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Chris Wilder and Graham Potter - Team talk

Audio described with transcript

Transcript

Chris Wilder, Sheffield United FC’s Manager 

I’ve had to manage different personalities right the way through my journey, as you can imagine from where I started but you know I think you go that, through when I was a player, when I was a young player at 16 starting off at Southampton.

So, as you can imagine the amount of players that I have come across from my playing career and then going into management when I was pretty young and being a player manager just after I finished my playing career - professionally - you’re in at the deep end so you have to manage different characters, you have to manage different situations and experiences that I’ve not encountered in over 20 years, I’ve had to deal with this year. 

So, you think about it and as always the key is you always try and get the best out of your player which I think, if you look at - I’ve managed to do over a period of time. 

Graham Potter, Head Coach for Brighton and Hove Albion FC 

Football you have to remember is a player ‘s game, it's not a Coach’s game . You can’t intervene. There’s no timeout. Players are out on the pitch for 90 minutes and they’ve got to make lots and lots of decisions . You have to sort of empower them to feel good enough to take those decisions and then you’re there to help and support them.

In my experience I think players, although they might disagree and be angry I think they appreciate that you’re honest with them. The truth is always useful, I think, and when you talk about communication and you build a relationship it's probably more important listening than talking. 

The part of the job I think that I enjoy the most is when you can help people and you can make a difference to their lives. Winning football matches is important but certainly while I’m still in coaching or why I got into this was to create an environment where they can feel that they’re improving and getting better. 

And if you do that right, then I think that you’ve got a good chance that results can go your way as well. 

I think it all starts from understanding yourself, being authentic, honest and true to yourself. 

Because in the world there are people that will dislike you, they’ll disagree with you, there’s lots of opinion but you can’t listen to that. 

You just have to do what you think is the right thing, be true to yourself, understand yourself and act appropriately in that way .