The first-ever OFC B Licence was held in December 2012 with participants from a number of Member Associations taking part as they look to improve the technical prowess of their local coaches.
Tisam was among the 19 candidates who spent over two weeks at OFC Academy in Penrose, Auckland working their way towards the highest coaching level currently offered by OFC and was recently assessed on his progress by OFC technical director Patrick Jacquemet.
Tisam, newly appointed to the CIFA technical director’s role after acting in the position for close to a year, says a lot of work has gone in behind the scenes between the course proper and his assessment.
“We have been doing regular reporting with the OFC technical department since the course,” Tisam says.
“So for me that was updates on the regular training that I was doing with the U-17 national team before the preliminary tournament and in the lead-up to and during the OFC U-17 Championship after we qualified.
“I also did twice-weekly training sessions with the senior men’s team to keep me going until the season started.”
The former Cook Islands national team member says the workload associated with the B Licence qualification was manageable and easily slotted in around his other activities and responsibilities.
The assessment itself was another story.
“It was tough. Really tough,” he says. “But I got some really good feedback from Patrick on my coaching.”
The ‘final assessment’ requires the candidate to create a session around a specific topic, given to them by the assessor, and demonstrate their ability to apply it with senior players.
Tisam says his topic, crossing and finishing, was difficult but he believes he did reasonably well with the players understanding his intentions with the session.
While there is further work to do before Tisam will earn his B Licence accreditation, he says the benefits to his home country are extensive.
“It will help me in that I will become the highest qualified person on the island and through my role as technical director I will be able to share all that knowledge with fellow coaches.
But it will also increase my responsibility for the community, as Rarotonga and the Cook Islands in general has a very low knowledge of football.
With the B Licence and in my role as technical director I will have a greater responsibility for increasing that level of knowledge around the country.”
For more on Cook Islands football go to www.cookislandsfootball.com

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