That is not by accident, but very much by design as Horsman and his back room staff encourage the next group of budding professional players in Wales to become more self-sufficient, more inquisitive and better players and people on and off the field.
“We had a clear focus coming into this Festival and we are trying to do things a little bit differently with this group of players. We asked the players if these three games were about us getting them better or if it was a chance for them to make themselves better?,” explained Horsman.
“We want them to be more self-reliant and that’s why they dictate their dress code for the day, they decide when they are having their meals and they have to set-up and clear away their lunch stuff in the hotel. We tell them what we want to achieve from the day and they have to come up with the schedule.
“It’s about making them more self-reliant and to seek solutions for themselves. There is no point in us telling them exactly what to do every day – we give them the information, give them options and let them come to us with the answers.
“It is about ownership, and they have to take ownership. Culture and values grow within an environment that you create and all I said to the players at the start was that it is their responsibility to know what they need and when they need it on any given day.
“We know we all make mistakes, so we’ve told them they can mess up, but they can never give up – they must never stop trying to find the right answers to their problems on and off the field. Their development as players is only as good as their development as people.
“The final non-negotiable we gave them was a simple one, ‘if you don’t know, ask’. We want to encourage them to ask questions because, as a coach, you want your players to ask as many questions as possible to help them to
learn.
“We have asked them to drive their schedule and they have really embraced it as a group. The first few days were fantastic and, hopefully, it will help to make them more self-sufficient.
“The cream of this crop will become professional players and that’s why we’ve encouraged them to take ownership of their environment, rather than be spoon-fed. When they step up into the professional world they will be one of 45 players and they’ll have to be self-sufficient and self-driven.”
The first game of the three in the inaugural Six Nations Festival may have ended in a 22-14 defeat against a powerful French U18 team, but Horsman and his coaches were still pretty upbeat about the performance. Now they will be trying to move thing forward before facing Irish Schools U18 and Italy U18 later in the week.
“We looked liked an Under 17 side while the French looked like a full-blown men’s team. They were a good side, but we worked incredibly hard and put great width and speed into our game,” said Horsman.
“That’s what we are about. We can’t be a smash and bash team, it doesn’t suit our style. We talked about filling the field, playing with speed and width and taking the right options.
“The disappointing thing for us was the opening 10 minutes, but the intensity of that opening period is going to be a great learning curve for the boys. It caught them cold, but the way they reacted was excellent and when we got back to 17-14 I thought there was only one team in it.
“Unfortunately, discipline let us down in the end, but we took a huge amount of positives from this game. The crucial thing is now we have two more opportunities to get better and we need to look at what we can do better.
“The whole team fronted up well and the really pleasing thing for me was the way in which we managed the physicality of the French and turned the game around.”
