What is the difference between a complaint and being compliant? The simple difference may be in the position of the letter ‘I’ but at a wider level, the difference may be seen in where we put the person ‘I’. Is the person who brings a complaint being compliant? A complaint states an objection; being compliant implies obedience. Where ‘I’ fit is the big question. Interestingly, Eddie Jones, when he was the coach of the England rugby side, was interviewed by a magazine called ‘i’ in 2022 and it seemed his biggest complaint was that players were compliant. What can we make of all this?
Jones claimed that the majority of high-level rugby players came from independent schools where they were taught to be compliant, in other words, to be always obeying, obliging, yielding to orders, and therefore not have any toughness or insight when things go against them. He complained that schools’ rugby, perhaps with its emphasis on discipline, produced ‘compliant’ rugby players who could not respond to adversity, who would simply do what they were told. That would indeed appear to be deeply concerning as we do not want to produce such players. So, Jones does not want compliant players who only do what they are told; he wants players who can think for themselves, who can put into practice what is necessary no matter the situation. That is good.
While he complained that “Players are taught to be compliant,” he also went on to say that “The best teams are run by the players and the coach facilitates that.” That perhaps requires much explanation and clarification. To some, such a statement might appear contradictory: how can players run the team when the coach is to be “facilitating”? Is the coach at the side of the pitch at a professional level “facilitating” the play while screaming instructions non-stop to the players, telling them where to pass, what to do, passing on directions? He may think he is “facilitating” players but in fact he is not allowing them to run the team.
The coaches at the side of our school playing fields currently are certainly not “facilitating’” what is happening on the field; they are determining, directing, demanding, dictating what is to happen. They tell the players where to go, what to do. Far from facilitating the players they are frustrating and shackling the players. More than anywhere else and now more than ever before (considering the five Cs of twenty-first learning), coaches at school sport level should be helping the children to learn for themselves; matches are examinations to see what they have learned. Coaches are not there to give the children the answers. Players must run the teams at school for them to learn.
In a previous article, we considered the view that “good teams produce good players” (having also reflected that “better people make better players”). Now we must understand that the “best teams are run by the players” and how that is to be found in school sport. Players need to be allowed to learn to take responsibility for what happens on the pitch but to do that they must be given the responsibility for what happens on the pitch; they must learn to see what is happening and to correct it themselves, rather than be told the whole time. The coach can only facilitate that by helping the players to realise that they must make the decisions, the actions.
Jones’s biggest complaint is that players are too compliant but our biggest complaint is that all too often our school coaches actually want their players to be compliant; they certainly will not tolerate any complaints from their players but they want them to do exactly as they say, listening to their every instruction throughout. They do not allow the captain to run the team; they run the team. Oh, for the day when we see all the school coaches sitting down on the bench, quietly watching the players do their best, carefully noting questions they can ask their players (not noting what they will say) to help them understand where there is a need for a response, calmly facilitating them to run the team on the field in the best way they can. Facilitators assist learning – not winning. Winning may then come from the learning.
It is unfair, unsatisfactory, annoying, unacceptable (in other words, a complaint) that school coaches do not allow the children to run the teams, to learn from mistakes, but rather expect them to submit entirely to the coach’s every thought and word. No more compliance? No more complaints then.