This weekend sees further moves towards the implementation of a revolutionary new coaching aid. Notational analysis provided by a specially designed computer programme will prove of great assistance to teams and coaches.
Eugene Young, well known from his involvement in the University of Ulster at Jordanstown, is Director of High Performance Planning in Gaelic football with the Northern Ireland Sports Institute. Together with a Scottish company called Elite Sports Analysis, he has helped devise the programme, which supplies data for post-match or real-time analysis.
"It works by connecting a lap-top computer to a digital camera and can be programmed to fetch whatever data a coach wants. If you want to look at the breaking ball or how many possessions get kicked away, the programme will do that. In real time, it can supply a coach with information during a match or at half-time.
"Managers on the sideline generally have someone to keep track of some of these things but the advantage of this is that it's comprehensive and can be downloaded onto disc or vhs."
In Scotland, when Craig Brown was manager of the national soccer team, Elite Sports Analysis provided him with such detailed data that he could show players in the dressing-room at half-time a video or dvd of the errors or successes of the first half.
"Within three hours of the end of a match you have a complete set of notation. You can call up all the free-kicks conceded and play them on the bus on the way home or show a player a tape of himself playing well and use it as a motivational tool."
At the weekend, Young will be taking a seminar to tutor coaches and GAA members with an interest in IT. "What I'm trying to establish is a support system for coaches. I know they have too much to do, so the idea is to set this up in order to provide information for the training environment."
Among other initiatives that Young has been involved in was the recent goalkeeping workshop for senior and under-21 goalkeepers under the supervision of former Ireland soccer goalkeeper Packie Bonner. "It was mostly drills and technique like blocking shots," according to Young, "but it was very successful."
Meanwhile, a football challenge between Dublin and Cork will take place on Saturday in Dunmanway at 7 p.m. in aid of the Aidan Con O'Sullivan trust fund. Tommy Lyons and Larry Tompkins will field full-strength teams in the final warm-up before their opening championship games against Wexford and Kerry respectively. Donations to the fund can be made to AIB Castletownbere, A/C 01211085, sort sode: 93 62 78.
Aidan Con O'Sullivan, a member of Adrigole GAA Football Club, was seriously injured while training on May 1st 2001 and has been undergoing treatment at the National Rehabilitation Centre in Dun Laoghaire. Aidan is confined to a wheelchair.
