Behind closed doors: The role of debriefing and feedback in a professional rugby team

Abstract

Despite the popularity of performance analysis with high performance rugby environments, limited attention has been paid to understanding how coaches and practitioners use this information to impact on performance. The aim of this case study was to gain an in-depth understanding of how a professional rugby team-playing in New Zealand's ITM cup competition-uses the post-match and pre-match meetings to debrief after performance and preview prior to future performance. Multiple ethnographic techniques were employed to generate a comprehensive picture of the phenomena, including participant observation, video recordings, formal and informal interviews, field notes, descriptive statistics and document analysis. Each meeting was transcribed separately and analysed using an inductive content analysis process and themes were identified. The case study explores how four key factors-the role of the coach-facilitator, player engagement, leadership and the balance between reflection and preparation-impact on the debrief/preview process. The findings reveal that while considerable emphasis was placed on the importance of player learning and engagement in team meetings, delivery was often ad hoc, coach-driven and results-focused.

Athletes’ and coaches’ perspectives of performance analysis in women’s sports in Singapore

“…According to both the athletes and staff, the use of PA directly contributed to the development of positive culture and brought athletes and staff together. These findings are in contrast to the views of male New Zealand rugby players, where the team's coaches attempted to create an active process to encourage self-learning and selfdiscovery (Middlemas, Croft, & Watson, 2017). Instead, certain players never took part in discussions causing others to perceive this negatively impacted on the team's performance.…”

Towards a More Efficient Training Process in High-Level Female Volleyball From a Match Analysis Intervention Program Based on the Constraint-Led Approach: The Voice of the Players

“…Information was presented to players in two separate meetings each week. Specifically, at a post-match meeting held on Monday and a pre-match meeting held on Thursday (Middlemas et al, 2018 ). The purpose of the post-match meeting was to analyze the scout reports related to the team itself and to visualise, using video clips, the negative and positive aspects of their game.…”

“…It is also transmitted to athletes (Wright et al, 2016 ). Currently, because it is vital to involve players in the pursuit of sports performance (Bampouras et al, 2012 ; Middlemas et al, 2018 ), high-level sports teams typically incorporate meetings into their training schedules in order to present information to their players (Groom and Cushion, 2004 ; Mesquita et al, 2005 ).…”

Elite coaches’ use and engagement with performance analysis within Olympic and Paralympic sport

“…In addition, Middlemas et al (2017) identified only limited information (< 20%) generated by the performance analysis process was incorporated into the player's formal feedback sessions. This may appear concerning to the applied practitioner due to the large amount of work undertaken yet ultimately absent within feedback.…”

“…However, despite their critical role in the feedback process, the views of these coaches have been rarely reported within academic writing to date. Many of the studies investigating coach, analyst, or athlete perceptions have primarily focused on larger-team based sports such as rugby union (Francis & Jones, 2014;Kraak, Magwa & Terblanche, 2018;Middlemas, Croft & Watson, 2017;Painczyk, Hendricks & Kraak, 2017) and football (Groom & Cushion, 2004;Groom & Cushion, 2005;Reeves & Roberts, 2013;Wright, Atkins, Jones & Todd, 2013). However, some studies have also incorporated multi-sport (Bampouras, Cronin & Miller, 2012;Martin et al, 2018;Wright, Atkins & Jones, 2012) and individual-sport (Butterworth, Turner & Johnstone, 2012;Mooney et al, 2016) demographics, thus providing a wider insight into the perceptions and utilisation of performance analysis within applied practice.…”