The Guardian US’ Post

In my latest article, I recapped Team U.S.A.’s dominating win against Australia that advances them to their eighth straight Gold Medal Game. I wrote about who stood out, what advantages they had against Australia, and I even included why Australia has a bright future ahead! Check it out and give it a read. 🇺🇸🏀🇳🇿 https://lnkd.in/gwRf3fJB

I have not posted football related content on LinkedIn thus far, maybe I should post it sometimes. What this post is about is not only about football,but one of brilliant leadership. Ofcourse we won the Carabao cup or the league Cup, probably the least valued of trophies in England, but considering the circumstances it is not lesser than any CL kinda triumph and none of this would have been possible without the man here, Kloppo and his exemplary leadership skills and technical ability. Three lessons to learn 👆Making the best out of adversity: With such a paper thik squad due to injuries and despite losing Ryan in the first half itself, he used his technical ability to shuffle the entire formation with going on for like to like changes. It is always important to have a solid alternative plan. 💪Keeping the team motivated: It is easy to get bogged down when the team is a hospital and you are facing a team of stars like Chelsea with academy grads, but he instilled belief and hunger in them, and you could see it from how they ran Chelsea out in extra time. ✋Standing up for your team: Kloppo has always been at the front, leading and protecting his team. His refusal to shake hands with ref Kavanagh again showed it. It was disgraceful refereeing and seemed like they almost had an agenda not to let us win- with not even a card for Caicedo's tackle and the "technical offside". Kloppo is a genius, a true leader, we have learnt so much from him. Will be very difficult to see him not being on our dugout next season, maybe trophies can change his mind.

LEADERSHIP Football (again, sorry..) but I find this very interesting and I promise it's about much more than football. And I'm giving everyone an opportunity to reply tomorrow following the match to point out all the errors in the below. Togetherness 💯 Southgate is a coach who has brought the team together as a unit and has a strong vision of how the team should operate. This was based on anaylysing successful teams in competitions and finding their defining characteristic was being defensively sound. (links are all below for reference) Preparation 💯 My reference here is the work they have done to prepare for penalty shootouts -it's quite incredible. Read how the keeper behaves before and after each kick- I particulary like the way they create a 2 v 1 against the oppostion goalkeeper as England line up to shoot. I'd advise reading the twitter thread - even if football is not your thing. Performance 😐 However, he's seen as slow to change within a match - more reactive to bad situations than proactive to make it better before it gets worse. He's also clearly a very decent human being he's not someone who I would say is a great motivator. So the interesting thing is how best should this work ? Should we delegate or share more leadership given it's very rare people have everything ? How good does a leader need to be to feel confident enough to admit they can't do it all ? The team I support brought in a throw in coach (because they used data to see it was a neglected area and could give marginal gains over their rivals) -but did that only happen because it was seen as not threatening the overall leadership due to being quite niche? Have we had enough of "experts"? https://lnkd.in/gkZDGCzq https://lnkd.in/gz55WyMt Geir Jordet on X: "A subtle England penalty shootout innovation (since 2021) is their deliberate, structured & functional use of social psychology. Here, Saka is picked up by John Stones after his penalty, to swiftly welcome him back in the team. What did England do and why did they do it? 1/7 https://t.co/yuzNoXUJRq" / X

❓ Should I stay or should I go? ❓ ⚽ #Bundesliga top manager #ThomasTuchel has just answered that question for himself - but it has taken an arduous (and surprising) 3 months of back and forth to get there. 🪓 Having agreed to part ways some 3 months ago, FC Bayern München recently made a surprise U-turn to possibly continue with Tuchel after they had been turned down by the likes of #XabiAlonso #RalfRangnick, and #JulianNagelsmann (who would have been a returner at Bayern himself, see the pattern...?). ❓ If your organization asked you to step back into a leadership role they all but dismissed you from a few months ago, would you go? Why? ❓ How would you re-invent your leadership (or ask your organization to re-invent their) if you were to go back? If your tried-and-tested approach didn't work the first time, why should it the second time? ❓ Knowing that your old/new employer is backed into a corner and - for better or worse - you are their last resort. How would you play your cards? So many questions, and we thought we might have nothing to talk about once the season ends. 👇 Looking forward to your reflections in the comments! Keep the ball rolling... https://lnkd.in/e4ydmjZP #BayernMunich #leadership #PremierLeague #change #power #influence #miasanmia

