Owen Slot talks to former England coach Clive Woodward about the dearth of top class coaches in Britain in The Times.
"Great Britain may have soared in the medals table at the Beijing Olympics two years ago, but Sir Clive Woodward believes that the team had the potential to rise higher. He says that there were at least six sports in which their athletes could have won medals if their coaching had been at a world-class level.
"Woodward, the performance director of the British Olympic Association (BOA), is not dismissive of the coaches, but is highly critical of the system. “Our best coaches are totally unsung heroes,” he says. But he also believes that there are not enough of them and that the structures to produce them are hopelessly inadequate — and that someone needs to help them.
“I passionately believe that you cannot win a gold medal unless you have a world-class athlete and a world-class coach,” he says. “This country is developing bucket-loads of talent. But are we developing enough world-class coaches? I don’t think we are."
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