"O Canada..."

by Tony LaCarte
•
14 Jan, 2019

Vancouver you had Rusty at 'Hello'!

Our thanks to Tony LaCarte and @BCRugbyUnion for sending us this piece on Rusty's trip to Vancouver

To develop skilled players that can play the game of the future we need to have coaches that can innovate. Over a sunny weekend in beautiful Vancouver British Columbia, St. George’s School hosted the annual BC Rugby Conference. Tearing up the script, Rusty came prepared to share his magic with Canadian coaches and players.

The first evening Rusty shared his knowledge on how to create amazing camp environments and develop leaders. Rusty brought these two topics to life by sharing his own experiences and tapping into the collective knowledge in the room. Rusty also introduced the idea of coaching the individual with love and care which would be a central themes throughout the weekend. Some of the other key topics throughout the weekend involved re-thinking set piece and developing x-factor players.

On the field Rusty took coaching with games to the next level! BC coaches and players were exposed to the idea of creating the game within the game through use of individual and team challenges. It was amazing to watch as players tried new things and stretched themselves along with sharing very open and honest feedback with a diverse group of coaches. Rusty spent the first 5 minutes of the session just getting to know the players which allowed him to get some very honest feedback and discussion from players and give coaches new perspectives on lines questioning and player experience. His ability to make people feel comfortable created the best learning environment for coaches and players and this is where the magic lies.

Rusty is able to show people what is possible in coaching. Not only did coaches walk away from the weekend with a lot to think about but Rusty also gave ideas on how coaches can stay connected with each other and continue the learning following the conference.

A Magic partnership with Core37

by The Magic Stig • 29 October 2020

The Magic Academy team up with Core37

Tactical Challenge Cards - Pre Order NOW!

by PH715909 • 31 July 2020

We have used the wisdom of an array of coaches including some of the games top rockstars to pull together over 140 cards with their best games, practices, challenges, scenarios, concepts and coaching hints.

Coaches contributing include Stuart Lancaster, Eddie Jones, Giselle Mather, Jared Payne, Geoff Parling, Danielle 'Nolli' Waterman, Ian Peel & Joe El Abd to name but a few!

Making the most of their lockdown experience, Rusty and Fletch between podcasts and webinars have designed this latest resource to support Wizards in developing skilful adaptable players and teams. The tactical content will centre around challenges based on Scrum, Lineout, Transition, Attack, Defence, Kick Off, and Huddles.

With the cards themed around 'tactical', Vanessa at Fuzzbox Design has rocked it with a new look and new feel to the Cards .We have maintained the 'never tear' material so that they are completely weather-proof (Stig has tested them in the washing machine).

We know coaches are going to love these and have made them available for pre order now with expected delivery from September

Order yours now by visiting the online store here

The Magic Academy Coach Development Platform

by The Magic Stig • 24 June 2020

MA and Coach Logic combine to provide the coolest hang out for coaches who want to get better!

The 3C's of Coaching

by The Magic Stig • 23 August 2019

Rusty and Fletch catch up with Magic Stig ahead of the 3C's world tour!

The 3C's of Coaching

by The Magic Stig • 28 June 2019

Rock it with Rusty and Fletch on this new CPD!

Rocking it with The ECB

by The Magic Stig • 9 May 2019

Rusty swaps his wand for a cricket bat when visiting the ECB!

The Italian Job!

by Nick Scott • 8 March 2019

Fletch takes the Magic to Italy to visit Colorno and Nick Scott

Magic night at Woodford RFC

by The Magic Stig • 30 January 2019

Rusty visited Woodford RFC to cast some spells...

When Panda's are asked to share...

by The Panda's • 22 January 2019

Some really cool feedback on Rusty's experiences with his visit to Edmonton, Canada.

Canada, we loved you, the whole experience was emotional!!!

1. What was the most challenging part of training?

- For me the most challenging part was my personal challenges given to me by the coach (I.e. you can only walk/have to make 3 passes) - im not used to having an individual goal given to me for a game while also havig to work as a team and do something I don't normally do!

- The most challenging part of training was keeping my focus off the ball during play time at moments to figure out how the other team was trying to win.

- Noticing what the other team is doing. I want to work on looking up and manipulating defence. It's not one of my strengths, so I found looking for the 'visual cues' (ie defence walking/blitzing) was a challenging part of training, BUT A GREAT WAY TO REMIND US TO BE AWARE. A good challenge to enforce mindfulness, and I felt like I improved as the training went on.

- Executing one thing after making the decision that that was how you were going “win” the game. The way we played changed completely and was only focused on doing that specific thing. Especially for my team we didn’t choose offloads or switches but crossfield kicks and grubbers. Our playing format changed completely to cater to that.

-knowing you were being watched by a huge number of coaches was intimidating.

- For me the most challenging part of training was all the layers Rusty added to the play (like the barriers for communication or things the other team would be doing) and how we were forced to figure things out on the go and adapt to that

2. If you could pass on one thing you learned to a coach what would it be?

- ASK your athletes what they want, don't assume that as a coach you always know better than us; involve us in decisions, rules, games, training ideas etc.

- I would pass on that coaches should have fun too, set a good mood and lessen the stress that players or themselves might have. I.e joke telling.

- Complicated is ok!! I think coaches sometimes get stuck in their ways and play the same games and mentally put limitations on their players. They might think that we can't do something, so they don't even want to attempt it. Failure is good and creating new games and drills to challenge our mental game is important!

- Let people have another chance at their attempt; especially if they tried something difficult or new.

- To mix things up in practice with those little challenges. I really enjoyed those.

- Something I'd pass on to coaches would be the fishbowl skills session he brought up because I think that is something that would be beneficial on any team (especially when learning to play the sport) to be able to work on individual skills in a smaller/ more personal setting

3. What was your favorite moment during training?

- Laughing with my team; asking what their goals were and trying to see if we could make it work and when we messed up just laughing about it

- My favourite moment was when he would make jokes and try to involve everyone in his conversation and play.

- Hearing what different coaches pay attention to. (i.e. How many times we laughed in a training<--love that), I also enjoyed being able to try new things in training like kicking!! Forwards get in trouble even when it's just for fun. A lot of skills have been categorized as important for certain positions rather than ALL POSITIONS, so it was nice to break the barriers and just play.

- I liked the incorporation of mini challenges between the games.

-watching the kids get to attempt different challenges rusty gave them.

- Favorite moment would be the mini scrum against Courtney because it was so spontaneous and will probably never happen again haha

4. Any last comments?

- What a cool experience! It's a nice change to play all these games and have opportunities to just try something and see what happens. Thank you!

- n/a

- GREAT COACHING EXPERIENCE. I learned a lot in the hour we trained, and most importantly had great fun with high intensity rugby! Thanks again Rusty!!

- Giving the players the opportunity to try new things was great. Rusty talked about forwards not being allowed to kick and it was very fun to be able to experiment with kicking.

- super fun training session!!

- Overall, I had fun in the session and although it was challenging, I thought it was really beneficial to just be put in that environment where Rusty would challenge us to try new things and I think his perspective as a coach was really refreshing and constructive

The Magic Academy goes "Dutch"

by The Magic Stig • 12 January 2019

Fletch goes 'Dutch' in the Netherlands...