BUILDING WINNING TEAMS
The former coach of CD SanFrancisco, CD Genova, SD La Salle, CF Playas de Calvia, Al Shabab FC, Al Ahli SC and Nongbua Pitchaya FC, is recognized as one of the Spanish coaches with the most projection in current football. His sports career begins in Spanish grassroots football, training in all categories. Later he directed 3 seasons in Regional and Third Division after he begin his international career in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Thailand.
David is a competitive coach with a winning spirit, given that despite his time as a trainer in lower categories, he also achieved many championships with these teams and later started in the professional world with great force.
David Pons has done much more than just produce winning teams, he has developed a successful team management system and an exceptionally open, offensive, competitive, methodological style of play and thanks to this style he has become one of the most respected projection coaches. in modern football “.
David produces winning teams through a personal and professional approach to get the maximum potential and performance of his players and the team as a whole, thanks to global and individual improvement.
He has the ability to measure the strengths and weaknesses of both his teams and his opponents, as well as find the right solutions at the right time to all the problems that arise during the season. This is undoubtedly the greatest virtue of a seasoned coach, who has made victories and the way to achieve them, the hallmark of his Football.
A coach appreciated above all by his players for his skills on the offenssive. During his time as a coach, he received from the beginning with a more defensive vision, which has allowed him to give importance to his exquisite concern for the offensive and his passion for having everything under control in defensive concepts or in the strategy in set pieces actions.
He immediately began developing decade-long strategic and department management plans. He has also focused on creating a totally innovative method, which improves several essential areas and changes the training structures, with his own method:”THE PONS METHOD”
This interview granted to TheTotalFootball to the Spanish Professional Football Coach David Pons.
The Total Football: What relationship do you find between management and coaching?
David Pons: When I was training at the base, I combined it with my marketing company aimed at improving the performance of companies, with the position of coach and sports director, so my duties were more oriented to grow always directed to the performance of the business, so at the same time, I have always tried to grow in team performance and help improve the club’s departments. Designing performance programs and producing synergies with them so that the different departments work with greater efficiency. In short, performance is the sum of many small details.
The Total Football : At what point is current football?
David Pons: Today is a very technological, open, complex and exciting world, in which a great knowledge of football alone will not lead to a coach, and more to a former elite player without experience of the optimal performance of a team , either in grassroots football or in a professional team. Much more is needed and treating everything in a comprehensive way, but applying the appropriate solution to each situation, to each player, to each club, to each team.
The Total Football: How has Modern Football changed?
David Pons: Historically in football, there has been a central figure, usually the president, who managed a bit of the organization’s decisions in each of the club’s movements.
Today, modern organizations rely on new technologies in different professional departments so that, both through “Big Data” and “Business Process Management” and other management tools, they can have greater executive and management efficiency. , so that the decisions and their impact on the clubs have the minimum possible errors.
A few years ago, that person who did or did not put the money, the president, was quite dictatorial. In many countries this is still the case and in fact, many clubs are being bought with this model, so it costs more to achieve institutional performance, the old system is still simpler for all members, it was much easier for all involved.
Nowadays the success of the clubs requires more than the participation and management of the sports director and the coach in making decisions. In the end, with the relevant information in front of them, it is the CFO and the board of directors, led by the president, who have the final say, but have much more objective data to take.
Modern football requires data, technology, and above all efficient people. Now to work successfully with people in the organization, more is required of the coach or the executive.
The other part of efficiency is clear that it is the sport in which the coach must find the key to condition the minds of the footballers, so that they think as a whole, as a unit and be able to get the best out of them as a group and individually. . For this, the day-to-day, game by game, detail in detail, training by training, is essential. You have to win small battles to reach the optimum level, to achieve sporting and financial results, everything goes hand in hand.
The Total Football: How should professional clubs make the switch to modern football?
