WABC Instructor, Isley completes Guyana’s ‘Start Coaching Programme’

Feb 17, 2022 Sports

– advocates more international engagements

Kaieteur News – After successfully hosting the “Start Coaching” programme, which is a collaborative effort of the World Association of Basketball Coaches (WABC) and Federation Internationale de Basketball Amateur (FIBA), WABC Instructor, Nelson Isley, believes Guyana has great potential and would like to see it thrive.

WABC Instructor Nelson Isley

Speaking with Isley about the foundation on which the programme was constructed, he said: “It’s pretty simple. FIBA along with a lot of the coaches, we felt like that the Caribbean is a part of the world that has enormous potential. We know there are talented kids down here, but we felt like they needed some help at the grassroots. So this course comes from the World Association of basketball coaches, which now is in charge of all accreditation for coaches around the world.”
“So we felt that we starting a basic little starting coaching course, which is really a course of only about one day; six hours, and its created for Federation’s to run, but FIBA thought it would be a good opportunity to send one of us, one of the instructors around, to get the get it started. So it’s really a course it’s meant for PE teachers, for parents who may want to help their children or even for ex-players who maybe have an interest in coaching.”
“We set up a programme to do about 12 or 14 Caribbean countries and so far we’ve done Aruba Turks and Caicos, Grenada and then last week I was in Suriname and then Guyana is the fifth one and from here we go we go on to some other countries,” the former Buffalo Braves player further disclosed.
Nelson was also asked, ‘What do you think Guyana needs to take them to the next level?’, to which he replied: “Well I think it’s going to begin with grassroots coaching and that’s the basis of this course and hopefully out of this we could get a number of people who are interested and can work with young kids in the basic fundamentals of the game. Because at that age basketball deals with all the fundamentals; passing, dribbling, shooting, footwork, and as they get older and they have these basic skills down, you can begin to make better players out of them and then you get into coach at a higher level.”
“I would say to a country like Guyana, who I think has a lot of talent, that you’ve got to branch out and begin to play more internationally because you can stay here for 365 days and if you don’t get out of here and play against people better than you then you’re not going to get better.”
“I think this a country that has some good potential, I think you’ve got some good leadership in the Federation, so I’m just wishing them the best and hope this will help. Because after this, the better coaches, we want to promote them up to take the WABC level one, because we’re trying to get a uniform system in the world where we have coaches that are competent, very competent coaches under the WABC curriculum. These courses that are come in level one, two and three, they’re not easy. They’re not easy. We’re looking to get the best coaches from each country that will be certified.”

Discover more from Kaieteur News

Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.

Latest News