TD Series: Mark Rogers

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TD Series: Mark Rogers

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Mark, thank you so much for taking the time to allow us to conduct this interview – to start, can you tell us a little bit about yourself?

Tsawwassen Soccer Club Technical Director. I do some local soccer media work for TSN with a weekly football show called “Footy Soldiers” which airs each Saturday morning on TSN 1040 and TSN 1410. Also, I am a TSN radio analyst for pre and post Whitecaps games and a colour commentator for Whitecaps 2 matches.

Can you expand a bit on your playing and coaching background?

I spent 8 seasons in England playing 7 with Wycombe Wanderers and 1 with Stevenage. At Wycombe we qualified for the FA Cup semi final in 2001 eventually losing 2-1 to Liverpool. I spent a number of years playing for the Canadian National Team representing them at the 2002 Gold Cup placing third. On retirement from playing I have worked with the UBC men and women, BC provincial team programs, with the Canadian men’s national team and most importantly with my hometown youth club in Tsawwassen.

How did you get into coaching – what was the defining moment that made you realise this is what you wanted to do?

On retirement in 2006 myself and Mark Watson assisted my old UBC coach Mike Mosher with the UBC men’s team. We won the National Championship and it was a fun experience. It was around that time that I began to be interested in coaching.

Who was / is your biggest influence?

I have always had a good relationship with Mike Mosher. He was my coach at UBC, then became a friend and mentor for my coaching career.

There seems to be a bit of a misconception on what a Technical Director actually does – can you shed some light on what your typical day is like when you have your TD hat on?

I can’t really comment on what other technical directors do. Too often the titles of Technical Director and Head Coach are intermingled when really they are very different jobs. For me a Technical Director guides the philosophy of the club which should fall in line with our National plan. The director should then implement programming to achieve targets within the plan and philosophy. The Technical Director should be responsible for managing a staff of qualified coaches and then oversee the education of the clubs players. The direct education of the players should be the...

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[Regs]

So far, we've heard from a number of people off-site with positive feedback on Mark's interview here!

What do the members here think? Anything you've taken away from the article that maybe you were not aware of?

Cheers,

Regs.

 

[DJones]

Excellent interview with direct questions and well thought out answers from Sparky!

Enjoyed the read and hope to read more!

DJ

 

[Mike Meade]

Really liked this. Nice job.

 

[TKBC]

excellent series - looking forward to growth!