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Diet and Nutrition
This is a subject that is dear to my heart and I have always found fascinating for a number of reasons. Primarily because I eat like a horse and never seem to put weight on. I must be the only person alive who can go for a two-week all-inclusive vacation to Jamaica and come back 3Ib lighter then when I left!
During my Childhood My mum who is a great Cook used to cook for my Dad who was a really plain eater. A real meat and potato man I remember watching him scrape the gravy off his meat to check for any smidgen of fat!
Everyone I’ve ever spoken to in the USA about England says the same "Great Country I loved England but what do you guys eat over there! Well nothing very exciting if you lived in our house anyway.
Honestly no exaggeration we’re talking serious naivety on the food front here I had never eaten a pizza until I was Sixteen, when I was at school I couldn’t even spell lasagna never mind think about eating it. I remember coming home from my buddies Vinny Vernon’s house after enjoying Chinese Sweet & Sour Chicken for the first time and telling my Dad how good it was
" Foreign Rubbish If it was that good why do they Cover it with batter and smother it in sauce
Was his reply!!
It wasn’t for Vernon’s’ my Dietary Vocabulary would have been ever more limited than it was until I left Home for Sports College in Cheltenham, England and it was there whilst living in halls of residence that I was forced to eat foods that I thought I didn’t like otherwise I starved and I wasn’t too keen on that idea!
So I quickly discovered every day in our dining hall that eating new foods was a mental perception rather than a fictitious allergy and become more adventurous trying more new foods that I previously wouldn’t touch. This was also due to the fact I didn’t want to appear pathetically fussy to my new friends. Although to this day you couldn’t get me to eat a Brussell Sprout if you paid me!
As far as how diet and nutrition could affect your playing performance I must admit I didn’t really give it much thought until I remember picking up a newspaper at college and in it was an article By Neil Webb who was at the time playing for Manchester Utd explaining his sudden rise in his level of performances that season and the main reason on gaining selection to the Full England International squad was the fact that he had being working with a club dietician to change and improve his eating habits . It transformed his physical condition, which dramatically increased his energy level, and therefore he had more to give in each game. So I then became curious to find out how and why this could happen and gain the knowledge And be able to transfer and benefit the players I was working with and my findings were astonishingly simple yet equally neglected at that time
MICHAEL MAGILTON
Mickey was a 17-year-old apprentice professional during my time at Norwich City. He was a really skillful left footed player who had come to the club from Belfast in Northern Ireland with a big reputation, as he was the younger brother of Jim Mailto who at the time was captain of the reserves at Liverpool F.C.
Most days after training Mickey would come up to my office and pretend to make me a cup of tea but the real reason was that he was homesick, was bored and didn’t want to go back to his digs but this was fine with me because I liked him and as I had just moved from Liverpool and was a missing my Family & Friends we swap stories about how different it was to come to live in a rural area after being used to a Big City.
One Monday I asked him how he’d played the previous Saturday and he told me he was running the show in the first half but complained that the coach had pulled him off after only 15 minutes of the second half and told him he had played well but he had substituted him because he wouldn’t last the full game. Is the coach right? I asked him " yeh! I suppose so" he said reluctantly Why is this? I asked him. He just replied, " Don’t know " and he really didn’t.
On Saturday mornings I used to go along to the training ground to watch The Youth team this was a squad packed with talent in fact I’ve just counted that eight of the 11 players playing that day went on to become full pros and are now still playing in the English Leagues. Eight out of eleven that is a staggeringly high ratio. Normally it would be between 1- 3players would "make it from any one age group. The point being Mickey was a skillful as any of them so why didn’t he make it?
It wasn’t for about a month or so later until I discovered why this was the case. It was Friday afternoon and Kit Called me into his office "Tone, The youth team have an away game down in against Queens Park Rangers in London in the morning and Webby the Youth Coach would like you to go down to assist him, do you want to go? Your kidding me of course I do. I shut his door but couldn’t contain how pleased I was clenching my fists above my head as I danced down the corridor; at 19 years old this was a great learning experience for me being exposed to such talented players.
We tied the game 1-1 Bradley Allen Scored their Goal and everything went well until on the way home a stone flew up and smashed the windscreen of our Van so we had to pullover and wait for someone to come out and replace it. As time went on the players were getting restless and hungry so Webby told me to take them over the road were there was a chip shop and convenience store. I told the lads they had $3 each to spend on what they wanted and notice Mickey just got a bag of fries and went into the convenience store and bought chips and soda. I didn’t think much of it as the rest of the lads were doing pretty much the same.
The following week Mickey came into my office and as he went to sit down I heard a rustling and crunching noise from his coat. What was that I asked thinking something had broken in his pocket. " Oh its OK its me crisps he said. He the proceeded to pull out two full bags of Worcester Sauce Chips followed by six or seven empty packets it was like a magician pulling handkerchiefs out of his top pocket! I love em he told me with no embarrassment or hesitation as I talked to him it became apparent that He wasn’t eating any real breakfast and grabbing 2- 3 bags of crisps on the way to training every morning. Is that what you eat before a game I asked him. Yeh ! Why?
No wonder he was running out of gas in games he had nothing inside him to give him the amount of energy required to last 90 minutes. When I explained it to him he was really surprised but by that time it was too late for him the decision had already been made to release him.
His brother Jim is currently playing for Southampton in the English Premier League earning several thousand dollars per week. The last I heard Mickey was working in a clothes store back in Belfast. How often must he think that could be me?
