Judo and badminton would probably not be the first two sports thought of when looking to form a footballer, however, it would possibly be a lack of imagination. There were some in Ajax who saw things differently. Donny van de Beek of Manchester United is part of a skill generation that has benefited from the cutting-edge concepts of Dutch coach René Wormhoudt.
It was Wormhoudt who developed the athletic skills style followed through Ajax in the first component of the last decade. The precept was that other young people had to compete in other disciplines to become the most productive athletes imaginable. Racket sports have been incorporated into the program and, yes, a dojo has even been built so that those fledgling beginnings can pass at the feet.
As Wormhoudt explains, he focused on an undeniable idea.
“Focusing only on football would probably not be the most productive way for a football player. “
Now that he works as a strength and conditioning coach for the Netherlands national team, Wormhoudt still has the opportunity to paint with some of the players who passed through Ajax’s academy after his concepts were adopted: Van de Beek, now 23, one of them.
“I spoke to Donny when I heard we were going to talk,” Wormhoudt told Sky Sports in a video call from his home in Holland. program at that time. “
But how did he do it?
“Badminton for a football player is very smart for agility, footwork, speed, but it is also very useful for hand-eye coordination, spatial awareness and rotations. If you can’t rotate either side to the highest level, you notice and they’re gone, more or less. We trained a lot with him in his left and right hand, his left and right foot. “
So far, very sensitive. But judo?
“I grew up with judo and martial arts,” Wormhoudt says. “What I learned was that if you can like him, if you can have greater balance and skills, you can be a better football player.
“Judo makes you very aware of the fall and when you’re not afraid of the ground, you make other decisions in your balance strategy. Zlatan Ibrahimovic did martial arts and wasn’t afraid to fall. Some guys who played outdoors and were volleyball” goalkeepers learned not to be afraid, but top players don’t know how to fall properly.
“What I learned from practicing judo is that even if someone is more powerful than me, I can know which way we’re going. I can use your strength to my merit. This way, if I’m completely comfortable with my balance, I can use it to my advantage when you push me.
“Another merit is fundamental strength. This is for functionality and injury prevention. Judo also has an absolutely different football culture. All this brings you everything you can use on the field. You can excel more because you’re exposed to other ideas. “. . “
Wormhoudt has become accustomed to resistance, especially from his fellow coaches. If you ever had louis van Gaal and other influential Ajax figures, it’s a club familiar with schisms, where the battlefield of concepts can be bloody. have moved away from a program that devoted part of the time to other sports.
Parents also their methods.
“Many parents think that the only way to become a better player is to spend many hours on the field, however, it’s just a concept of quantity. The concept that if I spend more hours than you on the field, I’m going to be bigger isn’t fair. What about quality, what am I doing? You still want to play football, but that’s just a component. It’s hard for other people to accept. “
Wormhoudt understands the elite game and is well aware that spending time on football’s main points remains vital, but is armed with studies suggesting there is a better way.
“My colleague, Professor Savelsbergh, showed me a study in the UK that found that young people who played 3 or more sports at the age of 11 were much more likely to form a national team in one of those sports. a smart year old in football?We tell them to avoid the tennis game. “
He tells stories about Johan Cruyff and his fascination with baseball, Marco van Basten and his rare ability with a racket in his hand. “I’ve worked with him a lot and he’s an example of what I’m talking about. At that moment he practiced a lot of squash, but at that moment he practiced many other sports, even dived, flipped back, etc.
“Ruud van Nistelrooy told me he was doing taekwondo and other sports and that helped him as a striker in football. “
Again, yours are backed by evidence.
“There are many studies in Belgium that supported my concepts at Ajax. They found that when you trained in a game for two hours, you had a safe motor IQ. When you were training for six hours, your IQ was increasing. Logic. But when you trained for two hours in three other games, your IQ increased. In fact, spending two hours doing another 3 games equals six hours making a game, so in less time, you’ll be informed faster.
“If you need to make a better football player, you need to make a better user and it all starts with the brain. This is a much larger area. If you’re skilled, this won’t be enough at the level. a lot of other things you need.
“Basic motor skills like moving with the sound of music are also very vital to your motor skills, adaptation, decision making, form popularity and anticipation.
“This variety is so important. You want other reports because it improves your ability to adapt. You can get very special if you can adapt better than the other. “
“But if you don’t exercise your adaptability, you have less popularity in ways, anticipation, decision-making, etc. So we have to expand the cerveau. se on, it’s too late and it sounds horrible
“It’s a more holistic approach. “
Since then, Ajax have moved away from this approach.
“Other people have come in, ” said Wormhoudt. Ve with the dojo where they judo. Go to the gym. They couldn’t get rid of the athletic skills track so it’s still used for rehabilitation, but it’s not the way I was looking for it as intensely as it was.
“It’s a case now. The fact that we remain number one after spending some of our time doing other sports demonstrates the fact of this in Belgium. You can be effective with fewer hours and use the rest of the time to expand your sport. “”skill”.
In fact, it is desirable that there is now a generation of emerging skills at Ajax, adding team members who have captivated Europe so much by reaching the Champions League semi-finals in 2019, which were developed according to Wormhoudt’s ideas.
“It gave me great satisfaction. I’m very careful to say it’s my influence. I can’t say that. That’s what I’d say. I’ll wait for other people to wake up. “
Meanwhile, Wormhoudt expands its vision beyond elite sport: it created the Athletic Skills Model and Skills Garden, a solution for public spaces, wonderful playgrounds designed to optimize youth learning and health.
“Young people played outside,” he explains. “They were climbing and would play in combat. He’s already gone. So we have to complete this development. It’s my concept at Ajax.
But the benefits of a varied career, a course that allows you to become a footballer, also have many fitness benefits. They can be implemented to anyone. Less injuries. A more fitness lifestyle. Less abandonment, more creativity and a longer sports life. a much broader idea. “
Naturally, he incorporated his ideals on the need for a variety of skills to expand the flexible athlete in the field of skills. “I implemented it in the design,” he adds.
“I put a lot of asymmetrical portions because it develops our creativity. When we were kids, we used to play with streetlights and cars. But when the adults came in, everything became symmetrical, so we lost that creativity and because not playing outdoors has a double effect.
“I continue to expand and innovate. It’s about building a world. “
As for Van de Beek, he has to make some adaptations to adapt to a new life in the Premier League and, fortunately, he has had them in that sense.
“It has to temporarily adapt to a new scenario and a new game intensity. Not only in matches, but also in training. I hear players talk about the Premier League and say it’s much more intense than the Dutch league, so it is” is going to be interesting. How will it adapt? I hope I’ve taught you a lot about adaptation. “
It is also time for the anecdote to illustrate this point.
“It’s funny,” Wormhoudt adds, “I talked to Jari Litmanen about ice hockey training and asked him what he had learned. He said he had learned to make decisions quickly, but the other thing he had learned not to go to duels was the kind of thing, the adaptation.
“I hope Donny can take this with him because he’s not the right guy for duels. He has to think and act faster than the others. If this happens quickly, Manchester United will laugh at him a lot. “