 Hello and welcome once again to the official AFC Bournemouth podcast, the unique insight into life behind the scenes at the Cherries, where we aim to bring parts of the club to life for you by talking to some of the key figures. Once again, alongside myself, Chris Temple is club journalist, the man behind a lot of the terrific written pieces on the club's media channels, Neil Peret. Neil, good day to you. Good day to you, Chris. Looking forward to this one. Yeah, today now we're going to be talking perfectly honed athletes, optimum nutrition, things that you and I haven't exactly followed through our careers. That's a bit unfair, Chris. I run to the pub most nights and sprint back from the Chippy as well. Well, we should add before we start that with current Covid safety guidelines in mind, we're recording this episode virtually, all sat behind our laptops in different locations. Well, in this series so far, we've spoken to technical director Richard Hughes, Dutch winger Arnaut Danjuma and January signing Jack Wilscher. If you haven't yet heard those, then do pop back through our catalogue and enjoy. Well, today in episode four, we spin the wheel again and take you into the science behind AFC Bournemouth with one of our longest serving members of first team staff. Now, our guest started his career in football at Manchester City before joining Rochdale. He then swapped Scotland for the South Coast, joining the cherries in 2012 under Paul Groves. It's a very warm welcome to the podcast to the club's head of sports science, Dan Hodges. Thank you, Chris. Thanks, Neil. Looking forward to it. Now, Dan, it's great to have you. Let's first of all flesh out some of those career bullet points for us. Talk us through your journey in football to where we sit here today. Yes, I started my undergraduate journey at Brunel University in London. As I got through the end of my first year, I realised I was no longer going to be a professional footballer, unfortunately. So I thought, right, how can I get myself in there and actually work within elite football? So no, I'm serious now. I had a big interest in the performance side of football, obviously, and wanted to be a part of it. So I completed my undergraduate and towards the back end of my third year, I managed to get in touch with the head of sports science at Manchester City at the time, so Damien Rodin. We actually had a meeting whilst I was in the midst of sitting my final exams. I think Man City were playing spurs away. So I went across London to a hotel and met him for breakfast. And obviously, being a bit starstruck at the time, there was lots of Man City players around the place and I was a bit in awe of it. But hopefully, well, must have come across well and managed to secure an internship. It was initially to help them out with the following pre-season for the six weeks. And then luckily, I managed to keep my head down and earn like a two-year contract, a fixed-term contract as their intern. That was kind of a long side, working with the 21s at the EDS, Elite Development Squad at the time, and helping out with the first team as well. So it was very good. It was, you know, it was a very good grounding for me. Some say, you know, a very luxurious grounding to go from nothing to Manchester City. But I learned from some amazing people there and obviously from there went to Rochdale, which was probably at the other end of the spectrum. But equally, equally is important. And then obviously, you make the move to the Cherries in 2012. And of course, you've been a Premier League club. But talk us through the club, I guess, as it was made up when you joined in 2012, because presumably back then, what, eight, nine years ago, sports science was still pretty evolutionary at a Bournemouth level. Yeah, definitely. I came from Rochdale, like I said, and that, you know, there had been a fitness coach who performed me, who was very good and everyone spoke really highly of. So then I came down here and there was already a really good gym in place. There was the infrastructure. The pitches were not quite there yet, where we trained now on the Pavilion side of it. But they were just growing through. So we did a preseason at Camford and then ended up coming to the training pitches here as the season got underway. It was really good, really exciting. I was a little bit nervous at the time, obviously coming down from Manchester. But it was nothing too new as I obviously went from London to Manchester in the first place. I had an interview with Paul and I managed to get the job title of head of sports science, even though I was head of no one apart from myself. Thought head on that side, luckily, and obviously kept that kept that title all the way through. So Paul employed me with Sean Brooks, Garve came in at the same time as me, Garvin Stewart, who's still here now, our head analyst. And it was yeah, it was really good that you could see the club was no disrespect to Rochedale. But the club here was was geared up to go further. They were spending a little bit more money on the infrastructure. The playing squad was was better. And they wanted to get up through the leagues, which was, you know, really important from my side of things as well. And I was excited to start. You just give me an idea actually to get myself head of commentary as my new title, even though I'm the only one. How would you how would you sum up your your eight or so years? Because I think it's fair to say you've the roller coaster has probably done a full full circle if you like in those eight years. Yeah, it was an absolute whirlwind to start off with. Didn't we didn't start the season too well, which ultimately led to the, you know, the, the leaving of Sean and Paul. And I was very, very nervous when I heard that Eddie Howe was coming back. I knew that he had taken a previous fitness coach with him to Burnley. So I was, you know, I was fully expecting to be to be let go. And I was thinking, you know, where do I go from here really? But luckily enough, I got a chance. And, you know, I'd like to say I took it