Martí Zuviría was the Aide-de-camp to General Antonio de Villarroel Peláez during the Spanish War of Succession (1701-1714). His childhood had been shaped by Bazoches: the modern military engineering school of Sébastien Le Prestre de Vauban —the father of the discipline. There, the Ducroix brothers, Armand and Zeno, took on the task of developing in Martí the skills a dexterous military engineer needed to possess. The Ducroix method was anything but lenient or indulgent; on the contrary, it was an enervating system of uninterrupted physical and mental exertion. Even with his eyes shut, Martí had to remain fully attentive at all hours.
Here is an example:
«You have succeeded in becoming truly alert when, even as you are distracted, you remain alert. Do you take my meaning? Of course not. Nor, at one time, did I. It has to be internalized. At a certain point, you will think your mind wanders, but the alertness mechanisms are still on, keeping close track of things.
For lunch one day, I was given a plate of chickpeas. The Ducroix brothers were eating with me that day, and they noticed the second my mind began to wander.
Armand whacked me on the forehead with a ladle. “Cadet Zuviría! How many chickpeas on the plate? Answer immediately!”
I quickly ate a spoonful before answering: “There were ninety-one. Now, eighty-one.”
They were delighted. And I had not made it up. I myself was not aware that I knew the answer —until they put the question to me. The mouthful I ate was to vex them, and to demonstrate that I was now being observant continuously, not just from time to time in isolated moments.
Each time I exited the Spherical Room [a room without any corners, egg-shaped, pure whitewashed walls full of objects of all kinds], the question was always the same: “Cadet Zuviría, what was in the room?”
As much detail as I went into about the objects I had seen hanging up, their distances from the floor, the gaps between them, the verdict would almost always be: “Pass, but not perfect.”
Eventually, one day, at the conclusion of my list, I paused and then added: “And myself as well.”
They had told me a thousand times that the observer forms a part of what is being observed. To my chagrin, it had taken me months to grasp that I also was one of the things in the room. Maybe this will seem a simple lesson in humility or even a not tremendously witty play on words. However, it was anything but.
As the enemy prepared to attack my bastion, I had to see everything, enumerate everything. Our rifles, theirs; the condition of our defenses, the number of cannons, the lengths and width of their parallels; and my fear. Nothing in the world distorts reality like a dose of terror. If I was unconscious of my fear, the fear would look instead of me. Or, as the Ducroix brothers would say: “Fear will cloud your sight, then it will be doing the looking instead of your own eyes.” The world is a killer; men die storming or defending ramparts. But in fact, the whole thing is no more than a minuscule white sphere, lost in some corner of the universe, indifferent to our troubles and pains.»
—Martí Zuviría, in Victus, by Albert Sánchez Piñol
What my namesake Zuviría —friends called him Zuvi— describes has also happened to me. I imagine any of my mentors, playing the role of Armand Ducroix, asking me: “Cadet Cañellas, what is in the team?”
As much detail as I would go into the players, the synergies they brought to light when they combined, the traits their uniqueness made emerge, their verdict would be: “Pass, but not perfect.”
Eventually, one day, at the conclusion of the list, I would pause and then add: “And myself as well: the coach.”
Just like Zuvi could not see himself in the Spherical Room he was in, I could not see myself within the team I was leading. It had taken me years to grasp that I also was one of the components of the team. The observer forms a part of what is being observed just as the coach is a part of the team he leads.
As the opponent prepares to attain functionality by perturbing ours, I am someone who —through the unique lens of my role— must also provide efficiency to the team. I must consider the names and relationships of our forwards, midfielders, defenders, goalkeeper —as well as everyone contributing from the sideline; which environments are shaped by our opponents; the information relayed to me by the technical staff; and, also, my capacity to help the team striving for efficiency. Undervaluing the coach’s role when it is exercised wisely only leads to problems for the team.
The fact that the coach does not physically participate in the team’s on-field play does not mean he is isolated from it. His direction from the sideline neither places him in a position inferior nor superior to the players on the field; it does not strip him of any right to be part of the team. With the peculiarities inherent to his role, the coach is simply another team component. Just like the midfielder, the goalkeeper, or the video analyst, the coach must perceive and act, combine, synergize… in pursuit of the team’s shared purpose. Maybe this will seem a simple lesson in humility or even a not tremendously witty play on words. However, it is anything but.