David Pons: In my view, organizations if they want to take the step towards modern football, they must have more knowledge, more information, be more competent, to have more financial and sporting efficiency. For this, the change must be first from communication, from institutional development, sometimes you come to a club and you see that they have people with a negative attitude towards their image in front. It is still a mistake. Everyone is important in a club but there must be organizational hierarchies and for this they must understand that the figure of the Sports Director and the coach is essential. Like the coach, the principle of uniqueness in dealing with each player is also fundamental. Organizations must understand that they must provide a certain degree of security to Sports Directors and coaches so that there is some institutional tranquility to find performance in modern football.
The Total Football : How does that translate into winning teams?
David Pons: It translates into work on the personality of the organizations as they are increasingly organized, through processes in the different departments that produce the ideal synergies for the proper functioning of the club as a whole. There must be a hierarchical commitment to respect the different positions of the club and their different responsibilities. This should be the biggest goal of a club, to be organized.
The Total Football : What is the biggest obstacle in creating performance teams in modern football?
David Pons: The coach must control his ego. It must be demanding but at the same time democratic, the player must note that he can communicate with him without fear. Performance environments must be created and that is not easy, both the staff and the players must feel comfortable. They should not feel uncomfortable because they have dictatorial superiors, I understand that there are countries where this is more complicated, due to a cultural issue. But if they want to be competitive they will have to enter the new era of football in order to compete more efficiently. That’s where the breakthrough comes in. That’s exactly what you need to build a successful, winning organization, and therefore, winning and performing teams. We are all one. Soccer is a whole.
Previously he spoke of balance, which is fundamental for the balance of football teams, for the emotional control of the players, for the hierarchies of the club, for the components that must form a club. Balance, for me in a sports entity, means health. A healthy, ascending club. Let him stay away from absolutism. Let me explain, there is nothing good or bad, for example the ego, which we have talked about before, is a negative connotation, it refers to egoism.
Many times it,s an antagonist of a word for my fundamental in football and in business, focus, focus. Too much ego means that you are perhaps not focused on the goal of the club, the team or that you do not have enough empathy to put yourself in the shoes of other club mates or players, because your focus is diverted, but at the same time time the word ego means self-confidence, assertiveness, etc. .. conditions that seem essential to all of us for a professional footballer or for the health of a good organization. Therefore one of the keywords in an organization that boasts in today’s football should be “BALANCE”
If an organization does not have balance, it can be seen that many of its components act with insecurity, sometimes disloyalty, often attracting attention in public because they see their territory threatened. They only see their own work, they are not able to see the work of others. They don’t understand organizations as a team. Global effort in search of a common goal.
The Total Football: What differences exist in different countries of the world in reference to football?
David Pons: If you ask me about my analysis, in the detection of deficiencies in different countries, I think that each coach will do their own analysis. From my perspective in the different countries that I have worked, I will say that the improvement must be oriented towards the mental improvement, and on the basic fundamentals of football, because many times they start playing very late and without the best means, so many players they guide badly, control with the outside of the foot, like the pass, and this resource should only be used when it is the best option and if your level of efficiency when you do it does not leave you at a disadvantage or uncoordinated and in matters of personal discipline and group. But generally speaking, each country that I have visited is different and each one has good things and not so good things. But if you ask me what can be decisive for these types of improvements to be carried out, I will tell you that the main thing is to create performance environments in which the footballer is seen as the great protagonist and the coach as a supporting actor, unfortunately in many sites is not. And many more factors come into play that alter performance first and institutional tranquility second.
The Total Football : How do you approach the job of structuring training so that your players are prepared?
David Pons: I believe in structured training, which has led us to success in other years. This structure and planning is open and it changes or not due to the feelings that the team gives us, we talk about it and we base ourselves a lot on the problem, on finding the solution. Once the competition has started, the opponent’s analysis comes into play. We concentrate, with the help of the latest technologies, on giving instructions if possible very precise visuals to the player so that he is clear about his task both in training and in competition.
