Football, Running, Health and Fitness as well as many other sports!
The decision to sign up for the Virtual London Marathon was a little bit of a late one. The reason I decided to sign up was to test my fitness levels and really see where I was in terms of the 26.2 mile distance. Considering two marathons had been cancelled this year. The price to take part in this was a very low £20 and that included a medal and t-shirt!
Date: Sunday 4th October 2020
Continue reading “Running: Virtual London Marathon 2020”
Having taken part in my first Sunderland City Half Marathon in 2017 I jumped at the opportunity to apply to become an Ambassador for the race.
Continue reading “EOTN Ambassador – Sunderland Half Marathon”
On Friday 29th April it was announced who had been successful in the new restructure to the Elite girls game. Replacing the Centre of Excellence set up is the new Regional Talent Clubs. The main difference is that now it is tiered (very much like the boys Academy system).
The license is subject to Sport England and The FA Funding as well as constantly meeting the criteria which is set.
It is very exciting to see how this will aid the development of Girls football further as the restructure and changes have changed the age groups back to U10s, U12s, U14s and U16s.
It is brilliant to see the North East have a Talent Club in each Tier, as well as three Clubs from the old North East regional in tier 1!
Sunderland were looking to bounce back after the 8-0 hammering by Southampton the week before, playing Arsenal was never going to be an easy task for the black cats. Arsenal could claim to be missing a massive nine first team players, but the starting line up was still very strong especially with Alexis Sanchez leading the line for the gunners.
Only the second game of the Premiership season saw the Wear/Tyne Derby taking place. With Sunderland bringing in 10 new players and more players leaving St James Park than we have brought in, it was always going to be a strange game to guess the result of. Pre-match all kind of facts and stats were flying around including that we had scored against the Mackem’s the previous 22 games, and let’s face it they don’t manage to beat us very often. They seem to just crumble under the pressure, therefore we have a very good record at the Stadium of Light.
First season back into Premier League (where we belong, I must add) and obviously at the start of the season we were very much tipped to go straight back down. We did not really make many signings or at least proven in the Premiership players. We brought in James Perch who became quite the scapegoat amongst the fans. Dan Gosling on a free transfer, but would be out until at least Christmas due to injury. Sol Campbell who was already clearly past his best, and would just cost us money. But then an exciting new player would be signed on loan (but then permanent in January) Hatem Ben Arfa who looked fantastic but suffered a horrible injury when he had his leg broken after a Nigel de Jong tackle. So those being the new players brought in not really much was placed on them. We had to rely on the team who done so well making the Championship look easy the year before. Not forgetting of course our signing and possibly player of the season Cheik Tiote.
I graduated from the University of Sunderland in 2008 with a degree BSc(hons) Sport and Exercise Sciences. I have always played football from a young age, been a Newcastle United season ticket holder for 6 seasons now, sometimes attend Sunderland games and South Shields FC in the Northern League.
I began my coaching journey at the end of 2005 when I started my Level 1 football coaching course, finishing it early in 2006. I then started coaching an under 9 boys team.
In the summer of 2007 I went out to Greece for 10 weeks as a football coach at a holiday resort.
In 2007/2008 I also done some coaching for girls teams of all different ages, as the club I was with at the time had a very good set up for girls teams.
In 2008 after graduating I started the Level 2 football coaching course, moving to a different level in coaching. Learning different ways to put everything across to players.
In March 2009 I headed out to New Jersey in the USA working for The Sports Factory/TSF Academy. I was out there for 5 and a half months before returning to England. I was working with girls teams of all ages.
Upon returning to England I passed me Level 2 assessment and began Level 3/UEFA B course in 2010. I am currently completing all the pack work in a build up to getting my final assessment.
This blog will focus on the world of football coaching.
It’s been a long time since Newcastle and Sunderland both had player’s in the England squad let alone team. But that changed this week when Andy Carroll and Jordan Henderson both were called up to the full squad for the first time. They have both represented their country at youth levels and have had brilliant starts to the premiership season being key players for their respected hometown clubs.
Continue reading “Henderson and Carroll doing the North East Proud!”
Sunderland went to Stamford Bridge yesterday with everything against them, no team had even scored at there this season, the last two games they played seen them conceded 13 goals, no one gave them a chance. Even die-hard Sunderland fans would have just hoped for a draw and taken it before the game kicked off. But as soon as the game kicked off it was all Sunderland, yes that’s right they really did take it to Chelsea and continued to do so throughout the game. I even have to give credit to Steve Bruce for actually having a positive approach to a game for a change, he’s usually so negative its unreal! But fair play to the team he set out yesterday, it worked very well for them.
Continue reading “Why Sunderland beating Chelsea is great for football!”
I spent the whole weekend in the build up to the Derby game feeling both nervous and excited. In all honesty I thought the game would be a draw after a very close and tight affair – but that could not be further from what happened! The lads went goal crazy and outplayed Sunderland all over the pitch!