When I entered the room and started leading teams, I was not aware at all that I was inside. I am not proud of it at all, but I do not think it hurts, sometimes, to remember where you came from. The Ducroix brothers divided the human race into two: moles and Maganons [this is how the ancient Greeks referred to military engineers]. Ninety-nine out of a hundred were blind as moles. A good Maganon would notice more things in one day than a mole would in a year. I was a good mole: I did not see any of the objects in the room; I only saw myself. I was stuck in my head, in my imagination, seeing “universal” mental models, detached from any context, visualizing its perfect implementation in the “real” world. Yes, Martí: “You remind me of myself when I was a moron.” There was no favorable wind because I did not know where I was going. I have shared this before: I used to believe that a coach’s job was to teach movements —which is not synonymous with skills— constantly, to intervene every time something in reality did not align with their mentality, or to continuously instruct the behavior of every player.
With some justification, now, I dare to criticize coaches whose teams succeed in spite of the actions they take. Because I know what it feels like. Because I doubt that a coach’s quality is directly proportional to the number of interventions he makes. Likewise, a coach does not add value or contribute to efficiency simply by refraining from intervention. He must excel at intervening appropriately: at the right time and in the right way. And, during the moments when intervention is unnecessary, he must refrain from action; because doing nothing is far better than intervening wrongly.
I still had a long way to go before discovering, before realizing, this. But as I accumulated dead skin and various lessons, I finally started to see the room I was in. I began to notice some objects. Their beauty. However, it emerged an emotional antagonism toward everything I used to be and no longer believed in. I suppose that’s why I started seeing the room… but no longer saw myself within it. I had done so poorly that I completely rejected what I had been.
Path dependence led me to believe that a coach’s job was to let the team and each player express themselves. Of course, since for years I had been the only one in the room expressing… now it was time to compensate. To me, back then, the observer did not form a part of what was being observed anymore. The coach was not a part of the team he led. My actions were shouting that my role as a coach was to step aside and let the players express themselves: to state the task, not intervene… and let the team figure things out. A mere component of the team with fewer rights. I had to give up my seat on the bus. Unconscious of my singular role, the team was losing a key component with some potential to solve the challenges we faced on the field.
I assumed that for something meaningful to come out of the training process, the performer had to be a co-designer of it rather than a mere executor. Which, without a doubt, is how it should be. But I misinterpreted what being a co-designer of the process truly meant. I assumed —one day I hope to discover why— that co-designer meant “change of designer”, “let the player choose his own training”, or even “to hell with the teacher, the coach, and all his knowledge”.
So, at the padel academy, when foreign players came for a couple of days to train or when I had a private training here and there, I would start with: “What do you want to improve? What would you like to work on?” I believed —what a moron I was!— that co-designing meant they, the learners, were the designers; that I, the coach, was simply the recipient of an instruction to follow. As if the coach were useless, a simple dispensable tool. Everything depended on a learner who, more often than not, came onto the court with unfounded and false assumptions due to a lack of knowledge. I would end up, then, spending the whole session feeding balls, bucket after bucket, “practicing” the smash, repetition after repetition, all while thinking; “What a waste of time! If only we worked on the aggressiveness of the volley, their smash would improve so much more!” But, of course, I was “co-designing”. I believed I had to let them express themselves. I could not see myself within the Spherical Room; I, the coach, had no right to express myself.
Then —I do remember this— Ferran Adrià made me question things. When a guest walked into elBulli —the greatest restaurant in history— Ferran Adrià did not hand them the finest tools in the world —tools they could never fully master— and ask them to create their personalized tasting menu. But all the opposite: he used all his knowledge and tools to maximize the satisfaction of the person dining at his restaurant. The guests did not even have a menu to choose from. At most, they could only say if they had any allergies or intolerances. The menu? That was Ferran’s responsibility, the expert’s job. Ferran co-designed to perfection: his tasting menu, with few questions, was a great collaborative creative process between all components involved, working together, collectively. This, I think, is what it means to be a co-designer: to fully appreciate all the knowledge of the master, while fully considering the other parts involved in the process, the desires of —in certain cases— an intelligent, but inexperienced, learner, player… or guest. Being able to bring forth a meaningful result that addresses the needs of everyone involved in the process. Ferran, the genius, co-designed so flawlessly that no one could say no to him. Because the audience cannot be asked about what has to be co-designed, what has to be invented. If Henry Ford had asked people what they wanted, they would have said: “Faster horses.”
I have learned that if I ever have children, I would never let them design the family vacation. Imagine arriving in some unfamiliar place and saying: “Okay! Choose and tell us what we should do for you! What is the plan?” Intelligent beings, with so much of the world to see… would they make the best decision? I learned this from my parents. I was doing all the opposite as a coach. My parents did not even need to ask us because they already knew us well enough. They proposed a plan, altruistically, designed for us, lovingly tailored to our personal constraints: passions, desires, dislikes… and more. They truly understood what co-designing meant. Because, if they knew us well, they could undoubtedly take actions that fulfilled our wishes far better than we could have imagined ourselves.
Like Ferran, I was a part of the Spherical Room but, unlike him, I was not aware that I was inside it. I had the power —and great importance— to intervene, more or less continuously, in modulating challenging and meaningful constraints for the benefit of the team... but I rejected it. And despite this lack of awareness and rejection, I continued to be the coach of the team, to be inside the Spherical Room, and every action I did still impacted the team and conditioned their expression. As one of my mentors would tell me: “Since not intervening also influences the team, one must be very skilled in knowing when and how to intervene. Because not intervening is also a form of intervention.”
If the coach steps aside, he is not contributing his grain of sand to ensure the most meaningful result emerges for all team members. A team is not made up of the players on one side and, separately, the coach and their staff; nor it is the coach “against” the players, trying to convince them. The coach is just another component of the team, different or peculiar… like every other agent involved.
This, says Óscar Cano, is the great legacy of Josep Guardiola i Sala: achieving that all his teams are dominant —a personal necessity from Pep?— without distorting the essential qualities of his players. The creator of an efficient style that does not force any player to compete by imitating someone other than themselves. Every team member, the striker, the goalkeeper, the assistant coach, the physiotherapist, and even the fitness trainer —if they can remember to step out of the gym and look up from the laptop feeding them WIMU data— has their own personal constraints that must serve the team.
I do not believe the rapist Dani Alves ever thought: “On this play, I will do nothing so Messi and the others can express themselves.” He connected with Messi in the best way he could for the benefit of the team. At most, in a specific situation, he might have thought: “I will not intervene here because I will pin down a defender, which will help the team score.” Likewise, I doubt Messi ever thought: “I will constantly, hyperactively intervene in every play because that’s what my ego demands.” If anything, he likely did so in certain adverse situations or when he assumed the leadership that a team searching for functionality required. Messi, with his personal constraints, intervenes —directly or indirectly, actively or passively— in the best way possible to make the team as efficient as it can be in the environments it inhabits. I assume that, like Messi, Guardiola neither avoided intervening to “let others express themselves” nor over-relied on his intervention to satisfy his own needs alone. I suppose Guardiola mastered, as Óscar Cano put it, the art of intervening from the uniqueness of his role for the common good. He worked for the team and with the team to achieve goals, solve problems, and overcome challenges.
With time, I realized that in the team —coach included, with the same rights— there is a collective purpose across different levels and timescales: scoring a goal, the team’s victory, winning the league title. And that I had to value myself, appreciate myself a little, and adopt a behavior governed by the desire to achieve the collective purpose. That’s precisely what the coach’s role should be: to intervene when he can bring efficiency, clarity, a bit of light, for the collective. And, if he can’t, at the very least, not cause harm… because a coach is no paid to shout or intervene as much as he can. This does not mean that he should not set rules, build walls, promote slopes, convince, prohibit, or get involved... if he does so because what he sees makes him believe it does not help achieve the team’s purpose.
The team emerges from authentic components interacting throughout the season, in a task or during a match, to become more efficient, to win, and to achieve its purpose. The coach is just one more: another member who must use the advantages of his role to help the team reach its objectives. So, coach: use the power of your role to enhance the collective functionality. Make sure the team combines, works together, in the best possible way to be more efficient. This should guide your intervention.
Nowadays, after what I choose to become from what happened to me, I try to see the objects with the highest possible resolution… and I also see myself within the Spherical Room I am in. I try to see everything, to miss nothing. The observer forms a part of what is being observed. The coach is a part of the team he leads. Because when authority is ashamed of being so, its pedestal is never left empty. The idea of not voting does not exist. Carles Capdevila marveled when a couple told him: “We want to be parents without letting it change our lives.” One cannot be a coach without influencing their team. A coach, whether they like it or not, continuously builds a citadel that must be inhabited. He has the duty to build the one that best adapts to the context: who inhabits it, and in which landscapes the stones are laid. You are either in or out of the room. If you are in, you have to take a stand. It is impossible to coach, educate, and not influence; to avoid presenting, directly or indirectly, a lifestyle or a society one envisions as ideal.
That’s why the responsibility of those who lead groups is enormous. I aim to influence in a way that, according to the Ducroix spectrum, everything I do and that impacts the players brings them closer to the Maganon extreme rather than to the mole one. That if I leave tomorrow, those I have influenced become more adaptive. Guiding them without making them dependent on me. Perhaps that’s redundant. Adaptive is —or should be— synonymous with autonomy. But do not take my word for it. Never stop questioning what I preach.
Martí Cañellas | Fosbury Flop
