THE CANADIAN PRESS
Stephen Hart’s first course of action as the Canadian Soccer Association’s new technical director is to tour the country, meet with various coaches and officials, and find out what their various needs are.
The native of Trinidad and Tobago has coached Canada’s national development, youth and senior teams and takes over responsibility for grooming players 20 and under with no shortage of ideas of what needs to be done to improve the calibre of talent in the pipeline.
What he doesn’t want to do is force feed a one-size-fits-all plan to provincial associations whose priorities can be as divergent as the country is big.
"Right now we’ve got to put some sort of structure in place that is agreed upon by all parties and then slowly start building upon that," Hart said Thursday during a conference call announcing his appointment.
"There was some good work done by (former national men’s team coach) Holger Osieck in the past and he came with some ideas, albeit he wasn’t here that long. With the lack of an infrastructure, he probably found it difficult to work in because of the size of the country and basically everybody doing their own little thing.
"Let’s be honest, what may be a necessity for Newfoundland that’s probably under ice for eight months of the year may not be the same for Vancouver. So yes, you have a general plan of approach, but it’s also got to be flexible and workable in all the provinces."
That outlook should help the 48-year-old Hart unite the notoriously fractious provincial associations under a series of priorities he would like them to embrace. So should his resume, as the former T&T international and technical director for Nova Scotia Soccer has experience at all levels of the game, and will continue in his role as assistant coach with the national men’s team.
He also earned high praise from players when he served as interim coach of the men’s team during the CONCACAF Gold Cup last summer, when Canada lost in the semifinals.
"It was a unanimous decision by the search committee to choose Stephen Hart," said acting CSA president and board chair Dominic Maestracci, who added that there were 15 applications, six from outside Canada, for the job.
One of Hart’s priorities as technical director is for more emphasis on ensuring young players come up the ranks with improved technical skills. Another is having more uniform coaching practises across the country.
The ultimate idea is to have a system that focuses more on individual player development at younger ages so those who advance to the elite levels of the game arrive with more a refined skill-set.
"Every coach knows that in order to be successful or have good teams you need technical players," said Hart. "Technically we have to improve and in order to do that, we have to target the players at younger ages, their technique, their co-ordination and make sure we have the more technical-oriented coaches working right through the system."
.Hart says many Canadian coaches have talked to him about team building and, while he feels that’s important, he believes the development of players needs to be the ultimate goal. He points to the national under-17 team that played in the World Cup in 1995 as an example of his rationale.
"Today only one player from that squad is playing at a professional level and is eligible for our World Cup team selection," Hart said. "So that might have been a good team, (but) individual-wise we really gained very little from it.
"The present under-23 team has eight graduates from the under-17 program. It would have had more had the clubs agreed, and we have some 17 players in professional environments in Europe alone from the under-17 programs of the past. So you’ve got to weigh if that’s more successful than actually going to a competition and winning a couple of games."
In world soccer, Hart points out, clubs are responsible for producing players while the national associations lay down guidelines, train coaches and run the national teams. Without a national league in Canada, other methods have to be found to groom elite players, a point he plans to stress during his meetings with soccer officials across the country.
"In the past I’ve had a pretty good working relationship with almost everyone and now that I’m in this position that might change," he said. "We are all supposed to be working toward the eventual production of players to play at the highest level and at the grass-roots level."
While Hart’s responsibility rests with developing young players, he understands that his work will ultimately affect the talent pool for the men’s national team and efforts to qualify for the World Cup. That’s why he wants to focus on the technical skill of players rather than team systems.
"Our priority is to create a sort of soccer education to develop as well-rounded a player as possible," he said. "Whatever style the senior national team coach wants to play, then they should have as big a base as possible to select from of players that know how to play."