The Total Football : How do you teach those skills?
David Pons: Almost always after the analysis we bring what we have done well to training to be able to repeat it and what we have done wrong both in defense and attack, to rectify it. The detection and implementation of the different patterns of play is essential. Then through the Pons Method and group work we take those patterns to the video projection, so that we understand them, then to the training so that we can practice them and then to the competition again so that they are effective, to repeat them again and make them habits of our game model.
All of this requires focus from both the coaches and the players, it requires persistence and discipline and concentration among other things.
The Total Football : What has the “Pons Method” contributed to your training model?
David Pons : First of all, I am proud that a few months ago on an island in Thailand I found the tranquility to develop this method in the midst of the global pandemic so complicated for everyone, because with the dynamics of competition it would have been practically impossible and this forced stop has me provided that necessary space to think. And now that both I and other coaches will be able to develop it, since with this method, only a new stage begins that changes the training structures and not only in soccer, since I have had an interest in knowing it from American football and soccer. soccer in the US, due to the change of focus from such an analytical system to a training model that treats soccer as a whole, makes training more fun, encourages synergies between departments, improves efficiency, soccer player rehabilitation as an intermediate method, and it will evolve technologically, you have to be in luck, football is winning.
The Total Football : What do you think are the main management skills of a successful coach?
David Pons: First being an analyst is essential, having the ability to measure and analyze everything, I am good at this because of my experience in business.
– Being a born problem solver, understands that they are part of the performance process of a team and that the success of a team is precisely in their management.
– Never blame the players and less in public.
– Always do, first of all, self-criticism.
– Be able to make your players understand your game model in the shortest possible time.
– Be a natural motivator
– Be organized and help the club as much as possible in its organizational growth.
– Daily improvement
– Be able to delegate to their staff and that there are the correct synergies between all departments always focused on the improvement of the footballer, global and individual.
The Total Football : What does it take to create a decision-making process in which the people of the club feel they can participate?
David Pons: It starts with the expectations that the coach sets. It is part of the club’s job to try not to sign people to the organization who are experts in their particular area of responsibility, who are hungry to continually improve their knowledge, and who are 100% involved and committed to the team.
The coach must allow himself to be able to convey that he expects everyone to create precisely that sense of belonging, that both the staff members and the players themselves participate and volunteer their ideas. Ideas that can be used to create standards of behavior and dress that make the team grow.
The priority objective is to create a communication channel that allows relevant information to arrive from the bottom up.
The Total Football : And what are the qualities that define the modern footballer?
David Pons: One of the keys to being a competitive player today is the ability to respond, to be faster physically, but above all mentally, than another player. And the modern football player have to take care of his career, of his image, of his body, and of his mind, one modern player, have to be professional the 24 hours everyday.
We must create intelligent players in the game but also with a technical delicacy that allows them to carry out decisive challenges in an increasingly organized football. And in this matter, in Europe we have innovated a little bit, we must find individual improvement methods such as the Pons method, which improve the individual footballer and globally, football is a whole and it is our duty to improve all facets of the athlete.
Understand that nowadays one must have a commitment of their own to get the best of you, as Ronaldo and Messi have shown. The player must be able to control the invisible training. Nutrition, rest, supplements, mental coaching, etc … It is essential to control all these issues, not only to have the fewest possible injuries but also so that the player can extend his career as much as possible in addition to helping him prepare your professional life by the time your career ends.
The Total Football : How do you get your teams to find performance in the shortest time possible?
David Pons: I have never had the option of having the best team in the category but instead I have managed to become champion many times and that has to do above all with how you prepare and how you are able to convey the idea, you game model to your team. Then you must have a professional team to be able to have a department that is capable of creating those bridges that lead you to control the small details. Today with the technological contribution we have taken a step forward, but professionals must be increasingly prepared.
When you come to a team after measuring and analyzing everything you must be able to identify the essential strengths of the team and if the balance fails or the team is not fully compensated, you have to try to compensate in the best possible way.
