coaches everything from tactics to psychology to philosophy of their teams, programs, and countries. On top of that we got to watch it in training and then observe the effects on game day. The eight international matches we got to see would have been incredible by themselves but to pair the training and active learning environment along with it would be really hard to duplicate. For example we stood in a fifteen-yard space between fields that had the German National Team training on one side and the French and Chinese National teams sharing a field on the other side. Balls (not many mind you) were flying over our heads. There is no doubt I'm a better coach for having done it."
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| Members of the US national team warm up before practice. |
The symposium started with a convening of the small group in Portugal followed immediately by matches in the Algarve Cup. Typically days involved either watching several national teams training or games with on field lectures from coaches. Evenings included classroom presentations by some of the country's best including Heinrichs, Colleen Hacker (US Women's National Team sports psychologist), and Mary Harvey (Director of Soccer Development for FIFA).
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| Ancakitis with US National Team sports psychologist Colleen Hacker. |
Topics in the formal presentations ranged from systems of play to dealing with the difficult player to psychological skills training. "It was an open forum with the presenters encouraging discussion both inside and outside of the classroom. There was always a discussion happening on the vans, during meals, at halftime of the games and during training among all the coaches in attendance. The first morning I sat down to breakfast at a table for four. I came back from the buffet and I was joined by April and a U-17 National Team coach from the Czech Republic. We discussed advantages of DIII over DI for most athletes, backs organizing in a 4-3-3, and how the Czech's develop their female players. It was surreal," said Anckaitis.
Some of Anckaitis's other unique professional development and education includes observing the U-20 National Team training camp last spring down in Texas and receiving his master of science from Smith College in Northampton, Mass. in 2003 whose program was designed to develop coaches of women's collegiate sports.
Editor's Note: The US women's national team won the Algarve Cup with a 2-0 victory over Denmark in the finals and repositioned themselves as the #1 ranked team in the world after a three-year hiatus. To watch video from the 2007 Algarve Cup go to http://www.ussoccer.com/common/stContent.jsp_26-2007AlgarveCup.html