In need of your half time team talk tips to motivate my players?

Lee-annes NetballCoach, Australia

the best way, i find, to motivate my girls, is to concentrate on what they are doing well, and what areas they need to concentrate on (just pick one or two for each player, ie stick on your player, or run forward to get the ball, jump for rebounds ect... i find giving them a task to concentrate on, helps.  and dont focus on the score.  i might be keeping score, but i never share that info with my players, and i never tell them they are in front if they ask.  its always, its really close and you have to keep working hard.  even if they are in front or losing by heaps.  

concentrate on the positives, and tell them the bits that you are really proud of.

hope that helps.

Jodie BrooksCoach, Australia

I agree with Lee-anne :-)  I had a coach from another code comment the other month about how he had observed a coach at half time telling his players to "not do this" or "don't do that" so they went back onto the field thinking "don't drop the ball" & guess what happened, yep, he dropped the ball.  I always focus on the positives, how well they are driving, how fantastic their defense is when they get their 3 feet & stand tall defending.  I never tell my girls what the score is cause they are 14 so it goes straight to their head & it's all they think about.  It's all about the positive :-)

Ian MarshCoach, England

Hi Andrea.

Depends on how old your players are, and this is slightly more negative than the good answers above, but my coach used to tell us in the team talk that we had 5 minutes in the second half before he would consider making any substitutions - this would give us a good incentive for going out and playing well from the first whistle.

For younger players I think it's also vital you highlight process goals (pass completed / shots on target / lots of effort running around the court) rather than simply outcome goals (final score). This way even if your team are losing they can focus on the things they can immediately affect themselves.

Janet Coach, Australia

I agree with both reinforcing the good things and giving incentives to try harder and tend to focus more on what is happening in the game rather than just the score. I find it harder to do break talks if there is a large score discrepancy either way but take notes to help me stay on track with skill improvement, tactics and reminders. Keep upbeat and positive yourself even when losing badly. When you need to address issues with individual players describe what you would like them to do & why rather than pointing out what they are doing wrong. Examples are: instead of "GD stop watching your player`s feet" try "GD you are tight on GA, we need more intercepts so eyes up will help you pick up the ball coming in" or instead of "WA don`t change direction mid drive" "WA you are trying hard, keep up your straight drives to allow space for second option". Try the search bar for some more info on this topic.