The Coaches Association was born when I started my pastoral work as a priest . I always looked at the Coach as a priest or educator who has the welfare of a group of people left in his care. The Coach like the priest, has a special call to serve those who are entrusted in his care . He is there to help them find themselves, educate them to life and develop their God given talents.
I am pleased to remember that those first courses in Football Coaching that the late Mr. Joe Griffiths started in Malta and to which I have been privileged to be part are to day much longer, deeper and more structural than those that we attended or organized ourselves at the beginning of the Malta Football Coaches Association. To day, coaches need to be more prepared in Psychology, physiotherapy, biology, nutrition etc. besides technical skills and tactical knowledge, A coach needs to build up his personality to be able to communicate to others with conviction the passion that he has for the game. A minimum preparation to become a priest needs a seven or eight year course and when you then plunge yourself in the ministry, the grace of God will help you acquire the experience that is so much needed in all walks of life.
Experience too maketh a good coach. We learn through mistakes and who is that Coach who never made mistakes!. Today , a coach is the scapegoat of any defeat of a team and he is salaciously paid to suffer that humiliation. Consistent to the idea that a Coach is first and foremost an educator in life, the first people I approached when in the early seventies I founded the Educational Sports Centre were PE teachers with hardly any coaching experience, except for a few.
Those were the days when the passion for football and using it as a tool to educate young children for life produced some of our best footballers for our local game in the eighties. To day I feel also proud to remember that the seed planted at Marsa in those years , inspite of so many difficulties, has blosssomed in the opening of the School of football “Inhobb il-futbol” at Ta Qali Technical Centre , in the Foundation of the Youth FA. and in the present fifty nurseries that take part in the Youth FA programme and competitions. I am pleased too to remember here the early Coaching Courses held at the MFA technical Centre with the help of the Coaches Association which produced most of the local Coaches. Now with the help of Uefa and Fifa these have continued to improve further.
Fifty years of an association , like that of a Priest is a life time of service to others. May the all the Coaches members of this association remain faithful to this call and may I wish long life to the Association. Take this as a call to serve and you will never regret it.
God bless you all.
Fr. Hilary
President Youth Football Assocation
