Capello gives World Cup insights

Tue 27th Apr 2010 | Football Industry Events

ENGLAND manager Fabio Capello gave an exclusive and revealing insight into the art of successful football management at a private forum for 50 sporting and business heavyweights organised by Leaders in Performance. Capello discussed in depth the FIFA World Cup and penalties, creating a winning team, the importance of team spirit, leadership, and his motivations in football. The following are some of the insights given by the England Manager:

On Team Spirit:

“Spirit is one of the most important things for a team. You need to have a good spirit to win. 

When I went to Real Madrid they had not won anything for 3 years which is strange for a club the size of Real Madrid. Inside the dressing room there were 3 different teams – a South American group, Spanish group and the others. I had to work really hard to break these different groups down and bring everyone together – I had to make strong decisions and make sure there was a spirit within the team – when the group found the spirit of the shirt they won.”

On The Importance of Leadership:

“Leadership is vital, you can’t buy it. You need to have it to be successful. The players will follow a strong leader, you need to be able to convince the players of your methods and ideas at all times and you can only do this by being a good leader.”

On Motivations in the game:

“The challenge motivates me the most. I love the challenge. The challenge of winning exists every day. The game is always changing and you always need to be preparing for your next game – you can never be sure what will happen with the players; form and injuries is part of the game and sometimes no matter how much you prepare and study, things change. You need to learn to be able to adapt and that is what I love.”

On Preparing for the World Cup:

“I spoke with the winners from the past, I spoke with Lippi, I spoke with Aragonese, I spoke with Scolari, I tried to understand everything, you need to understand even the little things. You need to be strong; you need to be able to change things if you need too. The spirit of the group is really important, with Lippi we talked about Italy when they won last time, when the players had free days the players and their families stayed together, after each game they had a BBQ, it created a great spirit of the group, these are the little differences that can sometimes make the difference when it comes to winning. The managers need to understand what is best.”

On Philosophy on Penalties:

“We always practise with the penalties, the problem is that during training the goal seems wide and the goalie seems little, during the actual game the keeper seems bigger and the goals seem smaller. The hardest thing to manage is the pressure. It’s important to train, you need to practise so they have confidence – but sometimes when its time decide who will take the penalties you need to change because players are tired, you need players with confidence who want to take them. I know who will take the good penalties, but sometimes at the final moment you have to change.”

Leaders in Performance is an international conference dedicated to the business of winning on the field and is run alongside Leaders in Football, the world’s most exclusive football business event.  Both events take place over 6th and 7th October 2010 at Chelsea FC, London.

If you would like to learn more about the US Study Tour or enquire about Leaders in Performance on the 7th October 2010, please contact one of the team on +44 (0) 208 545 1595 or email performance@leadersinfootball.com

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