at that time. And that season was was a whirlwind. You know, we were in the bottom half, or I think we're in the bottom three, actually, when Eddie Howe came in, Eddie Howe and JT. And, and then we, we things changed all of a sudden and everyone started looking up, obviously promoted that season. And then in the championship, it was, it was great. I was, you know, I'd set my goal early on to kind of get to the championship as a lead fitness coach as a head of sports science. And I was really excited to get there and test my wit up against some of the guys that I knew were in that league from my side of things. And then the club went from strength to strength, we were fully, fully supported by everyone at the board. And that's from from the manager to the assistant manager to the chief executive. Everyone was was kind of, you know, if we if we could justify why we needed, you know, a certain bits of equipment or what we were doing a certain test for, etc. Then it was it was fully funded and backed in that respect. And we were very lucky. So things progress very quickly in terms of our facilities infrastructure from the sports science and medical side. Well, come on a bit later to the differences as you've got up the divisions in terms of that your day to day, I guess, but let's let's go right back to the start. Let's strip this back because a lot of people won't actually know exactly what to make up your department. It started with just you but tell us now what your department is personnel wise, who's there and what their roles are? Yeah, it started with me and grew infinitely. To be honest with you, I took on an intern, Ben Donakie, who worked worked with me and he was working. He was working here till two o'clock and then he'd go and work at the bank because we weren't paying him as an intern here and then he'd come back the next day and worked till two. It's a little bit frustrating, actually, because I ended up cleaning up all the bottles and everything myself, which I didn't want to be doing at that time. No, but he at the end of that season, when we got promoted to the championship, he was taken on full time and fully earned that. Ben was pretty much on the whole journey with me and I can't speak highly enough of Ben. He then turned into our strength coach and looked after the gym side of things. Obviously, I was overseeing everything, but he was leading that. Ben was there. We had various interns as well. Then Phil Keane, he started as an intern. He's now working with the first team. We hired him. He worked with Perch when Perch was with the 21s. He was his lead fitness coach. Everyone knows Phil. He's a very popular guy around here. He worked extremely hard. He's been with the 21s for about five years, turned into a full-time role and now he's been promoted and up with the first team and fully deserved and really earning his stripes up with the first team and respect of the players and managers. Ben, it was Ben. It was Phil. I've got Rob Lloyd, who again interned with us as a placement student. He was from Loughborough University. He interned with us and then had to go back and do his placement, finished his degree off. He went to Leicester for a year. Whilst that happened, and then in the meantime, I managed to get a little bit more budget and brought him back. He's now one of our first team sports scientists. He looks after a lot of the data in the gym. A lot of our testing, our jump testing. He does on-field rehab and he's a real key member of our team. One I've probably missed out is Sean McCullough. Sean is our data, how would I describe him? His job title is first team sports scientist again, but he deals with all our data, all our data-basing, all of our crunching numbers. I definitely couldn't be without Sean. I actually met him at the end of our first year in the Premier League, I think. He came over as part of our GPS company and he was our contact there. He showed me some bits and pieces that he was doing on the side. I was like, wow, I want you in this department, you're going to make this department better. I spoke with the then manager at the time, Eddie Howe. He fully supported it and we managed to get him on board as well. That's my team at the minute. There's been some staff that have come on going in the meantime. Ultimately, it's myself, Phil Keane, Rob Lloyd and Sean McCullough at the moment. Dan, you spoke earlier about the differences between Bournemouth and Rochdale, but what about the differences between going from Manchester City to Rochdale? What was that like for you? Yeah, at Manchester City, you want for nothing. I actually started just at the end of their buyout when the shake took over, so things went exponential from there and exponential growth in terms of staff and facilities, etc. I'm really lucky to work there. When I went to Rochdale with Steve Eyre, who gave me my first opportunity to lead the department and be a first team fitness coach, it was certainly an eye-opener. We didn't initially have a training ground, so it was scratching around every day to figure out where we're going to train. We had no real equipment in terms of poles, etc., and the monitoring side of things was difficult in terms of heart rate GPS. They did have a heart rate monitoring system, which I used, but GPS, no. But it was a club where, very similar to here, but on a smaller scale, where everyone wanted you to do well. Everyone was living and breathing the club and I kind of just got my head down and really worked hard and supported them as best I could. That gave me such good grounding in terms of having to be transitional on the job, or I think one of the times, so it might be seen as a negative, really, but I worked there for one season and Steve Eyre, who employed me, unfortunately, lost his job in the December of that year, then took Chris Beach, who was the youth team manager who took over. He got the job for, I think, two months and the results didn't really improve. Then John Coleman and Jimmy Bell came in from from Akrinton Stanley and they took it through until the end of the