'We really want to make it a super strength of ours'

The FA’s head of para performance, Cath Gilby, described the warm-weather training camp in Tenerife as an overwhelming success and believes the ‘One Para’ togetherness among the squads has the potential to become England’s ‘super strength’.

Thirty-five players and 24 staff members from our Para Lions teams took part in the six-day camp to the Canary Islands.

There are seven Para teams officially affiliated with England and representatives from six of those travelled for the ‘mid-season pre-season’ trip, staying at the GF Fanabe hotel.

The Sunday-to-Friday training camp allowed players to take part in four days of double sessions at the ‘fantastic’ Tenerife Top Training, which is regularly used by other countries and is particularly in demand this year ahead of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.

“It was an overwhelming success,” Gilby said. “Our key aims and objectives we set before we left – so it being a big physical development camp, having multi-squad interaction and it being for players and staff – we hit all of those in abundance.

“We had to be really mindful of training load for the players because it would have been too easy to hit them too hard over the course of the six days, so we spent a lot of time prepping that in advance.

“We also built into some good time between sessions and in the evenings for the players to socialise and enjoy being together.

“That is a cornerstone of our programme and the players have really taken that upon themselves now, where we as staff don’t really have to do too much to facilitate that.

“The players [from different squads] train together now and they help each other, for example we had players from the men’s Partially Sighted team helping the Blind Women and it was all organic.

“We also have some new staff, so this was a great introduction for them and a chance to not only meet the other staff but also players who are in other squads away from the teams they are assigned to.

“We hit all of our goals for the camp.”

Recovery is key 🏊

A break from the training pitch for our Para squads as they cooled off in the pool following another intense session! pic.twitter.com/gKV4CkLU5L

— England (@England) January 25, 2024

This was the second year our Para Lions have headed to Tenerife for a warm-weather training camp in January.

Gilby explained one of the major differences compared to 2023 was that this year was split more clearly into team-specific technical training in the mornings before the squads got together for physical sessions in the afternoon.

With the ‘enjoyable but hard’ physical work in the afternoon, plus the morning sessions, much of the players’ downtime was spent doing recovery work or resting ahead of the following day.

There was some enjoyable evening activities pencilled in though, as Liam Drake, Para talent inclusion lead, hosted a quiz on one of the nights and the final evening saw the return of the Pride Awards, where coaches and staff nominate players who showcase the FA Values throughout the week.

“The Pride Awards are a really good way to acknowledge what other things players bring on top of their playing ability and physical capabilities,” Gilby explained.

Catching up with @joedixoncoach_ from our England Deaf men’s team at the end of day three in Tenerife! 👊 pic.twitter.com/sZ2vVH4omW

— England (@England) January 24, 2024

The FA’s head of para performance went on to discuss how the Tenerife camp is symbolic of the progress being made in the Para programme as a whole.

She said: “The Tenerife trip shows where the players are at and where they need to progress. They don’t have the same club environments our men’s and women’s team players have, where they would be doing a lot of those aspects with their clubs rather than country. Because they don’t have that in Para teams, we felt it was really important we step up and do it with England.

“It is also a great way of upskilling, educating and raising player knowledge around different areas such as training and recovery.

“It is really showing where we are progressing in the Para programme and even since we did it in 2023, the way the players engaged, delivered and interacted with each other during the camp, underpins the One Para programme, which is the cultural piece we are really trying to drive among our seven Para teams.

“We really want to make it a super strength of ours and we are really starting to see that. It really shows how far we have come.”

It wasn’t just the staff who were happy with how the warm-weather camp went, with Gilby adding: “We had a lot of players coming up to us at the end of the camp to thank us but also to say how much they enjoyed it. You can easily see that in all the pictures and videos that went out on our social media channels.

“We have had messages from the players saying they felt this is a great start to 2024, a huge bonus and provides them with increased motivation heading into 2024.”