Not all great players become great managers.
Steven Gerrard belives clubs and the Football Association could be doing more to ameliorate this situation.
The 35-year-old, who has admitted that this is likely his final year as a player, wants to make the move to coaching once his time with LA Galaxy is up.
Speaking to the Telegraph, Gerrard explained how he feels English football is losing a wealth of knowledge and experience.
They should be getting offers they cannot refuse. If a player has got 100 caps and 700 club games how can a club and the FA just let them go? They have so much to offer.
A lot of clubs don’t let it happen - they don’t let players like that go. You see it at Manchester United with Ryan Giggs, Barcelona with Pep Guardiola, they say when you finish here, this will happen.
That he did not jump on the opportunity to carry out his coaching badges at a young age is something, which looking back now, Gerrard regrets.
All those hours spent watching boxed-sets - though one could hardly call The Sopranos a waste of time - is time he wishes was better spent.
I have regrets I didn’t start my coaching badges at 21-22. All that time wasted in hotels as an England player when I’ve been bored and was watching ‘The Office’ and ‘The Sopranos’. I wish I’d done my CBA (coaching) licence then so I’d be doing my pro-licence now. I know many players get to the end of their careers, get handed a thick C licence pack and say, ‘Nah, I’m not doing that.’ That’s 70/80 caps and 600 career appearances and he is just going nah. He could have had it done.
To streamline the transition from playing to coaching, the former Liverpool captain directs that courses should be made easily available to players in their youth.
Put these coaching badges on offer at a younger age. When you are training you finish at 1pm: have the coaching badges available in the afternoons so that when they finish their careers they are ready to become coaches straight away and they don’t need to start at the bottom and do all the tedious coaching courses that are out there.
Picture credit: Oliver McVeigh / SPORTSFILE
