As the teams get ready for the Junior Pan American Championships taking place in Trinidad & Tobago and Toronto later this year, we catch up with two of the people who are involved in preparing their young players for the challenges ahead. And, as we discover after talking to the coaches of the Chile women’s team, there is more than a hint of optimism in the air.
Alfredo Castro has held a number of roles within the Chile national squad structure. He was head coach across the entire national squad structure of Chile, taking charge of both the men’s and women’s senior sides in the 2015 Pan American Games. He will now be leading the Chile junior women into action in just a few weeks’ time (29 March-9 April).
Chile is a hockey playing nation that is showing great ambition to move up the world rankings. The appointment of former Argentina coach Sergio Vigil to work alongside Castro and the other coaching staff is a clear signal of the Chile Hockey Federation’s intent to make a serious mark on the sport on an international stage.
Vigil has been appointed Technical Director across the national squad structure with the stated aim of helping Chile qualify for the Tokyo Olympics in 2020. As he says, “It is not all about the senior team, it is about the juniors and the lower level players. We are making a whole new philosophy for Chile Hockey.”
With this avowed level of support, Castro and his support team will move into the Pan Am Junior Championships with renewed confidence and vigour. Both Chile men and women have consistently performed well at junior level. The junior women’s team are the only side to have defeated Argentina, when they beat them in the 2008 semi-finals. Chile then lost out to the USA in the final. The men have won silver on four occasions, along with three bronze medals.
Castro was Chile's head coach for that famous win over Argentina in 2008 although he left the country a year later to gain coaching experience in Argentina. He returned to his former role in 2014 in time to oversee Chile women progress to Round Two of the Hockey World League, where they finished third in their group behind host nation Ireland and Pan Am rivals Canada.
We caught up with Castro and his assistant coach Alejandro Gómez to find out just what they see as the vital qualities in young players.
“One of the greatest attributes is that ability to really understand the game,” says Castro. “To make the right decisions, almost instinctively. Of course, it is also important that their technical ability is very good and the speed with which they execute their skills. This is what we train so hard for, to ensure that they have mastered the skills and can play at a very high tempo. The third attribute is to have a great attitude in the face of competition.”
As everyone knows, the team to beat in both the men’s and the women’s competition is Argentina and Castro knows as well as anyone just how good the young Argentina players are. “The Argentinian teams are always the favourite to win the tournament, they have excellent players, and they are good individually and as a team. It is very difficult to beat them, but we have done so before…”
Castro also spoke a little about the coaching set up in Chile, explaining that the whole national coaching structure in Chile is very centrally-managed and, even before the arrival of Vigil, had a philosophy of cascading the training principles down from the national team to the junior levels "As a coaching team, we are working hard with our under-21, under-16 and under-14 players to put in place and support a national team structure. At the same time we use talent detection from under-12; both for male and female players.
“In Chile we are implementing a system of training and development that we expect will help the expansion of hockey as a popular sport. We have good coaches and good support from the schools. Another aspect that we are working on is to improve the level of the national championship so that there is greater depth of quality in the sport.”
Another former Argentine coach, Alejandro Gómez, is assistant coach to Castro. He was also happy to share his thoughts on what makes a great player. “I like players with good technique, that understands the game and are in good physical condition. In essence I look for a player who is smart on the field and can make good decisions during the game.”
Gómez adds that players need to be totally competent with their individual technique, to have better tools for decision-making. The more skills a player can confidently call upon, he says, the more options he or she gives themself.
But for anyone thinking that Chile are a team of flair players, Gómez reiterates that physicality is also an important asset. “While we spend a lot of time developing individual technique, we are always working together to improve the physical condition of the players. We look for fast players who can choose the area of the field where he or she can use individual skills to the benefit of the team.”
The final quality highlighted by Gómez is the importance of great passing and receiving. It is these basics, he says, that will raise the team to a higher level. For the junior women’s team this means regular training matches against men’s teams. “The best way of increasing the intensity of the game,” he adds.
When it comes to the opposition, Gómez knows what his team will be up against. “We know that Argentina will be the toughest team at the tournament. They are used to playing this kind of tournament, and they dedicate a lot of time to hockey training and playing, much more than a Chilean player can.
“We are trying to change this here in Chile and we are getting good results, but it takes time. Don’t get me wrong, this will not change so quickly that we are going to this tournament expecting to beat Argentina but we are training really hard to make that happen.
“We are convinced that if we play our game, stay focused and take advantage of the opportunities that we will inevitably have during the game, then we can beat them. We respect them but we don’t fear them.”
