Premier Skills is a partnership project managed jointly by the British Council and the Premier League which combines football and language skills for young people worldwide.

The Premier Skills coach development programme demonstrates how football can be used to support the development of social inclusions, health promotion, education and equality. By bringing together influential people across these sectors, the aim is to establish a sustainable programme of community development through football.

These Premier Skills programmes have been run across the globe in such places as Africa, China, and most recently Hong Kong where Bolton Wanderers Football in the Community Senior Community Officer, Steve Obertelli was selected by the Premier League to assist in the delivery of the programme.

The course ran over eight days, at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, in Sha Tin. Along with a Head Coach, and two other coaches Steve was tasked with coaching and teaching in excess of 40 secondary school PE teachers from various schools how to coach football the way it is done by coaches in the Premier League.

The teaching consisted of practical delivery of coaching sessions which included topics such as goalkeeping, attacking, defending, and passing in the mornings on the football pitch at the University.

This was followed by theory sessions in the classroom which related to coaches, such as planning and preparation, the qualities of a good coach, food and nutrition and also what community projects are run by Premier League football clubs.



On the eighth day of the programme, the Premier League coaches handed over to the participants, and they had to plan and prepare a coaching session for a group of primary school children that were brought to the venue.

Steve explained that it was a great experience to aid his coaching development, saying: "It was a stressful eight days because we had to fit the coaching around the bad weather because it was typhoon season. But all the participants were really flexible and everything else went really well.

"To take people from a different culture and try to coach them the English way was a fantastic experience. The facilities were second to none and the participants bought into our ideas and notions.

"They asked a lot of questions about the way we coached and the way do certain things as opposed to the way it is done in their country, and that was very satisfying."