Replacing their home and away games programme with an internal 'Gold Cup' tournament, due to COVID restrictions (SEPT 2020), the staff of Hill House School in the North of England have been the architects of problem setters, not problem solvers thanks to MatchPlay Cards.
Not wanting to lose the competition, challenge and learning opportunities that external matches provide. The 'Gold Cup' was created to replicate these demands in a representative way with MatchPlay Cards, asking players to adapt quickly and make decisions effectively as they battled their way through the team and player challenges assigned to them.
Hill House Hockey provides the very best solution for combining excellence in hockey performance and a fully integrated academic programme, offering boys and girls one of the very best coaching and playing programmes, enabling pupils to develop and improve within a supportive and safe environment.
" Allowing us to problem solve and play some really great hockey!" - Director of Hockey, James Ross
Building a game around the often forgotten people, the goalkeepers, Jame's mindful selection of MatchPlay Cards for these players together with the cards chosen for the outfield players challenged players to adapt and overcome their opposing team's tactics to #ChangeTheGame; "The cards worked against one another for each of the teams, one team was trying to be over-attacking, pressing in certain areas the other team were looking to transfer out of that area."
"The ownership went from my head to their hand" - Director of Hockey, James Ross
"Now it has got to the point rather than them asking for a game, they will say 'can we have a card game?!"... Which is lovely, it starts discussions in small groups are great" adding "We will have the scoreboard running, everything is scored so they can turn around and see what is happening."
Staff were able to continually check and challenge players learning through games, helping staff see players in the future and design sessions to support development. Considering themselves as game designers, using MatchPlay Cards as a supportive tool, staff were able to open up possibilities for players to make decisions and take action in order to solve game-related problems.
Add MatchPlay Cards to your coaching toolbox to #ChangeTheGame. Totally multisport in their design MatchPlay Cards will fuel conversation, promote decision-makers and connect players with their game behaviours. Discover more now - https://www.thecoachinglab.org/shop