Lessons from Gareth S. I remember the big tournaments back to the World Cup 1978 – when Argentina won (I remember the volume of long hair most of all, I’d never seen that before). The past few years of England football have been a proper emotional roller coaster. After finishing bottom of their group in the 2014 World Cup they followed that with more disappointing performances in Euro 2016. Enter Gareth Southgate. And the turnaround in performance is remarkable. World Cup SF in 2018, Euro Final in 2020, World Cup QF in 2022, and of course – a close second in the Final last Sunday So so close…. But it's not coming home just yet. He has also fostered a strong sense of unity amongst the players. The team loves him (bizarre that the public and the press generally don’t). I’m a fan. And I hope he chooses to stay on (if he wants to). Here is what we can all learn from Mr S. - Vision and Direction He took charge during challenging times and turned around a struggling team with clear goals and a long-term vision. Applicable Learning - Set a clear strategic direction and align efforts towards common goals. This clarity helps teams to navigate tough times and steers the organisation towards success. I’ve always been a big fan of objective trees. - Develop Talent Gareth believed in and supported younger players who many previous managers may not have taken risks on – Saka, Mainoo, Palmer, he fostered their development and built confidence. Applicable Learning  - Invest in development, recognise and realise potential, and provide growth opportunities. - Performance Improvement He led the team to consistent progress in major tournaments, showing continuous improvement. Applicable Learning - Continuously drive performance improvements. Set high-performance standards, measure progress, live by them, and celebrate success. - Build a Resilient Culture Gareth revolutionised the team's approach to penalty shootouts, transforming them from a game of luck to an exercise in control and preparation. He changed the team’s mindset towards risk. Applicable Learning - Create a resilient culture that encourages employees to embrace challenges and view setbacks as opportunities for growth. Personally I hope he stays – the WC qualifiers are just around the corner – the team is on his side – let’s get behind him. Otherwise, big Sam might return… Fingers crossed for the next one #leadership #teamwork

Total Football (soccer) is a tactical system in which any player can take over the role of any other player in a team. In this fluid system, no player is fixed in a predetermined role; anyone can successively play as an attacker, a midfielder and a defender. The only player who must stay in a specified position is the goal keeper. Soccer as well as American Football is usually dominated by formations, structure, control and planned plays. The same is the case for most management styles. Most leaders believe that control, structure, formations and planned actions (plays) is the only way you can succeed as an organization. But as the Dutch Manager Rinus Michel realized in the 70’s, if you loosen up on structure and control and allow your players (employees) the freedom to move outside the traditional formations and essentially trust them to do what needs to be done, while fluidly supporting each other, without over (micro) managing them, you often achieve even greater result and with much happier players (employees) as well. Using this strategy Rinus guided the Dutch to the 1974 World Cup finals beating both Argentina and Brazil along the way. So if you want your “team” to succeed, in a world against much "better" and structured competition, consider total football as a management strategy. You’ll be glad you did and so will your teammates, even if you don't win the "World Cup final" 😉