season, so it was three different spells, three different managers, very different, but again that gave me a very good grounding in terms of my personal relationships, how I dealt with them, how I dealt with the players, etc. But yeah, really thinking on your feet, I think one of the times, one of the managers, I can't remember who it was, but they got caught in traffic or an accident or something and I ended up taking the whole of the training session, which at the time I was like, wow, what's going on here, what do I do? But you know, the lads are on board and I managed to wing my way through that session, but you know, those kind of experiences really shape you for the future, I think. Rochdale's renowned for its meat and potato pies as well, Dan, did you get stuck into them? Neil, that is not me, unfortunately, I am aware of the nutritional side of the value of things, so I stayed well away. Listen, you've been on the journey, like you said, from the depths of League 1 to the Premier League here and is it like a player's sort of mentality? Are you similarly competitive with your rival in sports science as you come through the leagues, you sort of touched on it earlier? Yeah, it's not really spoken about, obviously, but people, the thing about sports science and especially in football is no one's really doing anything that different to each other, if you know what I mean, so obviously managers have different philosophies and different training methods, etc. And that has a big influence on things, but in terms of recovery, nutrition, invariably people are kind of doing very similar things. My very best friend, Ali Harris, is head of performance at Fulham now and he started at Fulham as I started at Man City, or I think a year after as an intern and kind of worked his way up. So he was one of the best men at my wedding. He's, you know, one of the Godfather to my two little girls. So we band to back and forth and there's kind of an underlying rivalry, of course, but we want the best for each other. But what I'm saying is we're able to speak sharp and and see what what we're doing. And although there is a slight rivalry there, it's always good to kind of compete against each other. And that actually happened once actually when he was head of performance when they had their first year in the Premier League. So before this one, the last time in there in the Premier League. And that was just a it was a great, great day for me, my family, his family all there. And it was a really good day and we won as well, which is brilliant. Dan, I've got to say, when I sort of go back to the early 90s when I first started covering the club, which was probably long before you were born, but not Chris, perhaps. Sports science, it was almost unheard of in those days here. We had someone like Sean O'Driscoll, who was playing physiotherapist, youth team manager, and he was probably driving the team bus as well. And that was all in all in one. Dan, how it's just evolved so quickly, has it not? Yeah, it definitely has, Neil. You know, from from the facilities that we have to the equipment we use. And and yeah, but ultimately, I think you, we always have to remember sports science sometimes has a bad rap for putting blocks on players. And, you know, you can't do this, we can't do that. But, you know, we're there to to kind of help guide the manager in and make him or help him think about things that maybe he didn't think about in the past. So under no circumstance would I be saying, no, no, no, don't do this, do this, do this, or likewise take any credit for any success, any wins or anything the team have had any fitness things the team have had. I don't think that that's part of it. You're there to kind of guide the process and help help become an expert in the side of things that you're responsible for. I think that's important to get across. Talking about responsible, what is your remit and what are your responsibilities Dan? So ultimately responsible for the for the fitness of the team, I think that obviously delves into a different categories in terms of recovery, nutrition, you know, the strength side of things, monitoring on a daily basis. So it's really putting training plans in or helping the manager and the coaching staff to put training plans in place and provide little recommendations based on the physical side of things on the physical element of players individually and collectively as a team, putting those in place and helping, like I said earlier guide guide the manager in terms of, you know, what, what from a physical perspective, what should things look like, what should this day look like, what should this training session look like from a, from a, yeah, say again a physical perspective. So responsible for, yeah, recovery, nutrition, although I would not claim to be any sort of expert in nutrition. We lean on other experts and use their guidance. Interestingly, at the minute we're using Royce Wiggins. So Royce retired from playing and worked extremely hard is now doing his masters in nutrition. He's got his diploma in nutrition as well. And he is, you know, he is well read and really into it at the minute. So we're closely linked and he's helping, helping the department on that side. Just coming in on there about another ex player who perhaps people don't know as well as Royce Wiggins, Alex Parsons, has he got some in, or has he had some involvement before? Yeah, Alex at the end of mid-season last year, he's been doing a course or qualification, an exos qualification, which is a strength and conditioning company in the USA. And he's coming with that. He's worked with a couple of players individually. We had some good feedback just in terms of helping their movement and how they, you know, how they execute certain actions on the pitch. So yeah, he came in and did some sessions with the team and picked out certain individuals as well, which, you know, it helped us. I think he really had a big benefit at the end of last season. Unfortunately, COVID, COVID strikes. So he hasn't been in since, but I know that he