13 Janaury 2016
By Bryan T. Smyth
bryan@TheCork.ie
Cork City FC are have confirmed the appointment of Kevin Tattan as the club’s High Performance Coach.
Kevin, who is a Sports Science graduate from the University of Limerick, has also worked with the West Coast Eagles Australian rules football team and last season worked with the Derby County first team, while doing a Masters at the University of Derby.
Speaking to CorkCityFC.ie, Kevin said: “The demands of the game are increasingly massively and there is far much more emphasis on sports science, nutrition, recovery and preventing injury through strength training.”
As the City players prepare to return to pre-season training, Kevin outlined the close-season programmes they have been working on: “We wanted to get some running volume into them before they come back into pre-season, so when they hit pre-season they can get into ball work pretty quickly.”
“We didn’t want them coming back where they had no running done and they had to do high speed movements or change of direction without any prep done, because that can pre-dispose players to higher injury risk. We gave them off-season running programmes which gradually build up and also gym programmes, to make sure we can get straight into the gum stuff when they come back.”
“The players themselves will feel the difference. If you can increase your strength and your running capacity; it might not be completely obvious, but if they can feel better in themselves and it can reduce injuries, that is hopefully what we can achieve through the Strength and Conditioning programme we are putting in place.”
Cork City manager John Caulfield welcomed the appointment, saying: “I’m delighted to have Kevin on board to enhance our management team. We have great links with Eoin Fehily of Fehily’s Fitness and the Mardyke Arena over the last two years, and bringing Kevin on board is further progression in that respect. We wanted to have someone on site full-time and Kevin will be here every morning when the lads are in training and will be working closely with them.”
