After reading a lot of these threads regarding who's best at this, or who's best at that; best team ooop north and best team darn sarf etc, what is clear is that we do have some class players lurking about and yet, as has been well documented, we have but 3 pro teams.
Now what seems obvious to me is that we as a nation have a certain degree of pride, it manifests itself in many other sports so we shouldn’t be surprised when it surfaces in Paintball.
I wonder how many of you guys have ever gone to watch an England football game at Wembley or wherever and felt that rush when you walk up to that stadium mob handed playing against Germany or whoever, that feeling is multiplied ten fold when you go abroad with the team.
Pride oozes out of ya, you just can’t help it.
And what the fcuk has this to do with Paintball ?
Well, imagine we could create British teams (even Jock ones) where we could be proud of them and have a real; chance of competing at the top of our sport, I would love to see us dominate again, I really would.
But I suspect something is working against us and I think we have a systemic problem that is going to be hard to overcome and it is one of parochialism.
We are just too ‘local’ in our thinking; teams seem to be set up with ‘convenience’ being a main determinant.
Teams generally start with a few friends playing together or even family and the genesis of that team tends to be the very reason it will always have a built in plateau of achievement that can’t be overcome.
Basically, because of the way the team was formed in it’s beginning, it is this very structure that will hold it back.
Successful teams, teams who get to the top as pros, have a policy of going after players who are the best.
If you have a team of pals or relations, then there is a certain amount of in-house reluctance to say ‘goodbye’ to friends or family members who do not make the grade, this is just natural consequence of the way we seem to do things over here.
We obviously now have to face up to the reasons of why we actually play this sport, if we are playing for fun, then cool, by all means continue playing with your pals and family but if you as a paintballer and a sportsman have true aspirations, then you need to think outside of the present English way of doing things.
We have some real talent in this country, real talent and we now have a resurgent regime of practice, leastwise I have seen it down here in the south with sites like D7’s and I suspect Markie C’s up north and others providing venues for practice and development of aspiring teams.
The infrastructure for a better Brit ball is now falling into place with these type sites but we are pretty much doomed to a long term program if we organize ourselves the way we are doing at present.
So, if we have the sites who are now catering for teams to improve and we know we have the players but……. well, that’s the problem you see, it’s the in-between bit, the existing team infrastructure that now becomes the problem.
The number of potentially top players is quite large I would think but they are generally dispersed amongst too many differing teams. Of course there will be a transition of these top players over a course of time where teams like Tigers and Shock will hoover up really good players but we need to create a few more Hoovers, in other words more teams who are aspirational and do not rely on ‘local’ or convenient considerations as important.
The model we have been adopting for the past God knows how long in Brit team development is redundant guys, we can’t rely on local teams with local players then going out to practice to get us back to the top.
We have to now rethink the way we go about things but I’m not so sure the identification of how we must change is gonna help us because it needs people who are focused and have money to align what we need with what we have a resource
If we want to get Brit ball back up there then we need to create teams ‘Nexus’ style.
We need certain people to get out there, and start putting teams together with a view of creating a side to push for the top.
John Payne and Triss Hewitt are doing this with the Copenhagen Ducks (Method), I did it with Nexus and Chris Pelling is doing it down in the South West.
It’s not enough guys, we need more Pellings, Paynes and Hewitts, we need guys who are proud to be British and focus themselves on team development.
I am going down this weekend to Exeter to pick the guys for Chris’s team from about 50 or 60 players and if the resultant team work hard, then there is no reason why they can’t push for the top.
Nexus was formed from just such a bunch of hopefuls, remember what that early Nexus did, my God you can hardly forget it with the amount of times I go on about it
There is NO reason why we can’t have another 5 Nexus type teams from England and I ain’t exaggerating here, we have the players but they ain’t playing in the right teams.
We need more entrepreneurs like Payne and Pelling to help this process.
If we truly have a desire to get Brit ball back on track then we need to adopt a different model of operation because the traditional model is just not working, and to be honest, cannot ever work in this modern, more professional paintball environment we find ourselves in.
Players need to think more about personal ambitions and aspirations, teams need to think more about goals and how best to achieve them and at present we are not really creating an appropriate infrastructure to allow our best players to flourish in the best teams.
If we are serious about getting Brit ball back up there then we need to be acting serious and not just paying lip service to this resurgence that seems to be erupting in the UK.