In tennis, perfection is impossible... In the 1,526 singles matches I played in my career, I won almost 80% of those matches... Now, I have a question for all of you... what percentage of the POINTS do you think I won in those matches? Only 54%. In other words, even top-ranked tennis players win barely more than half of the points they play. When you lose every second point, on average, you learn not to dwell on every shot. You teach yourself to think: OK, I double-faulted. It’s only a point. OK, I came to the net and I got passed again. It’s only a point. Even a great shot, an overhead backhand smash that ends up on ESPN’s Top Ten Plays: that, too, is just a point. Here’s why I am telling you this. When you’re playing a point, it is the most important thing in the world. But when it’s behind you, it’s behind you... This mindset is really crucial, because it frees you to fully commit to the next point… and the next one after that… with intensity, clarity and focus. The truth is, whatever game you play in life... sometimes you’re going to lose. A point, a match, a season, a job... it’s a roller coaster, with many ups and downs. And it’s natural, when you’re down, to doubt yourself. To feel sorry for yourself. And by the way, your opponents have self-doubt, too. Don’t ever forget that.

🚀 Calling All Football Fanatics! ⚽️ As the England vs. Denmark match looms large on the horizon tomorrow, I’ve got an exciting incentive brewing for our Midlands agencies! 🌟 🔮 The Score Prediction Challenge: Step up to the goal line and take your shot! Predict the final score of the game. Submit your score guesses before kick off (don’t be caught offside!). 🎉 Friday Victory Lap: If your prediction hits the back of the net, you’ll be entered into a draw along with others who predicted correctly and the winner can celebrate with a Friday takeaway – the perfect way to kick off the weekend! 🍔🥳 Ready to play? Drop your score in the comments below! Let’s score some goals together! ⚽️🙌 #Recruitmentagencies #recruitmentconsultant #recruitmentmanagers #umbrellacompany #marketleader

Uninspiring & Insipid... World Cup 2018 - Semi Finals 🥉 Euro 2020 - Finals 🥈 World Cup 2022 - Quarter Finals With such strong results, one could be forgiven to think that England played excellent football during these tournaments. In the last few years, England has been blessed with a wealth of talent especially in attack. ⚽ Most are amongst the best in their clubs and play terrific football for them. On paper, their squad might be in the top 3 in Europe (premier league bias maybe 🤔). But when they play for England 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿, their play is often uninteresting. Still they got some great results! England has topped their group in Euros this time as well but in a very drab fashion. (Whoopie 😅) So has the Manager (Coach) of England been successful or not during this tenure? My thoughts? - Results can be misleading. Making money on a bad stock doesn't mean it was a good investment in the first place. - The process has to be enjoyable for you and the stakeholders. If the fans are not enjoying the football their team plays, then the joy of winning will be fleeting. Legacy is built when you win trophies and hearts. ❤️ - Avoid attribution bias. We all have a tendency to attribute positive outcomes to ourselves and negative ones to external factors. What I would like is to see the talented folks play free flowing attacking football and hopefully get good results in the process. And you?

I was watching Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Finals last night as the Edmonton Oilers again beat the Florida Panthers to tie the series and send it to a decisive game 7 and this is the image I fell asleep with. Notice the look on the faces of the Panthers. Shock. Disbelief. It reminded me of being at the Men's Finals of the US Open Tennis Championship in 1999 between Andre Agassi and Todd Martin. It was tied 2 sets each. The fifth set would decide the championship. I remember Todd Martin coming on the court for the fifth set walking slowly with his head down and shoulders slouched over. And then came Agassi. He jumped out of his chair and ran to his position on the court. And guess who won the match? Agassi won the fifth set 6-0 and won the tournament. I don't know who's going to win the deciding game of the Stanley Cup Finals on Monday. But based on the body language of the shocked Florida Panthers, I'd bet on Edmonton. Of course skill is important in tennis and in hockey. But mindset is the key in both instances. The Panthers have the skill to win, but will they have the mindset to pull out the victory? As with anything else in life you need skill but you also need the right mindset. #wellness #networkmarketing #antiaging #supplements #health #nutrition #fitness #healthy #bodybuilder #preworkout #dreams #goals #epigenetics #supplements #entrepreneur #success #stanleycup #usopen #andreagassi #mindset