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End of Season Review… why bother?

We think it is one of the most important checkpoints for teams wishing to develop and grow. Can it throw up some stuff we don’t want to hear yes for sure but more often than not there are nuggets and valuable lessons to be learned. It is also an opportunity to look at the things that went well so that they become enshrined in our process. All in all conducting one is easier than you think, here are 5 steps I use.

1. Review Your Goals and Achievements

I’m sure you had a set of clear goals at the start of the season that were tracked? It is important to assess where you got to with those goals, did we fall short, did we meet or over achieve? Our goals are like a compass and can keep us on track through out the year. It’s equally important to allow them to be adjusted through out the year. Will this be the same set of goals for next year? Hopefully they will evolve based on the player pool and the challenges ahead. A couple of points to consider:

League/Cup position and results. Did they meet expectations?
Playing styles; foundations. Did you have goals around your set piece?
Individual player development. Did they?

Be honest and open about what worked well and what didn’t. Ensure you highlight any concerns raised throughout the year, does the coaching style and depth need to evolve?

2. Team Culture

This is a big one from where I stand, getting the culture right will go a long way towards performance on the pitch. Feedback from players, coaching staff, management and other stakeholders is key here. A couple of considerations

Communication effectiveness – were we all on the same page?
Leadership dynamics – did we have the right selection in leadership groups and captains?
Were the pillars of our culture clearly lived and demonstrated by the whole group … not just the players?

We believe that as much as we plan our season from a technical perspective, we must plan for the culture we want to see, foster it and give it the fuel to grow.

3. On-Pitch Development

Evaluate how our on pitch development tracked throughout the season. How did it match back to our goals and targets, did our skill levels live up to scratch? Did our attack or defence evolve through out the season as we would have liked. How did we develop tactically, did we adjust our training schedule accordingly?

Analyse improvements in set piece, attack and defense strategies.
Review individual player skill development and positional effectiveness.
Assess whether training sessions effectively addressed any in-game issues that were repeated.

If we are working with the same core player pool for the coming season putting the effort into this step can really set ourselves for the future success.

4. Video Analysis

For us Video analysis forms one of the cornerstones of our team development. It is essential for objective assessment throughout the season and can help players and coaches to see where the focus should be. It is important to ensure the time we are putting into it is efficient and consistent and producing results. A couple of key questions:

Are we focused on the right areas of the game?
Does our play evolve based on the feedback being given?
Are we gathering the right amount of data for the right part of the season?

One way to get more buy-in from the team is to get different groups to present throughout the year. This spreads the load and enables more collaborative learning. We are a bit biased but RugbySmarts can definitely help in gathering efficient, targeted analysis.

5. Set Clear Actionable Objectives for Next Season

Establishing clear, actionable objectives for the coming season will help create a continuous learning environment. The more you can get others to contribute to the process the better the chances of success. Having this work done at the end of the current season will lighten the load and allow you to focus on tactical and skill elements when you get back on pitch.

Set clear, measurable goals and objectives based the information you’ve gathered
Ensure you plan for culture and any other off pitch activities for example; pre-season conditioning, skills acquisition and development.
Communicate, communicate, communicate!

Focused, data driven reviews can really help bring you to the next level.

So is the end of season review worth it? In our opinion yes for sure, it is tool for growth and can bring real clarity and focus when used in the right manner. Couple it with an award winning platform like RugbySmarts and you could be a long way towards achieving your goals for the coming season.

A couple of years back we wrote a blog post on end of season review from a video analysis perspective which you can read here some of our thought process has evolved and we hope we have incorporated that here.

We’d love to get your thoughts or indeed have a chat with you and see how RugbySmarts might help your development journey.