Warmer Weather Training Camp

Warmer Weather Training

Back in February, West Ham United took the somewhat controversial decision to take their first team squad out of the country for some warmer weather training. It's fair to say that this wasn't a particularly popular decision among supporters.

This was a team who had just offered up one of the worst performances yet under the stewardship of Sam Allardyce; the limp 2-1 defeat away to Aston Villa. A team who had won just three of their previous twelve games, losing seven of those, and conceding almost 2 goals per game in the same period. A team who had conceded 11 goals in the previous 5 games didn't deserve a holiday, was the common argument.

Allardyce claimed that warmer weather training would help to rejuvenate the players, help to heal tired and worn muscles, and, most importantly, improve results.

Now that the dust has settled on the season, it's time to ask if Sam was right.

When comparing the results of the twelve games after the warmer weather training with the results of the twelve games before hand, it becomes apparent that there was a turnaround of sorts. There were fears in January and early February that West Ham's form would continue to drop, and that the club would slide towards the relegation zone.

However, after returning from their trip, results picked up dramatically. In the following games, we earned more points, scored more goals, and conceded less. The chart below shows the differences in results before and after.

Despite this upturn in the stats that count, the numbers for specific performance areas in the two sets of games don't make for particularly pretty reading. In the twelve games after going for the warmer weather training, West Ham averaged less shots per game, less shots on target per game, less possession, less successful dribbles and less accurate passing.

In fact, in the games following the training camp, West Ham failed to control move than half of possession in any game, with the 48% (according to Opta) against Reading on the final day the best of the bunch.

The chart below shows the average numbers of shots taken, shots on target, successful dribbles, and tackles per game from the two sets of games. As you can see, the margins between the two sets are minute, suggesting very little change in performance indicators before and after the training. This is rather surprising given the stark differences in numbers of points collected, and goals scored and conceded.

Considering the fact that individual performance areas did not drastically improve after the warmer weather training camp, it seems fair to conclude that performance levels were not significantly affected by the camp, despite what the upturn in results might suggest.

So, if the stats suggest that our performances in individual games did not dramatically increase why did we have a positive return in results?

Well, I think that the answer is consistency. It's widely accepted that a consistent, regular team is more likely to succeed, whilst a team dealing with injuries and regular team changes may struggle to pick up any momentum. When the idea of a training camp in the sun was discussed back in February, one of the benefits we were told to expect was that injuries are far less likely after training in the sun. There is plenty of research available that suggests that muscles are less likely to strain or tear when training in a warmer climate, and that muscles tend to heal quicker in the heat. 

After a quick scan through starting line ups before and after the training camp, this appears to be the case for West Ham. In the twelve games prior to the camp, 30 changes were made to our starting line up, 2.75 per game, with a particularly bad run of almost 4 changes per game being made in the games from New Years day up to the training camp.

Compare this with the changes afterwards, and there is an incredible difference. After returning from Dubai, we made just 1.33 changes to the starting line up per game, managing to name an unchanged eleven for 4 games on the spin (Manchester United, Wigan Athletic, Manchester City, Newcastle United).

The chart below shows the difference in the amount of changes being made to the line up across the time frames. What is particularly clear is the sudden from from game six onwards in the pre-training camp games. These were the games from Norwich City through to Aston Villa, during the coldest months of the year.

The positive impact that the sunshine may have made to the overall health of the squad is typified by Andy Carroll. In those 12 games leading up to the training camp, we saw Carroll appear just three times for the club. However, following the training camp, he appeared in 11 of the 12 games, only missing the match against Liverpool for which he was ineligible.

My belief is that the benefits of taking the players on a warmer weather training camp are plain to see. Although we didn't start dominating possession and creating tons of chances after returning, the increased points tally and comfortable run in speak volumes. The sudden drop off in numbers of changes being made to the team speak volumes to me, and I consider the consistency in our line up for the run in to be one of the main reasons for our successful end to the season.

I think it's fair to say that, on this one, Allardyce has been proven correct.