sees a couple of our boys on Zoom, on Zoom meetings, which is good. You spoke about training there, Dan, just run us through a typical day's training for you personally. Yeah, so my day would start at quarter past six in the gym for my own benefit. That is my one main hobby. Me and Phil Keane can often be found in there sweating our nuts off at that time. After that, we have a medical and sports science meeting at typically eight AM most days. And that's the plan the day, how it looks like from my side of things, how it looks like from the medical perspective, what injured players are doing, etc. So that that's an important meeting where everyone's on the same page. At that point, myself and Craig Roberts, the doc, will go and see the manager around about Hapa State. And again, the dock or feedback on availability for training, who's who's fit, who's not, who's training. And then I'll stay in a little bit longer and kind of go through the training plan for that day, depending on what we're doing, what physical outcomes we need from that day. And I'll help, you know, give my recommendation on that side of things. And then it's just about planning, planning the day, really, what the warm-up is going to look like, what any conditioning, anything we're doing on the pitch is going to look like. I'll meet with my team and we'll go through that in the morning. Then at around about 10 30, the guys will do pre activation, which is almost like a little training preparation. If you like, you know, different exercises, which will help the guys prepare for what they're going to face on the field. And then they'll come outside about 10 45. I'll lead the first part of the session, the warm-up and make sure that we get the players where they need to be. They will then train. After training, depending on, again, depending on the day, they might go in the gym. We'll oversee that and facilitate their session in there. And then it's all about looking at the data from training. And as I mentioned, Sean, he will go through that. I will then look at it, feed back to the manager and go and meet the manager and perch again in the afternoon and kind of go through what we did in that day and how it looked for the players. You touched on it down a minute ago. Data will come on to a match day and your routine for a match day shortly. But that data you're collecting and that Sean is leading on on analyzing, I guess, tell us how you're picking that data up. What what instruments do you use? We always see the players wearing those little heart rate monitor vests and things. How are you collecting that data? Yeah, so that's a daily increase. And again, like I said earlier, there will be no secrets. Every every football team in the land, every professional football team in the land will now be using those. But they're GPS monitors. So we can track everything the players are doing on the pitch, you know, from an external perspective in terms of distance covered, high speed running, sprints, and then individualize it for themselves, look at their own different thresholds for certain things for different speeds, etc. So that data, as you can imagine, with 20 players on a daily basis for an hour and a half training session, there's there's lots of it, you know, we've accumulated, I think the only season I didn't have it here was at the start of League One, we got it towards the end of League One. So we got all of that data there. They also wear heart rate monitors, which kind of gives us a little bit of feedback internally. So how the players are responding centrally to that training session or to that training stimulus that we're giving them. Again, that data is all collated in databases. So we know our norms for certain days, what we expect from certain players in certain positions. We have all that cataloged and and then can feed all that back. And the same for any drills that we do on the training pitch, we split all the drills, we look at how fullbacks respond, how center midge respond, you know, is that drill replicating the intensity that we're going to get in the game at the weekend. And it's kind of building up all these different libraries. So when we are discussing our training sessions, we know where we're at and roughly what kind of response an individual player is going to get. Just as a brief aside, have you ever stuck a heart rate monitor on a manager during a during a game? No, no, I haven't. That's an interesting topic. No, I haven't. No, I can imagine that be quite high, almost scary in some instances, I think. I can imagine some managers might go off the charts with that one. Now then give us that we've given us an idea of brilliant insight into your training day. Let's imagine it's a home game as you know, you might have in the championship. Well, what's your match day for a three o'clock kickoff on a Saturday afternoon? Yeah, so on a matchday, one of the important things is the players that are left out of the squad. It's really important that they're looked after and they're getting what they need. So when ultimately they are called upon, they're ready to perform. So anyone that's left out of the squad will either work, will work at the training pitch, be at home or away. So that they'll always remain here. And that will be with either myself or Phil, Rob or Sean. So we'll put on a training condition session for those guys in the morning, say about 10 o'clock. For example, they will train and then and then it's about prepping nutritionally for the game really. When it comes to a game, the work is almost done for the training week, if you know what I mean. So we're setting up for the game. We're making sure that players are hydrated. They've got what they need in terms of their drinks individualized. They've got, you know, gels, etc. Caffeine, everything's set up and ready for them. So when they when they report to a game around about half past one for a three o'clock kickoff, then everything's there for them. During the game that there's prep, we have a lot of players that will do individual activation. So they will on