RHYS Sullivan, the new Plymouth Argyle community development officer for south east Cornwall, has set up a new initiative to meet the need for football coaching for children in the five to 12 years age bracket.
Sullivan, whose dad Phil and uncle Colin both played for Plymouth Argyle in the 1970s, and whose father was also manager of Liskeard Athletic, has launched turn up and play sessions at St Cleer Football Club on Saturday mornings, between 9am and 10am.
And even though they have only been going for a couple of weeks, they have already proved a resounding success, with more than 45 children attending.
‘Considering how bad the weather was, to get 48 children coming along for the first session was excellent and that was very pleasing,’ Sullivan told the Cornish Times.
‘We know there is a call for it and a need for it around the area. It is not like when I was younger. I used to do Saturday and Sunday mornings with my dad, Phil, when he was manager at Liskeard.
‘But things have just died away in recent years, and there doesn’t seem to be anything running, so that’s kind of the reason why I decided to do it really.
‘The coaches are myself and Jack Gaynor, who played for Polperro, who is a coaching apprentice at Argyle, and he assists me, and if the numbers keep going up, we will have to get some more coaches in as well.
‘We are holding the sessions at St Cleer Football Club. I know Jon Colenzo quite well, and I have spoken to him in the past, and now the two youth teams have merged to become St Cleer and Liskeard Youth, which used to be two separate teams.’
Sullivan explained that the aim was to benefit both the two local football clubs, as well as help Argyle find players of the future.
‘It is a two-way thing really. They are looking to try and get more players into their teams, and it looks like we should be able to help them with that with the numbers we are getting so far,’ he said.
‘But also, with me working for Argyle, we have a development centre that runs on Monday nights at Liskeard, which is the start of our pathway.
‘We are in the schools during the week, and the best players at the schools get invited to the development centre, and then if they do well there, they go to the Centre of Excellence, and if they do well there they go to the Argyle Academy, and if they get up to that, then they are looking at can they become a professional footballer?
‘I just want to try and get more people playing football, and being able to work with Liskeard makes that more possible.’
Sullivan added: ‘Steve Bishop runs an under-fives at St Cleer and that is quite popular as well, with around 25 players there, they have just started an under-sixes and then they are running all the way up to under-14 level, and hopefully those teams will then carry on up to under-16 level and then go into either the Liskeard or St Cleer senior teams.
‘At the moment it is just working with the younger ones, but they are struggling for under-14s at the moment, so if it all goes well, we might try and stretch it to a second hour and try and get an older group involved.’
As many sporting clubs are finding these days, it is becoming a struggle to get youngsters to carry on playing sport as they get older, with so many counter-attractions available as they progress through their teenage years.
‘Once they become teenagers then there are so many other things now to attract them, such as computers and that sort of thing, and there is a definitely a drop off once they go up to secondary school, which is on the to-do list for me to tackle,’ he said.
‘I have good relations with Roger Quaintance at Liskeard and Alan Yendell at Callington schools, so hopefully at some point I will speak to them and see if we can get something set up at the schools to try and get more players playing in that age group, but I have only just come back to this area after working away coaching in America for a few years. When this role came up I jumped at the opportunity to go back to Argyle.
‘There is lots to do and lots going on. There are some big teams in the area such as Liskeard, Saltash, Callington etc, but there doesn’t seem to be that much going on underneath for just people to come and play football.
‘Monday ‘Development’ sessions are at Lux Park, and at the moment they are by invite only, but we are trying to increase that because we want to try and get more people on the pathway to Argyle if they are good enough.
‘It doesn’t necessarily mean they are going to be a pro footballer, but they can get some good training and go from there.’
St Cleer chairman Jon Colenzo has welcomed the initiative set up by Sullivan, and is delighted with the turnout so far.
‘It is a great idea,’ he said. ‘With the amount of kids we have got coming to the sports field now, I know there is quite a long waiting list for kids wanting to join our teams, because, depending on what age groups they are in, it is different sized teams.
‘We have got a scenario, for example, with the under-13s where they played nine-a-side last year, so they only needed 12 players in a squad, whereas this year they have gone up to under-14s, and it is 11-a-side, and they are struggling with the bare 11 each week, because they had to turn players away last year and they have not come back this year.
‘With this Argyle Soccer School, it keeps the ones on the waiting list that maybe aren’t getting quite as much football involved as well. It is good to get kids in the community playing football again.’
He added: ‘The 14-year-olds age group is where they get to know girls, and have Saturday morning jobs, and they lose interest in football, so if you can keep them going through that to an older age, they want to play men’s football, and that then benefits the senior teams.’
The FA are also running an initiative at Liskeard on Mondays called he Wildcats, which is try to and get girls playing football, and Sullivan said: ‘We are trying to push this but we are struggling for numbers with that one, with about four a week turning up.’
Any girls aged five to 12 that want to play football can turn up to that one between 5pm and 6pm.
At February half term, Argyle are also running their roadshows.
There is one in Liskeard on a Thursday, but this time we are also doing part of the roadshow from 9am to noon for 3-5-year-olds, and that is the first time they are doing that.
‘Again we are trying to get younger ones in and playing, and it is half a day to come along and play, and play some games, with multi-skills and football,’ explained Sullivan. ‘We are also at Saltash, Bodmin and Torpoint that week.’
Argyle in the Community also offer birthday parties, and they are working in schools, teaching not just football but other sports as well.
More details on what Sullivan and the Football in the Community department do in south east Cornwall can be found on Facebook at Argyle Community Trust East Cornwall, Rhys Sullivan East Cornwall Coach for PAFC, and the website is www.argylecommunitytrust.co.uk.