Men’s and Women’s Hockey teams of New Zealand induct Assistant Coaches
In order to further improve the performance of the players and development of the sport ahead of the 2012 London Olympics, the Men’s and Women’s hockey teams of New Zealand have hired the services of Assistant Coaches. Hilary Poole, the Chief Executive of
the Hockey New Zealand, was of the opinion that the development programme is meant to prepare the squad for the London Games.
Greg Nicol has been selected as an assistant coach of the Black Sticks Women, who will work under the supervision of Mark Hager. From the other side, Darren Smith has been inducted as assistant trainer of the Men’s hockey team, who will train the
squad under the command of Shane McLeod.
Poole while speaking to the media said that they had twenty-five players in the each team besides ten other development players representing the national teams every year. He further stated that the extra-assistance will ease the workload of senior coaches
and they would put in complete concentration on players’ performance.
Smith and Nicol will render their services from Auckland and will provide practical assistance to the players as per the plan of the senior coaches. They will also monitor the performance of the players besides assisting national trainers.
In addition, they would provide their services in the longer term regional talent development programmes. In order to ensure the consistency of the national development programme, they will also support the regional coaches to improve the performance in
the ground level.
The Chief Executive added, “We were searching for coaches who had international experience in national assistant roles, had been part of an Olympic programme and had a strong knowledge of hockey in New Zealand – and both Greg and Darren were stand out applicants.”
Greg Nicol – the assistant coach of the Women’s squad
Nicol has been working as Managing Director of the Kelt Capital from 2007 to 2011. It was one of the most successful hockey academies based in Hawk’s Bay that provide training from the very basic the advance level. He has also served as assistant trainer
of the Men’s hockey team of New Zealand during the Beijing Olympics. Besides working as special trainer of the South African squad, he rendered his services in various coaching positions in England.
In his international playing career, he had had 200 international caps representing South Africa and marked 200 goals. It is vital to mention here that he is holding the third position in the history of the sport with 245 goals.
The first and utmost task of Nicol will be upcoming Champions Trophy scheduled to be held in Amsterdam.
Darren Smith – the assistant coach of the Men’s team
Darren Smith has had working experience with Shane McLeod and Kevin Towns while he took the Kuala Lumpur Hockey Club (KLHC) from bottom to fourth place in recent Malaysian Hockey League (MHL). Earlier, he worked as Performance Director of the Midlands Hockey
Region from 2007 to 2010. In his major duties, he commanded the training programme, performance plan and to establish talent hunt programmes.
As a professional athlete, he earned 212 caps in international hockey representing the Black Sticks from 1995 to 2006. He had participated in Kuala Lumpur Commonwealth Games, Melbourne Commonwealth Games, Manchester Commonwealth Games and Athens Olympics.
It is necessary to put in here that he was chosen as Best Player of the country back in 1998.
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