a home game, they will they will go across to our gym and in the stand. And one of my guys will facilitate their every need that they need in there. So it might be certain isometric exercises or different bits of preparation they need to perform on the match day as part of their warm up. They'll come back over and then about and about two, let me think I think my time is right. Can't believe I've forgotten we've had so many games this year, it's blurred into one. And so roughly about 25 past two, so 35 minutes before kickoff, the starters will go outside and that's when you'll see me taking the warm up as part of that prep for the game. So they'll do some band work, some activation work on the pitch as a team. And then go through their movement prep, etc. And you'll see everything that we do from that perspective with the with the coaches. During the game, it's just it's just looking at players. So one of the one of the big things in the championship this year, which I probably, we probably missed the boat on last year in the Premier League was having the GPS systems in game. So in the Premier League, we never had that because we used to use a camera based system and get data League wide. So every team we play every player in the league, every game in the league, we had that data physically how players were performing in the championship, we're not as you know, it's not as readily available, should I say, cost wise and things like that. So we now use GPS in games. It took a game or two for players to stop moaning. But they finally come around to it. So yeah, I'll have a live feed there on the iPad next to the bench. Now, I'm not saying that that helps me make any sort of any sort of decisions or any form any information to the manager, but it's good to oversee and look at averages knowing what what players should normally be doing in games, how the team's doing at certain periods of the game. So I'll be watching that and also looking out subjectively looking out my eye how players are, providing gels, etc. If they need them. Yeah. And then post game is the is the worst part of my job is that is the running for the subs, which they hate as well. I've got to say myself and Neil will have stood at pitch side on a midweek away game somewhere it's lashing down the rain at 10 o'clock at night and the subs coming out to do their running. It does look at one of the worst jobs of being a footballer. Yeah, I look at I've had many a fight with players after games. Just before I let Neil come in down just a quick one there on analyzing that data on the bench on the iPad. Does the manager ask you does he say is X knackered or is why struggling or whatever? Yeah, the manager will look for feedback for sure. Just even even I will watch the game in it in a different perspective to them. Perhaps I'm looking more physically there technically tactically and physically by the way, but I'm looking more of a physical perspective. So yeah, managers will often, you know, why is he stopped running? Why is he looking at it, et cetera? Yeah, I get all of that. But it's yeah, it's good to get that, I think. Dan, you mentioned just then about running the subs at the end of a game. Now on recently, we played Millwall and we noticed that the whole Millwall team and all of the subs came out and ran on the pitch. And I know I said to Chris, this is something I've not really seen very much. Is there any idea why they would have done that? Yeah, so there's previous research or, you know, a previous thing was to get the subs out for a warm down if you like, sorry, get the starting players out for a warm down. So I think I come out at the end of that when when they're starting team are out, they were just having a little jog and a stretch which which is perfect. You know, it's a good idea. We do it slightly differently. I was a little bit more passive inside. We have ice baths set up and our medical team are there for for post game massages and stuff. And then we look at our mobility and our range of motion stuff on the day after in the day after that. I'm not saying it's wrong or right. It's just just how we do it. So yeah, that's nothing new. And then I think they did have all nine subs out, didn't they? So I will individualize ours depending on where they're at in the week, what they played in the game, how many games they've played, what they need really from a from a physical perspective. So sometimes I'll have all nine subs out. Sometimes some subs might come on at 45 minutes or or 55 minutes. And you know, they perhaps don't need any work after the game in my opinion or at that time. So so yeah, that that's really yeah, the nooks of it. That's that's probably the reason why you mentioned just there down the medical department. I guess the biggest biggest question may be unknown for those of us who aren't quite as insightful in terms of the the crossover between you and the medical department. You've mentioned already at the start that you you meet with Dr. Craig Roberts and the manager on a daily basis in the morning before training. Talk us through that crossover between you and the medical department. How you work together. Sometimes is it difficult? Do you do you have opposing opinions? Because of course, sports medicine, I guess, would be described as the application of the science, isn't it really? Yeah, for sure. Our teams grown massively. You know, when I first come here, it was it was Dave Gardner and Steve Hard. Both are still here by the way. And I enjoy, you know, a really good relationship with both of those guys. The you know, the age old debate of the medical team are the ones kind of pulling back. If you like where as a sports science conditioning team are the ones pushing players harder. So there's always that conflict between us for sure in that respect. But ultimately, I think you have to work together in order to achieve what you want and to get the players where you need them to be. So it might be that, you know, that they have, they know the injury history or more in depth injury history of certain players so that