‘The time of their lives’: How coach Phil Hingston supports Academy players

In doing so, it shows the care and attention of Palace coaches like Phil Hingston, Under-12s Head Coach and Foundation Phase Lead. Hingston says his approach with hopeful young players it to help them have “the time of their lives” by playing football and growing with the club. He is one of a number of staff whose primary responsibility is to support young prospects develop on and off-pitch.

All young players encounter challenges along the path to becoming a professional footballer, be it educational, physical, mental, or social. Palace have implemented a structure to ensure that all the players' needs are cared for, addressed and worked on.

“Through MDTs (multi-disciplinary meetings) we try to ensure holistic development as well as football development,” explains Hingston. “On a weekly basis, with medical staff, player care staff, sport science staff, safeguarding staff, all of the coaches and head of the games programme, we will try and focus on 12, up to 15, players across Under-9s to Under-12s.

“Each person will attend the meeting with notes on three or four players, which could be anything from scheduling, education, or an injury. For example: in the first episode, where [Under-12 player] Bola has been getting a lot of knee pain. We find out how we can devise a plan for each individual.

“It’s not always about issues, it’s sometimes just notifying all members of staff in all departments on how well somebody’s doing – so when that member of staff bumps into the boy around the Training Ground then they’ve got some way of connecting with them.”

The multi-disciplinary approach towards player development is a key component of ensuring the club and individual both benefit in the best way possible on and off the pitch, especially in the younger age groups. This is often achieved through Individual Development Plans (IDP).

Hingston elaborates: “We talk a lot about individual player development as coaches… and as part of that we usually break it down into four corners: technical, tactical, psychological and social.

“For example, they could be an excellent finisher, so we do more repetitive finishing. They could be somebody who needs to improve on the one on one defending, so we do drills for that.

“[If] we’ve just given a boy the captaincy for the night in order to get him used to his voice and get used to communicating with people, so we’ll let him lead lots of the session and it’ll be player-led.

“Sometimes it’s a psych thing. They’re my favourite [situations], because you really see people’s character when they’re out of their comfort zone – not just adults but children as well. One of my favourite decisions is giving bad refereeing decisions away on purpose, or bad scoreline-keeping to test resilience and see how the boys deal with it.

“The IDP session is designed to make sure that each player is exposed to an area of their development during that session and to ensure they have a lot of ways of improving each aspect.

“We have to improve their super strengths as well. If he’s good at something and that’s what’s got him in the building then we need to make sure he continues enhancing that skill.”

From a first-team point of view, a lot of the focus and action takes place on the pitch and in training sessions, however through the ranks at youth level it is almost flipped on its head, with off-pitch aspects taking priority. Hingston explains:

“A lot of the work… apart from direct coaching, is off the pitch. The kids all come in at various age groups and they’re all good footballers. Ultimately, it’s making sure the environment is right for them, both on and off the pitch – probably more so off the pitch.

“If a kid comes in happy he’ll usually train well, so it’s about finding out how their day’s gone, what they need, have they eaten, have they travelled from far, how was school, et cetera. Sometimes you really need to have a look at the whole framework before even heading to the grass.

“It’s amazing the amount of stuff that goes on off the pitch. Last year I had a lad that got diagnosed with diabetes. We noticed that he was different, low in energy. We advised him to go to the hospital and he got diagnosed.

“He was in hospital for about two weeks and our staff were just so great, putting a plan together, visiting him in hospital, visiting him when we got home and just reassuring him that this wasn’t going to impact him being in the system.

“The first thing he said was: ‘I’m going to get released now,’ but that wasn’t the case. I remember going to his house and just reassuring him, seeing him, spending time with him and talking about everything that wasn’t football. That’s just one example.”

The idea of being released affects players throughout the ranks, from the Foundation Phase (Under 9s-12s) all the way through to the PDP (Professional Development Phase, Under-18s-21s) and beyond when players are full-time professionals.

Naturally it creates pressure, but the structure in place throughout the club is designed to ensure that’s managed: the developmental phase is designed to detract from the idea of being released or retained until it is absolutely necessary.

“When it comes to pressure, I think some of the boys feel most comfortable when they’re in the training sessions with a coach. I try not to talk to the boys about decisions. I’ll never really have a conversation with any of the boys saying: ‘Oh, a decision is coming up. How do you feel?’ Unless I can plainly see that it’s bothering them.

“I think the game brings its own pressures – you’ve got to perform, you’ve got other people on your team, expectations, win or lose, the opposition. There's pressure there, then you’ve got mum or your family watching, the drive in to the game where all you’re hearing is: ‘Make sure you do this, make sure you do that.’

“If you’re playing at a high level, you’ve probably got everyone at school either wanting to be your best mate, or being jealous of you…. For us at the club, as coaches, we’ve got to make sure we create a place where they don’t have to think about the pressure.

“A lot of people say: ‘Just let the boys play.’ Well actually, when they come to us, that’s what we try to do. The only expectation we have on them is to focus on themselves. Coaches would rarely talk about retain and release until the time it comes for retain and release. That’s just one part of a season which goes on for 10 months, so the last thing the player needs to be hearing is about retain and release for 10 months straight.

“They’ve got to enjoy the journey, and we just try and make sure that when they’re on the journey they have the best time of their lives – that’s the most important thing. Yes, there's a three or four week period in the year around being retained or released, similar to exam period in school, where it will be a bit intense, but it’s up to us to make sure the rest of it is the time of their lives.”

Football Dreams: The Academy, a documentary about the Palace Academy, airs from 21:00 on Thursdays in the UK only. Find out more here.