Our Great Coach on this episode is Danny Kerry.
Danny is an English international field hockey coach
Danny became the head coach of the Great Britain women's national field hockey team in 2003, eventually leading them to a Bronze medal at the 2012 Olympics, a 2015 EuroHockey Championship and a Gold medal at the 2016 Rio Olympics.
In 2016 he awarded the FIH Coach of the Year, and in 2017 received an MBE from the Queen for his services to sport.
In 2018, he was appointed as the head coach of the Mens side, and led them their first ever FIH Hockey Pro League Grand Final in 2019.
Danny is a coach whose success has been built on his ability to self-reflect, learn and evolve. His story contains several pronounced inflection points and in this interview he discusses both in detail.
His style is intense, and couples both the science of physical and mental development with a player-first philosophy that places the individual and their unique needs ahead of team development.
His also innovative and not afraid to try and fail to find a way to step change performance.
Some of the many highlights in this interview include:
- How he focuses on density of decision making in training to help the team regulate their emotional response in games.
- The process his athletes go through to raise their self-awareness and discover their own sense of purpose. And how this in turn leads to greater mutual understanding between the players and staff,
- And how helping athletes deal with self doubt or their inner critic is an under reported aspect of the role of the Head Coach.
This was a deep and insightful conversation, and I hope you enjoy it as I did.
If you would like to send us any feedback or if you know a great coach, who has a unique story to share, then we would love to hear from you, please contact us at paul@thegreatcoachespodcast.com or contact us through our website thegreatcoachespodcast.com
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