A new season brings with it new goals and aspirations and Head Coach Anthony Seibold is determined to make those aspirations a reality as the Rabbitohs return to training tomorrow.
‘Seibs’ has a strong background in academia (he holds a Masters in Education) and with that comes a strong approach to the processes behind high performance. In 2018 a new training philosophy is being put in place by Seibold – ‘tactical periodisation’.
“We’re going to do some things differently to what we’ve done in the past. We’re trying to merge the technical, physical and mental sides of the game in our training sessions and we do that through a process called tactical periodisation,” said Seibold.
Tactical periodisation is a concept that will be unfamiliar to most, but a concept that has existed for quite some time in the world of professional sport.
More commonly seen in soccer with coaches such as current Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho, more recently other codes have begun to adopt this approach, including the England Rugby Union team, which has seen the English national side produce impressive results over the last two years.
The idea of tactical periodisation is the process of organising both the system of attack and defence and being able to transition between both during a game.
To do this, the team focus on skills, fitness and tactical and mental awareness in each training session, which is carried out at an intensity greater than during matches, so that the players learn to be sharper and be able to react quicker at the crucial points in a game.
“Every day we train a specific parameter of the game. We don’t do any extra fitness. It’s all done within those training sessions,” said England Rugby Union coach Eddie Jones of his tactical periodisation approach.
During each training session players are tested on different aspects of the game, focusing on specifics demands of both the competition and the coach’s game model. The emphasis of this peculiar method is to make sure the team puts in the attention and effort an eighty minute game of footy requires.
“We know that the hard work begins on Wednesday but we’re really excited about the start of it and the start of a pretty exciting new journey for everyone involved,” said Seibold.
