Wesley Gullin: 'I try to bring fun'

SCW: How do you go about creating a space where it can be fun but there are also boundaries and people know the right behaviours. How do you strike that balance?

WG: "I’ve always used senior players. In any squad, you can quite quickly identify players that have got really high standards. 

"Something I’ve always liked doing is making an example of those players to say, ’This is what I really value in a player’, in terms of good leadership and setting a good example for younger players. 

“Having those members in your squad, quickly identifying them and drawing on that helps set an example for the rest of the squad. And I think, quite quickly, the squad can see what a coach wants from them.

“The girls here are having great fun. I look over and there’s massive smiles on their faces. In the past, you would have struggled with attendances for that age group - now I look over and there are 20 of them every session, because they want to be there. They love the environment that’s been created."

SCW: In terms of your sessions, what does preparation, planning, delivery and reflection look like? How forward-looking are you and the ETCs in terms of planning?

WG: "It’s very structured. The centre leads give us the freedom to plan the session as we want to, within that England DNA and the structure they want us to get across. 

"There’s enough freedom there for you to be creative. Every squad will be different and have different needs, so there’s enough freedom there to do that. 

“But I think the model needs to prepare players for that next stage of the journey. They need to know how an England team presses. Then within pressing - whether it’s a low block, a mid-block, a high press - they need to know how to do that, and how it relates to their specific position.

“There’s a great level of structure but, like I say, there is that freedom for coaches to be creative, and to give their squad what they need.

"It might be that they work on that specific pressing pattern for a few weeks, because that’s what their squad needs."

SCW: There is an ongoing effort to improve kids’ experience of football, whether they ’make it’ or don’t. How important is that to you and your coaches? How do you make sure that is present in everything you do?

WG: "Player welfare is the top priority for all the coaches in the programme. It’s just so visible that everybody cares about those players.

"Quite a lot of these girls are going into senior football at a really high level..."

"It goes back to selection, in terms of who they bring in as coaches and even who they have as centre leads.

"They’ve got a massive responsibility to get these players ready for senior football. That is hard enough anyway, coming out of U16s football - quite a lot of these girls are going into senior football at a really high level. They’re going into National League [third-tier], Championship [second-tier] or WSL [top-flight] football. It’s a big jump. 

“Those coaches have got a really tough job to get across to them just how hard that will be, not just physically and technically, but emotionally as well. It’s quite a strain. 

"A lot of players now are getting scholarships in America. It’s such a brave move for a 16-year-old to think, ’I want to go to America on my own and play football out there’.

"Kira Hockley and Poppy Smith are players I’ve coached who have been out to America and played football on a scholarship.

“These are really talented girls that have been allowed to develop that bravery and strength of character to do these amazing things. Big credit to them as individuals.

"But the coaches in these programmes have got to take some, because they’ve had that massive responsibility to develop those players and get them ready for it."