they know how they respond to load, etc. So they might recommend, you know, doing less in this session or missing this session, which is, you know, is always up for discussion. And I think we work quite well in that respect. The other side of it, obviously is the rehab of injured players. So they will initially work with the with the physios and the medical team at the start. And they they will provide their rehabilitation. And then as it gets towards the end, the end of their injury, they will then come with myself or Phil, Rob or Sean on the on the pitch and really will work together to get them conditioned to work where they need to be for the game and to to get back to train and ultimately be fit enough to contribute for the team on a match day. So yeah, we work very closely together. The depart both, like I said earlier, both departments have grown a lot. And which can only be a good thing, you know, this is more, more knowledge in the room, more experience, which can only help us, I think. Dan, I don't think I've ever known a schedule like this season for obvious reasons, particularly the games schedule you hear about Premier League managers complaining that they have to play two games in a week and stuff like that. And I know I asked the manager about that and he said we'd love to be playing two games in a week, sometimes playing three games in eight days and was it nine games in 21 days or something like that just before Christmas. How how does that impact on player recovery and readiness and stuff like that for you? Yeah, as you say, I've never experienced it. We had we had it. The championship schedule is quite relentless as it is, you know, in a normal season, let alone with the added factor of COVID and a shorter season, etc. etc. So yeah, it has been it has been challenging. But once you get into a rhythm, players get into a rhythm of kind of play and recovery and and what we're doing alongside that is kind of monitoring the players. So, you know, a good thing myself and myself, the sports science team and the medical team will come together. Typically on a Monday or a Thursday if we've played Saturday or Tuesday, so a plus two day. When the players report to training, they will all come through a series of tests that we'd run. Just looking at their recovery markers, you know, you hit it on the head or we call it readiness testing. So so looking at different tests that assess their current status, how they've recovered from the game, where they're at in terms of, you know, it might be it might be neuromuscularly. So we look at their hamstring, the hamstring strength. We might look at their their ankle mobility. We take some some blood markers from them and look at the muscle damage that's been created from the from the load of the game. And and as we build those databases and those individual kind of thresholds for players, we know or we have a rough idea of where they should be out or where they're normally at compared, you know, in other games. And then you can look for the for the for the outliers if you like, are they recovered properly? OK, well, he hasn't recovered quite as well here as we thought he might have done. He might get some extra work with the physios or he might not go on the pitch today to do X, Y, Z. And and that's become a really important system for us. I think this season with so many games, we're building up a, you know, a real good library of where players are at and using that to feed back to the manager and hopefully, hopefully, hopefully keep the team as as fit as we possibly can for our for our ultimate game of getting promoted this year. Then it's obvious if a player gets an injury and they can't play. But what about if a player is so exhausted in a previous game and, you know, he's run like covered every blade of grass and stuff like that? Is it your job to advise the manager to say, look, so and so has run put so much effort into one game that it might be an idea that he doesn't start the next game? Does that happen? There's certain recommendations made that that might be, you know, feasible on different days after different games. So so, yeah, like I said, we have the GPS system. We know what players typically do in games. We know what's normal for them, what's high, what's low. And then ultimately, how many games in a row they might have played recovery X, Y, Z. So, yeah, that information is definitely discussed with the medical team and and fed back to the manager. And then, like I said earlier, it is down to the coach and staff, to the manager, to Perch, to then take that information and use it as they will. I'm not saying that the information is bang on. And, you know, if you think that certain players perform the above where he normally does, is he a high risk to injury, potentially? But under no circumstance would you be able to say, yes, definitely, we should do that. I think it's all a kind of guiding process and using the data to inform rather than dictate. Daniel, I guess in terms of players, just popping back to what you said before about readiness and recovery and their players in the current squad, given the schedule they face this season and some of the dodgy pitches they've played on as well elsewhere that you've actually thought, you know what, this is an amazing effort from this player to still be turning out these kind of results. And there's some guys in the squad who, I guess, defy your expectations as a scientist. For sure, for sure. You know, we're seeing them playing games or games in a row that we've never seen them do before. So, you know, it comes down to that creating that robustness. You know, they match fit and they're they're becoming nice and robust in terms of the physical element and how they get through games. And as long as we do what we can to help them recover post-game and in the game, in the time in between games, you know, they're big players and ultimately we need to have our best players on the pitch if we're going to do anything this season. So, we want to do everything we can to help the manager and help these