The One Show recently featured England Football Learning, The FA’s education arm promoting their aim to increase the number and diversity of coaches in line with the increase of women and girls [from all backgrounds] playing football, through their online Playmaker coaching programmes.
The show shone a spotlight on Riz Burhani, who was encouraged to get involved with coaching by members of her son’s club, who rightly felt that she had the potential to contribute hugely to the club. You can catch the programme on BBC iPlayer – The One Show – 25/04/2023 – the feature is the first one on the show.
A lifelong Aston Villa fan, in 2021 Riz did the online coaching course Playmaker which is run by The FA’s education arm England Football Learning and sponsored by EE.
Riz currently coaches a mixed team in the week, under-13s side Birmingham Impact FC, and having dreamed of playing as a child now wants to progress as far as she can with coaching qualifications.
Riz said: “With Birmingham Impact I had an opportunity to be a parent support from the sidelines. Unfortunately our coach at the time started getting unwell so I had an urgency to step up. I thought if I wanted to do coaching, I wanted to give justice to the children and do it properly. I wanted to be a qualified coach and really know what I was doing.
I found the EE Playmaker online when I was searching for football courses, I knew it was a stepping stone to doing my Level 1. Even though they’re football courses, they’ve made me think a lot more about communication, child psychology, how to deliver information so that it’s received well by the other person. I’ve had so much support from The FA, it’s made me a lot more ambitious.”
Playmaker by EE is a free completely online course, which can take between four and five hours to complete. You have up to a year to finish it, with the timescale in place to help people with busy family and work lives navigate other commitments.
The course itself covers all the basics of coaching plus how to structure sessions and make them fun.
Since 2021 there has been a 17% increase in the number of female players, with an ambition from The FA to see the number of female coaches increase too. Diversity amongst the playing population should be reflected amongst the coaching community, hence the importance of visibility around Riz’s journey into coaching.
To find out more, head to https://learn.englandfootball.com/courses/football/ee-playmaker
With thanks to the FA via MatchFit
