SoccerCoachingBlog.com has been established by Paul and Jennifer, both of who are absolutely soccer crazy!

Paul was born in Blackburn, Lancashire and his team is obviously Blackburn Rovers FC, established in 1875. He played soccer all through the youth levels in England, signing semi pro at age 16 and then being invited to trials with a number of professional teams including Liverpool, Blackburn Rovers, Preston North End, Blackpool and Oldham Athletic.

Paul then went on to play college soccer at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland and the University of Illinois in the USA, winning the National Collegiate Club Championship in 1988.

Paul began coaching at 17 years old and obtained various licenses including the United States Soccer Federation A Licence and the English Football Association Prelim. His mentor was Roy Tunks who played over 750 games as a professional player in England and went on to be the goalkeeping coach at Blackburn Rovers and Newcastle United.

Paul moved to the USA in 1996 and set up the Soccer Center of Excellence in Northern California. He grew this business to include an indoor soccer arena, two soccer stores and a fitness facility.

He had over 140 youth and adult teams playing in his leagues both indoors and outdoors, as well as over 300 kids each week in his soccer clinics. In total over 3000 players a week of all ages and abilities were involved in his leagues, clinics, camps and tournaments.

Paul sold his business in Sept 2006 and was immediately appointed the Head Men’s Soccer Coach at CSU Maritime Academy in Vallejo, CA. The previous coach quit the week before school was to start and Paul was asked to take over and get the team though the upcoming season. This was a wonderful challenge and by the end of the season the team had improved considerably. The team finished off the season unbeaten in their last three games including beating a team 4-3 that had beaten them 5-0 at the beginning of the season.

Paul and Jennifer then relocated to Southern California and within a week of moving Paul was appointed the Head Men’s Soccer Coach at Whittier College, an NCAA Division III School playing in the very competitive Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC).

Paul was hired as the 5th coach in 5 years and faced a similar challenge to the one he had at CSU Maritime Academy. Again, this was a tough test, but over the last four years Paul has led the team to their best seasons since the 1970s, qualifying for the Play Offs the last two seasons and placing the most number of players on the conference first and second teams two years on the run. Paul achieved these results in spite of being the only part time temporary coach in the conference.

Over the 4 years at Whittier College, the team won 2, 3, 9 and 10 games respectively, doubled the goals scored from 14 to 28, reduced goals conceded from 55 to 28, a reduction of goals against per game from 3.06 to 0.89 and increased goals scored per game from 0.78 to 1.47.

At the end of the 2010 season Paul resigned as the head coach due to the demands of a young family and trying to balance the workload of two jobs. Paul had completed his 4 year commitment to the men’s soccer program at Whittier College and handed over the reigns to two of his seniors to continue the development of the team.

Jennifer Walmsley has played soccer all her life, starting with youth soccer and AYSO, progressing through club soccer with the Irvine Strikers, ODP and high school. She played college soccer at the Solano Community College and was the assistant coach at Contra Costa Community College. Jennifer has played and coached on various women’s competitive teams and continues to play for the Hermosa Beach Women’s Premier Team.

Jennifer and Paul are glued to the Fox Soccer Channel every night and they watch numerous games as part of Paul’s recruiting efforts. They travel to Europe as often as possible to visit their families (Paul’s in England and Jennifer’s in Norway). Their last trip included watching Manchester Utd. vs Espanyol in Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s Testimonial at Old Trafford, as well as Rosenborg vs Molde in Trondheim, Norway.

Jennifer and Paul are excited to help grow a soccer community of coaches who can interact, share ideas and challenges and improve their overall standard of coaching.

Let’s Talk Soccer…….