Game is the teacher? Understandings and misunderstandings of games-based approaches

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Background: Games-based approaches (GBA) have emerged as popular approaches to team sport coaching in recent decades. Despite the widespread adoption of GBA in some coaching populations, misinterpretations have arisen through both mediated and unmediated learning channels. This has the potential to detract from implementation, despite a significant body of research from multiple theoretical perspectives.Purpose: Given the popularity of GBA in the literature and applied coaching practice, an investigation into the impact on player development and coaching attitudes was warranted.Methods: Gaelic games are a set of team sports indigenous to Ireland and provide an example where the national governing body has advocated for GBA for some time, through mediated and unmediated sources. Using separate focus groups with parent coaches (n = 15), talent development coaches (n = 17) and national governing body staff (n = 12), this work explored perceptions of the impact of GBA in Gaelic games.Analysis: The findings indicate that, despite long-standing promotion of GBA in Gaelic games, in practice, there seems to be a lack of clarity on what a GBA entails. Participants at all levels of coaching often misunderstood the approach, conflating it with small-sided games and assuming that effective coaching simply involves setting up games and stepping back. Despite this lack of clarity, participants associated the utilisation of GBA with the development of more skilful players who understand the game better than previous generations of players. Conversely, some coaches seem to adopt naïve applications of GBA, the implication being that rather than a sophisticated use of GBA, coaches were often ‘letting the game be the teacher’, an approach characterised by minimal guidance and limited scaling of game-form activities. In this regard, the notion that merely playing a game is enough to ensure player development, regardless of coaching input, is discussed along with the perceived impact of a copy-and-paste attitude to practice design, a cause for concern for some coaches.Conclusions: This study highlights the need for nuanced coach development, emphasising that GBA should be one tool among many, rather than a one-size-fits-all solution. NGBs are encouraged to support coaches in understanding the contextual suitability of different coaching approaches to promote equitable player development.