We can do it, I sincerely think we can, we just need to do things in the right way if we are to be successful.
Sensible thoughts anybody ?
Now what seems obvious to me is that we as a nation have a certain degree of pride, it manifests itself in many other sports so we shouldn’t be surprised when it surfaces in Paintball.
I wonder how many of you guys have ever gone to watch an England football game at Wembley or wherever and felt that rush when you walk up to that stadium mob handed playing against Germany or whoever, that feeling is multiplied ten fold when you go abroad with the team.
Pride oozes out of ya, you just can’t help it.
And what the fcuk has this to do with Paintball ?
Well, imagine we could create British teams (even Jock ones) where we could be proud of them and have a real; chance of competing at the top of our sport, I would love to see us dominate again, I really would.
But I suspect something is working against us and I think we have a systemic problem that is going to be hard to overcome and it is one of parochialism.
We are just too ‘local’ in our thinking; teams seem to be set up with ‘convenience’ being a main determinant.
Teams generally start with a few friends playing together or even family and the genesis of that team tends to be the very reason it will always have a built in plateau of achievement that can’t be overcome.
Basically, because of the way the team was formed in it’s beginning, it is this very structure that will hold it back.
Successful teams, teams who get to the top as pros, have a policy of going after players who are the best.
If you have a team of pals or relations, then there is a certain amount of in-house reluctance to say ‘goodbye’ to friends or family members who do not make the grade, this is just natural consequence of the way we seem to do things over here.
We obviously now have to face up to the reasons of why we actually play this sport, if we are playing for fun, then cool, by all means continue playing with your pals and family but if you as a paintballer and a sportsman have true aspirations, then you need to think outside of the present English way of doing things.
We have some real talent in this country, real talent and we now have a resurgent regime of practice, leastwise I have seen it down here in the south with sites like D7’s and I suspect Markie C’s up north and others providing venues for practice and development of aspiring teams.
The infrastructure for a better Brit ball is now falling into place with these type sites but we are pretty much doomed to a long term program if we organize ourselves the way we are doing at present.
So, if we have the sites who are now catering for teams to improve and we know we have the players but……. well, that’s the problem you see, it’s the in-between bit, the existing team infrastructure that now becomes the problem.
The number of potentially top players is quite large I would think but they are generally dispersed amongst too many differing teams. Of course there will be a transition of these top players over a course of time where teams like Tigers and Shock will hoover up really good players but we need to create a few more Hoovers, in other words more teams who are aspirational and do not rely on ‘local’ or convenient considerations as important.
The model we have been adopting for the past God knows how long in Brit team development is redundant guys, we can’t rely on local teams with local players then going out to practice to get us back to the top.
We have to now rethink the way we go about things but I’m not so sure the identification of how we must change is gonna help us because it needs people who are focused and have money to align what we need with what we have a resource
If we want to get Brit ball back up there then we need to create teams ‘Nexus’ style.
We need certain people to get out there, and start putting teams together with a view of creating a side to push for the top.
John Payne and Triss Hewitt are doing this with the Copenhagen Ducks (Method), I did it with Nexus and Chris Pelling is doing it down in the South West.
It’s not enough guys, we need more Pellings, Paynes and Hewitts, we need guys who are proud to be British and focus themselves on team development.
I am going down this weekend to Exeter to pick the guys for Chris’s team from about 50 or 60 players and if the resultant team work hard, then there is no reason why they can’t push for the top.
Nexus was formed from just such a bunch of hopefuls, remember what that early Nexus did, my God you can hardly forget it with the amount of times I go on about it
There is NO reason why we can’t have another 5 Nexus type teams from England and I ain’t exaggerating here, we have the players but they ain’t playing in the right teams.
We need more entrepreneurs like Payne and Pelling to help this process.
If we truly have a desire to get Brit ball back on track then we need to adopt a different model of operation because the traditional model is just not working, and to be honest, cannot ever work in this modern, more professional paintball environment we find ourselves in.
Players need to think more about personal ambitions and aspirations, teams need to think more about goals and how best to achieve them and at present we are not really creating an appropriate infrastructure to allow our best players to flourish in the best teams.
If we are serious about getting Brit ball back up there then we need to be acting serious and not just paying lip service to this resurgence that seems to be erupting in the UK.
We can do it, I sincerely think we can, we just need to do things in the right way if we are to be successful.
Sensible thoughts anybody ?