Every day in my teams and more after my experiences in different countries, we conclude that it is easier for them to have physical commitment than mental commitment and nowadays mental commitment is a priority. Improving mentally, in intelligence in the game, in problem solving, gives the player the necessary tools to get their best competitive facet.
The Total Football: What differences exist in different countries of the world in reference to football?
David Pons: If you ask me about my analysis, in the detection of deficiencies in different countries, I think that each coach will do their own analysis. From my perspective in the different countries that I have worked, I will say that the improvement must be oriented towards the mental improvement, of basic fundamentals of football, because many times they start playing very late and without the best means, so many players they guide badly, control with the outside of the foot, like the pass, and this resource should only be used when it is the best option and if your level of efficiency when you do it does not leave you at a disadvantage or uncoordinated and in matters of personal discipline and group.
But generally speaking, each country that I have visited is different and each one has good things and not so good things. But if you ask me what can be decisive for these types of improvements to be carried out, I will tell you that the main thing is to create performance environments in which the footballer is seen as the great protagonist and the coach as a supporting actor, unfortunately in many sites is not. And many more factors come into play that alter performance first and institutional tranquility second.
The Total Football : How do you approach the job of structuring training so that your players are prepared?
David Pons: I believe in structured training, which has led us to success in other years. This structure and planning is open and it changes or not due to the feelings that the team gives us, we talk about it and we base ourselves a lot on the problem, on finding the solution. Once the competition has started, the opponent’s analysis comes into play. We concentrate, with the help of the latest technologies, on giving instructions if possible very precise visuals to the player so that he is clear about his task both in training and in competition.
The Total Football : How do you teach those skills?
David Pons: Almost always after the analysis we bring what we have done well to training to be able to repeat it and what we have done wrong both in defense and attack, to rectify it. The detection and implementation of the different patterns of play is essential. Then through the Pons Method and group work we take those patterns to the video projection, so that we understand them, then to the training so that we can practice them and then to the competition again so that they are effective, to repeat them again and make them habits of our game model.
All of this requires focus from both the coaches and the players, it requires persistence and discipline and concentration among other things.
The Total Football : What has the Pons Method contributed to your training model?
David Pons : First of all, I am proud that a few months ago on an island in Thailand I found the tranquility to develop this method in the midst of the global pandemic so complicated for everyone, because with the dynamics of competition it would have been practically impossible and this forced stop has me provided that necessary space to think. And now that both I and other coaches will be able to develop it, since with this method, only a new stage begins that changes the training structures and not only in soccer, since I have had an interest in knowing it from American football and soccer. soccer in the US, due to the change of focus from such an analytical system to a training model that treats soccer as a whole, makes training more fun, encourages synergies between departments, improves efficiency, soccer player rehabilitation as an intermediate method, and it will evolve technologically, you have to be in luck, football is winning.
The Pons Method is revolutuinary an integral 360 Training method, that you improve all the areas in the training at the same time.
The Pons Method has improved the soccer player’s rehabilitation area in a specific and comprehensive way.
With this Pons Method starts everything, in all the Sports. More technology, more efficency, more funny, more performance.
Improve the sinergies between the club departments
The PONS METHOD, only start here, this Pons MEthod, going to revolution all the sports, more with the advanced technology are arriving to the sports.
The Total Football : What will be David Pons’ next project?
David Pons : Once I have created the Pons Method, which I believe is and will be a contribution to football, I am ready to undertake a new project, I am having a hard time deciding, at the beginning of this year I discarded many offers, because I did not see them competitive and some were first class division, later we have encountered this pandemic, now it is time to return to the grass, both as it normally is as first coach or as second coach if it is in a competitive league in which it can contribute how to learn, since this is a profession, you never stop learning.
“In football all the clubs want to win, but not all are willing to prepare to win”. DAVID PONS COACH:
