DAVIS HOCKING, 1996 BORN ANB PLAYER HAD THE PLEASURE TO VISIT FC BAYERN WITH HIS FATHER DURING THE MONTH OF AUGUST.

September 7, 2010 (RELEASE) --

Read the feedback and view some photos from their visit.

Bassam,

Davis and I would like to thank you for kindly introducing us to Werner Kern, program director of the youth development program for the FC Bayern Munich club.

We spent an hour with Mr. Kern before he had to go to Italy to watch his U17 & U19 teams play some friendlies in Torino Italy.

There were three things that Mr. Kern focused on and stated were key to becoming a good soccer player and a player on the FC Bayern Munich club.

The three attributes Mr Kern talking about was soccer, school, and the personality of the player, each being very important, though soccer did come first before anything. but school and personality are also important

Mr. Kern mentioned that it doesn't matter how good of a player you are, if you have a bad personality, and are always complaining and being disrespectful to the coaches, Bayern Munich didn't want them, and I'm sure it is the same with any professional club.

On a side note, the hotel we were staying was where all the youth stayed when they were trying out for Bayern Munich. The day we left the clerk told us a story about how one kid came for a trial for Bayern Munich. A great player but his personality was terrible. The clerk told us how he threw the key for the door at him. so the clerk called Werner and told him what this player was doing and how he was acting. This player didn't even last two weeks. So personality, although it is behind soccer it is still very important.

Mr. Kern also mentioned the schedule of the players. There was two practice sessions, once a day for the entire week, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. School was three times a week, and for meals in the formation center the players were given breakfast, and lunch, but no dinner. For dinner the players were given money by the coaches, and were permitted to eat where ever they wanted. Mr. Kern said that this was a way for the players to gain maturity, and eat healthy on their own.

While we were in Munich, we were fortunate to see the first line Bayern Munich team practice. The practice we saw also happened to be the first of the season and before a big game. So it was interesting watching a professional team get ready for a big game. Their practice started much like ours at ANB, dynamic stretching, lunging, shuffling, and jogging. Other things were added also. A mirror game was played for speed of reaction with a leader and a follower, also putting very tight tenser bands around the knees and having to hop on one foot from side to side. So you would have to hop one foot to the left hold it, then to the right, while keeping your legs apart. After their warm up they did a fitness drill, somewhat like the ones at ANB. Here we use hurdles to jump over; two feet one foot jumps, two feet in between, frontward and backwards, side to side, and one foot in between, once you finish the huddles and ten meter sprint. The difference between their warm ups and ours is here we do it on our own and they use the tenser bands. In Munich they had a big tenser band around their waist held by another player to provide resistance while doing the drill. The practice session ended with a 7V7 game with one neutral, although they were not limited to the amount of touches, 90% of it was one touch.

Davis personally found it very interesting to see a top level club warm up before a big game. On a side note one thing I noticed that was very important was the respect value, all players shook the coaches hand and were silent when the coaches were talking, while in warm up and cool down there was chit-chat, but all players were focused on soccer while they were on the pitch.

Thank you again Bassam.

Robert & Davis