Advice for Ultimate Frisbee captains with no coach

I currently play competitive Ultimate Frisbee in Australia with my local club in Townsville, the Townsvillains. Together with the leadership group we plan weekly training sessions, we organise everything related to our touring tournaments and most importantly, try to be the best team we can be. The season has come to end and after reflecting on the highs and lows, I realise there are some important ideas to follow when you are a captain and your team has no coach.

Historically, I never played with a watch. It was clunky, in the way, and I never cared about what time it was. Thanks to our ever growing technology, watches are now lightweight, and tracks all sorts of data. Nothing is more annoying than having to ask your teammate every odd 10–15minutes, “Hey what time is it?” . Having a watch allows you to manage the time at your own discretion. Moreover, it allows you to make sure you are sticking to your time limits during time outs, and half time. Most importantly, I found it was very effective in helping me decide when to take a time out. Deciding on a timeout for me was always based on, how my team is performing (are we up or down in the game), how critical the point was (will winning this next point put us in an advantageous position), and what stage in the game you are in (is it very early or is it very late and every point is critical).

As a leader, it’s really easy to just get the team together and say, “Do everything better”. It is never the wrong thing to say, because if we could do that, then it would make the whole team better. A more effective speech gives the team a specific focus and goal to achieve. It’s a lot easier to get to a particular goal, when everyone is working towards the same objective. That’s why telling the team, “Focus on stopping the inside break throws since they are using that to gain movement on the field” or “Your goal this next half is to take away the unders and challenge the deeps. We have a higher percentage of generating turnovers when we force them to throw deep.” gives them both an objective and motivation to achieve that goal.

When it comes to leading by example, it’s about showing the team that you are completely invested in your decision and focus. This demonstrates to the team that they are buying into a cause that their leader has completely gone into even before they have. This creates a sense of trust and honesty. A great captain doesn’t have to be the best player on the team, but has to exemplify the culture and beliefs of the team.

Even though I probably have done this myself at some stage in my career, I really notice this when in the captaincy role and see others speaking. Most notably this happens when a team member has made a string of turnovers in the game, we take a timeout, and they start saying, “hey let’s focus on this everyone! Come on! Are you kidding me?”. Regardless of all the extra details and no matter how correct they are, in the context of the game, no one wants to listen because they are requesting something when they themselves are not delivering. My suggestion, is for those players, admit what your mistakes are, and what you need to do to fix them. This shows that you are owning up to your mistakes and that you focus on yourself before trying to remedy the team.

You’ve trained all season long, and when you are in the tournament, the only thing you are really doing as a captain is placing people into certain roles and positions. At our National competition, I went through a different set of (what I consider) motivational speeches, ranging from metaphors to just plain bizarre analogies. At least for me, the team knows I, alongside them have been sweating and putting a lot of working hours into it, so the speeches don’t matter too much, it’s just about getting every to buy in to the idea. No matter how crazy the idea is. We cheered about loaves of bread 8 times out of 10. And that worked for us.

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