players stay fit and keep playing and impacting our results. And do you as a department and as a head take that as a barometer of how well you're doing if these players are churning out game after game week after week? No, I don't think so. I think, you know, there's been too many instances where you could take it the other way and things have happened where you think, you know, was that my fault or could I have done something to help that? So, I don't think there's there's anything to be gained from from looking at things like that and patting yourself on the back. I don't think that's the kind of business we're in. We're a team and we're kind of real small part of that team to help the team do what we want to do this season. So, no, I don't think so. Stay with the team. Every team, of course, plays differently. Every team, you know, some team sit off. Some people have a high press. Some people are, you know, very, very energetic all over the pitch. How much does a certain style of play of a team fit with the work that you have to put in guys? And sometimes a guy is simply not suited physiologically, I guess, to the kind of the kind of style of play that one team might have. Yeah, that's a good point, Chris. When I met with the manager, he outlined that he wanted to be a high pressing team. He wanted to get after teams. So, yeah, you know, that we need to get them used to be able to tolerate the level of work or the, we call it the worst case scenario that they would experience in a game. So looking at different time periods throughout that game and seeing, you know, what markers they need to be able to hit to be able to do that on the pitch and repeat, repeat that on the pitch to the benefit of the team. You mentioned nutrition a little bit earlier on as well, and you mentioned that you lean on Roy Swiggins quite a bit for advice on that. But just from, I guess, a more general point of view, I mean, we go back to the days of boxes of pizzas being delivered to the team bus, and I'm sure that was budgetary more than more than a lot of other things. But these days, we see the players walking out of the game with a little brown box of sushi or chicken or whatever it is. Just give us an overview on nutrition and I guess how you structure your advice and your guidance to the players. And I guess how good they are at taking it as well. Let me tell you, no matter what you give the players after a game, they will still mow. Since I've been here, when I first come in, you're right, we were using, I think, dominoes delivered to a bus, especially on away games. We then used, I changed that to like we'd find a local a local kebab shop to where we were playing and go and get some chicken kebabs, chicken kebabs and chicken pitas and we'd give them they'd give them post game. We then had a state of going through Nando's so we'd get Nando's delivered to the bus which was a pain in the backside for people like Jimmy Glass, who had to go and collect it. But now we have a chef essay who's very good so he'll cook. We have buses, luckily, that we're able to cook on with ovens and stuff. So in that time, preceding the game, it's important that they have a carbohydrate hit and a protein hit. They're starting to recover them straight away from the muscle damage and the energy expenditure that they've had. So it's trying to find ways that can get that nutrition back into them, the sugars, everything that they need, but also making sure that they do take it. There's no point in putting on a perfect meal if players at the end of the day are going to go, no, I don't want it. So the important thing is to help them to eat. So we put things like milkshakes on the bus after a game and I've been back and forth with it, and the other games are, they have Coke as well just to help replenish those carbohydrates stores and glycogen stores that they've depleted during the game. So it's trying to find little ways that we keep the adherence, but also benefit them physically as well. Unless Domino's want to sponsor this podcast, other pizza places are available, of course, as are other soft drinks and chicken manufacturers. Welcome. BBC heads come on to me there for a second. You mentioned there about the bus and what about an average day on the training ground? So other players come in and have breakfast and then obviously, I know at the moment, COVID protocols mean they can't all eat lunch in the canteen and things as they normally would, but how much of what they eat breakfast and lunch-wise is dictated by you and is dictated by, I guess, maybe the training that you've done that day or which match day, minus one or two, it is of the week? Yeah, so it's working closely with the chef and now we're at a point where our two chefs essay and Paul kind of know what dishes the guys need on a recovery day on a match day plus one or on a match day minus one. They might need to load up minus two. The carbohydrate content would increase so the players can sort of fuel themselves for the game needed. But yeah, initially, initially you sit down with the chefs and our old nutritionist, Matt Lovell, we would sit down and go through green days, red days, a high intensity day, a recovery day, and what foods might benefit players on those days. But then the chefs kind of get to know it and then you give them the guidance and they then play with the dishes and they know feedback from what the players like, what certain players like. So it's good to have that. You're giving them autonomy in terms of what kind of food groups they need but then the freedom to say, why don't you try this or players might like this. Yeah, so it's good. I guess there's probably a greater adherence to everything, isn't there, when things are going well on the pitch? I think of maybe accepting a certain training program or accepting a certain post-match meal or accepting something else. Do you find in your role that, I guess, probably coaches find the same, don't they? The adherence and the willingness to do everything. I'm not suggesting for a second people that I'm professional but