DIET & NURTITION; FUSSY EATER
RUSSELL DUNCAN
I first came across Russell when he was an eight year old at a Soccer School I was running in Portlethen, which is near Aberdeen in Scotland. I remember that week well because I didn’t sleep a wink for three nights .We were staying in a guest house called Windy Hill I should have known better with a name like that .The wind wasn’t the only thing howling during the night it turned out the owners bred "Lassie "dogs and when the wind stopped the dogs would start yelping and barking! Nightmare but they were a lovely couple that spoilt us rotten washing our training kit and feeding us like kings every night so we didn’t complain just in case that treatment stopped!!
Russ used to brush his thick dark hair back and this together with his dark skin affectionately earn him the nickname "Elvis" If you have ever spent a winter in Scotland you’ll know its more likely to have blue skin than dark skin and suntans are completely out of the question. Two weeks of 60 degrees is considered a heat wave!
Russ was a great little player and even at the tender age of eight showed tremendous potential and was a little goal machine. He was a really big kid for his age but he would surprisingly enough he Would get pushed of the ball by players who were much smaller than him.
I remember his older brother being on the course and I told him your Russell is a good player how old is he expecting to get an answer of ten he stunned me when he replied eight He won the most promising player of the week and was invited to trials for the TWS representative squad although I never expected him to attend as it was all the way down in Gt Yarmouth in the South of England. As fate would have it his Father was a long distance Lorry Driver who regularly traveled the 10 hours down there to drop off fish in the coastal resort of Gt Yarmouth and Russ wanted to come so him and his Buddy Mark Malcolm made the trip down with his father.
The reason for this soon became apparent when he and his parents showed great courage and at eight years old he would travel over 5 hours to stay with me for coaching in North Wales during his school holidays.
The first time he came down he was really quiet which was normal especially considering his age but as soon as he got on the training field with the other talented players who had traveled from Ireland, Scotland and England we soon realized we had discovered a real diamond he was banging I goals from everywhere with both feet against kids that were mainly two years older than him.
After training we went back to the hotel for lunch and my Mum had cooked Soup, Chicken Nuggets, Mashed potato and beans for all the players.
Now, First Meal time together is when I always sit down for 10 minutes to explain how important it is for players to eat well and why. Whilst I am doing this my assistant coaches always look around the room to catch the facial expressions of the players and those that are looking all confident you know won’t have a problem, and then you see a couple of little faces that look that you see in a dentists waiting room! Scared to death -Petrified. As the food came out I informed the lads that nobody was to leave their table until their plates had been checked. Sure enough most players wolfed their food down like they hadn’t been fed for a week! So of they went then there were those who weren’t looking too comfortable pushing their food around their plates and not really eating anything. I asked them what’s the matter with your food, don’t like beans one says. Have you ever tried them? No! So how do you know you don’t like them then? Well if you don’t try them you won’t be training this afternoon! So down go the beans Fork in one hand Glass of water at the ready in the other hand. Then comes that old pretending to be sick trick followed by an almighty Yak!! Job Done well played off you go.
Then there was Russell Sitting there elbows on the table Sobbing into his hands and he hadn’t touched a thing just pushed everything around the plate to look as if there had been some activity His friend Mark Malcolm had stayed with him even though he had finished ages ago and he was saying come on Russ just try it - its nice, Russ would just shake his head and sob a little harder!
So I thanked Mark for being a good friend and then told him he could leave. As the waitress came round I asked Russ if it was O.K. if she took his plate! A quick nod of a head still buried in his hands and the plate was gone. I told Russ how well he had done in training and how impressed I was that he had come down at such a young age and from what I could see he had the potential to become a great player one day, By this time he was looking at me eyes all red and Puffy from forcing out all those tears. Would you like to be a great player Russ? Yes! Well to do that you need a lot of energy and do you know where that energy comes from? Food he replied. That’s right so how do you expect to get energy from not eating anything? I won’t that’s right. So would you like me to help you because at your age I was a really fussy eater too? Yes please was his answer. What’s you favorite food Russell Pizza! What sort of Pizza? Plain Pizza! O.K. then tonight we will have Pizza for dinner if that’s ok with you Russ. That was greeted with a big nod the head and half a smile!
Sure enough at dinner he finished his Pizza without any problems and looked all proud of himself in front of the other players so I made a point of Congratulating him. Later that night I asked him to come and see me if he wanted me to make him a great player. As I among the phone in my office I hear a knock on the door Come In I shouted but nobody did so I put the phone down and went to see who it was. There he was standing in the hallway. Have you come to see me Russ? Aye! Good come in then Mate, look at these soccer magazines and I’ll be with you in a moment I told him.
As we talked I asked him what else he liked to eat and he thought about it for a while and informed me he also liked toast and ham sandwiches too! Nothing else? No! I asked him if his Mother got cross with him for being so fussy. Aye! Sometimes he said Well she’s right to because If you try new foods you will be able to be stronger and This is why despite being so big you get pushed of the ball so easy and if you do this your shots will have more power in them and you will beat defenders to the ball all the time and be able to score more goals.
He agreed So we shook hands on a deal that when he went home every week he would try 3 new foods that he had never eaten before and write them on a piece of paper and mail them down to me! Down they came every week.
Dear Tony, Custard, Lettuce & Meat pie From Russell
I had spoken to both his Mother and Father about this and they were really thankful as they were really worried about his eating habits.
On the next trips Russell continued to get better every meal time although he never could get round the idea of eggs!
His performances continued to impress us and of course every time he won a tackle I would shout "See that’s the Chicken Russ Well Done" or whatever food he had just conquered that day!! And he would look at me as proud as a peacock.
Russell is now 16 and is one the most sought after players in Scotland with many Top Professional clubs after his signature as he is now a National team player and last month I watched him score for his Country playing a year up!!
Eating the right foods can work for you too.
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