Anthony Hudson Speaks out on Time at Colorado Rapids: “It was my Mistake.”

Bangkok, Thailand – Former Colorado Rapids manager Anthony Hudson spoke recently spoke to RG Media. It was a really good read. He had a really humanizing discussion about his difficult home life growing up that affected him. He also speaks about his coaching journey and why the transition from being a national team manager didn’t translate well to the club game. Here’s what he said about his time

“One of the biggest things was I just love being on the training pitch and after 6-7 years in international football, I felt like I wanted to be on the training pitch every day, so that was the motivation there. The biggest difference is what I learned when I went to Colorado (Rapids) is when when you’re with a national team, you pick a group, when the squad comes in you set out your plan, this is what we’re doing, this is how we’re gonna play, this is how we’re gonna train, and these are our objectives, culturally, this is how we’re going to be.

“So we can be a team and we can be have high standards, and you get to the end of the camp, and you say goodbye to everyone, and when you start reviewing and planning for the next one, if there’s players that may be not up to the level, or players that may not fit into how you want to play or culturally not the right fit, it’s easy just to leave them off the list. When you go into club football, you have a group of 24-27 players for the whole season. That’s the biggest difference.

“You have to work with what you’ve got, and you have to get the best out of the the players you have and find ways to work with those players. I came from an environment in New Zealand, where it was very cut and dry. This is what’s expected, If you don’t do it, you won’t be in the squad and then going to Colorado. I probably took a lot of that demand into that team where actually, you have to adapt a little bit. So I think that was the biggest learning going into club football, doing it that way around, anyway.

“There’s a manager called Marco Gianpaolo who was at Sampdoria a few years, and I actually had been to Sampdoria a couple of times and met with Marco and was very close with his assistant. I went and watched them train, and the way they trained was unbelievable, it was something I’d never seen.

“Going to Colorado, I really persisted with a plan of ‘This is how we’re going to play,’ and when I look at Man United now and other teams, I just can’t understand why managers don’t adapt but I certainly didn’t do that when I was in Colorado. I I really persisted with a way of a way of playing, and unless you have the time to be able to execute and bring players in, unless you have that time, it’s irrelevant. You have to get results early, you have to find a way to win with what you’ve got early on, and I think I was in a sort of a false sense that I would have the time to be able to do that, but you quickly realize you don’t, and that was a big lesson for me.”

“I remember the assistant of Sampdoria spoke to me after I left Colorado and said ‘Look in Italy, not only do the players want tactics, but they expect it, and if you don’t give it to them, you’re not going to be around long.’ Then he said to me, ‘In America, It’s not like that.’ And he was so right. It was a big lesson in knowing I’m in a completely different culture here, where players are coming out of college and from different places where they probably haven’t been exposed to this level of sort of detail and and tactical work. And it was my mistake to think that this was best for them. So that was a big lesson, just understanding that that culturally, where you’re at what players can take, and it was a good lesson. I’ve adapted slightly, but I’ve always been very, very detailed, very organized with lots of videos, detailed training sessions information to try and help the players.”

Does Hudson acknowledge what went wrong and how the structure needed to be different? Yes. Does he acknowledge lessons learned? Yes. Does he accept blame? Not really.

Photo Credit: John Babiak

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