Hampshire Performance Centre

The environment we are looking to create within the HPC will look to further offer stretch and development beyond what the athletes have received at AC. 

The HPC will offer increased frequency of sessions and the idea of this, paired with the reduced numbers attending the sessions, is that it will allow the coaching team to deliver more focused tactical and technical coaching, not just to the group but also on an Individual level for each of the players enrolled.

The squads will consist of the players deemed to be the best performers from each AC squad across their cycles, meaning that the overall playing standard will be higher than in the AC and allow peer to peer player stretch, along with the stretch offered by the coaches within the environment. 

Key focuses for the program will be around further development of the athletes' hockey intelligence and out of possession hockey.

These are areas that are essential to player development, and in the past have often been the difference between performing at AC level and taking the next step in their development journeys. 

HPC Coaches will use feedback written by AC lead coaches to help set player development goals for the program and then monitor progress on these throughout the process. 

The groups will be small this year but hopefully grow a bit in future years. As such, I am fully aware we may need to subsidise this a bit in year one but we want to keep the cost more or less the same as the DC. Let's see how it goes!

A few things to note:

• As players are nominated out of the AC to the PC, they will go up an age group. So, an U14 AC player will  be U15 PC and so on. That means that an U17 player will be an U18 PC player and at the end of the PC, there is no further activity currently being offered in the Hampshire Pathway. You'd be forgiven to think 'what is the point?' and beyond the high level coaching, I guess there is no point. Despite that I hope that if you're nominated, you will want to have one last push with your peers, playing some great hockey!
• We have selected dates that do not clash with DC because that would give us problems with pitches and coaches. I fully appreciate not everyone will be able to attend some or all of the dates, so we are not going to make invitation to the AC assessments conditional upon attending the PC.
• If you take a place in the PC, you will not be expected to join the DC. You don't want to 'over play' and, in all fairness, the DC may not be the best environment for you. However, this may be slightly different for goalkeepers. While we will include goalkeepers in the PC, we may not be able to offer some of the opportunities specialist 1-2-1 GK coaching with a group of other GKs, DC-style, can offer. If you are a GK, you will know what I am talking about. So, if you're a GK selected for PC, you are welcome to attend the Sunday DC GK sessions free of charge if you wish. Just make sure to let us know.

I think that is it for now. If your AC coach wants to nominate you for the Hampshire PC he or she will let you know and then pass that info over to me. I will then make the necessary changes on the Pathway Management System and you will get a formal invitation which you can then accept or refuse.

If you have any questions, comments or suggestions about the Hampshire PC, please use the form below to send those straight to me.

Koo Janzen

Chairman,

Hampshire Hockey Player Pathway Group