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The conference, which was jointly organised by the Irish Football Association and the Football Association of Ireland, involved presentations at the Fairways Hotel on a variety of topics aimed at coaches working with male and female players up to the age of 16.  In addition, Saturday afternoon was devoted to practical demonstrations which took place at the nearby JJB Soccer Dome.

The conference kicked off on Friday night with a talk on long-term player and coach development by Pat Duffy, Group CEO of Sports Coach UK. He emphasised the importance of coaching and talked about the critical factors in player development.

Michael McGeehan, Director of the National Coaching and Training Centre, spoke about their work in promoting coaching education in Ireland and in particular their involvement with the FAI’s coach education programme.

On Saturday morning Dr Giles Warrington from Dublin City University commenced proceedings by making a presentation on recognising and avoiding burnout in young players and showed delegates how to tell the difference between fatigue and burnout.

Former Finn Harps player, Gerry Harvey, who has spent the last nine years working with young players at Chelsea FC, spoke about education and welfare issues and the problems faced by young players going abroad to play professional soccer. He pointed out that 85 per cent of all boys who have entered the English scholarship scheme are lost to the professional game by the age of 21.

The manager of Switzerland senior women’s team, Beatrice von Siebenthal, spoke about the development of women’s football in her country, the creation of an academy for women players and the decision to allow male and female players to play together up to the age of 20.

Tosh Farrell, of Everton FC and Ricardo Moniz, skills coach at Tottenham Hotspur made presentations in the morning and followed them up in the afternoon with practical sessions at the nearby JJB Sports Dome in which players from the FAI’s Emerging Talent Programme and Women’s Winter Training Camps took part.

Farrell focused on how to work with players of different abilities in the one group and keep it fun while Moniz concentrated on the importance of skill training and in particular the one v one situation.

On Saturday night, at the Conference Dinner in the Fairways Hotel, there were special presentations to former Northern Ireland goalkeeper Pat Jennings and former Republic of Ireland defender Chris Hughton, in recognition of their contribution to football and coaching.

On Sunday morning IFA Director of Coaching Roy Millar and FAI Technical Director Packie Bonner outlined to delegates how their respective associations develop the game while former Scotland manager Craig Brown spoke about the importance of Coach Education and his experiences at both club and country.

The conference finished with a panel discussion looking at issues for coaches and the two associations in relation to the development of young players. It featured Roy Miller, Chris Hughton, Northern Ireland manager Nigel Worthington and FAI Senior Tutor Noel O’Reilly and delegates were able to pose questions to some of the speakers.

“The conference has been a major success and demonstrated the insatiable appetite of coaches on both sides of the border for knowledge. We look forward to hosting it next year in Northern Ireland,” said Roy Millar.

“This was a great example of co-operation and demonstrated to coaches on both side of the border that we face the same problems and can tackle them better by pooling our knowledge and working together to solve them,” said Packie Bonner.

The entire conference was filmed and excerpts will shortly be shown on uefa.com, fai.ie, irishfa.com and eircom.net/soccer