just in terms of the banter or the attitude you might get. Yeah, definitely. When a team's more successful or winning games, they're open to more things. Definitely. I think that's in all walks of life, really, isn't it? You're more open if you're happy. I would say that is the case but that being said, our boys are very, very, very professional. I can't speak highly enough of the group and how they apply themselves and outside the training ground. That's testament to how they perform and regularly playing. Dan, I just want to ask you about sleep because I think it was a couple of years ago there was a story came out that one Premier League team took their own mattresses to away games and put them in the hotel that they were staying at overnight and everybody was sort of aghast at that but I would imagine they probably weren't the only one. Now, do we do things like that and what's your view on sleep? Sleep is huge, you know. I can't tell you how important sleep is from preventing disease to making sure you're refreshed for your body to adapt from exercise, et cetera. Sleep is really, really big, really important and that's something the manager here will definitely understand as well so we might adjust training schedules to allow the players to have a little bit more time in bed a little bit more time at home especially post-game, mid-week when they're not back until late or they're not leaving until late. A lot of the guys you'll find they have a lot of caffeine and a lot of adrenaline after the game and they won't sleep until 3-4 in the morning so you really need to think about that and cater for that in the days after the event. In terms of mattresses and stuff yes, we didn't go as far as mattresses but last season we had pillows for players so we linked up with a pillow company a pillow company a mattress company, I don't know what they call them Bed Shop They're called Beds Are Us for going on Chris's way of sponsoring the podcast and they come in and provide an array of pillows for the guys to test briefly at the training ground and then players and staff jumped on it like Fletch, definitely I think he got two they jumped on it and then we would the Sports Science Department the Kitman even security would take we have a head of security, Chris and our chef that goes to the hotel before games so they would take the pillows up with them and get them delivered to each room it's difficult for us to provide that service now with the amount of games we have so players if they want it will take it themselves if not they'll just live in the luxurious hotel pillows that we have Just two quickies about the nutrition or the food side of things Dan you mentioned then that there's a chef that can cook on the coach I mean when I first heard that I thought that was quite remarkable it was almost like you know how does that work what's he got there an oven, a fridge and all this sort of stuff how does that work and then secondly are the players allowed to have treats maybe things that you wouldn't expect a professional athlete to have is that allowed yeah so firstly it's become a lot more difficult since Kobe for the chef because he's got to cook on two buses, bless him but at the back of the... why does he do that, do you have to stop at services and swap over no so he'll he'll stay on the buses as the games going on and that's when he'll kick in and do his bit and cook the food so at the back of the bus there's Mark Waves there's multiple fridges everywhere to store the food we have plates and cutlery and stuff but all that stuff's ready for the players when they get on or some players might not want to eat straight away so they might give it sort of 10-15 minutes and then they'll eat once once they're ready so that side of things is really important like I said earlier in terms of getting what they need to have at that point into them and yeah Neil I said about coax and milkshakes those type of things help get those sugars back into the players and replenish their stores so yes we do do naughty things I think there has been known to be the odd brownie flying around after the game as well but as long as the guys know that that's important post-game and probably not to have during the week every day now we've taken up plenty of your time already to do shorter I guess supporter questions to get through as well before the end let's take a couple of those now shall we one of which comes from Mr. Fern on Twitter who's a PE teacher based out in Poland who says how do you weight the training for players based on the different requirements of their positions on the field and what kind of factors would be in play yeah so that would be where we use the GPS system if we know what our fullbacks are doing or expected to do in a game we would then you know we need to prepare them for that so be that on the training pitch or in pre-season when we're running etc we know that the kind of intensities they need to get to and so we will condition them accordingly so you might see a centre back might not be running as far as a fullback or a centre mid might be running at less speed so to speak as a centre forward who repeatedly sprints so yeah we use all of that and like I said we call it worst case scenario so it's really conditioning those players to be able to cope with the worst periods that they would face in a game physically be that individually or and positionally I've got a supporter question from James McCafferty has Dan's general and football knowledge improved since he was nominated worst staff quiz team member 2014 that was Eddie Hall that was a ridiculous absolutely ridiculous um yes I'm an intelligent guy you know we we don't do many quizzes anymore to be honest with you but I'm sure that I would be right up there if we did the days of Steve Fletcher standing at the front of the bus with a Micah Garner they thankfully oh yeah we don't give him that much airtime because he would never stop talking that's why he's banned from this podcast at the moment we've already got an hour or so a couple of other shorter ones would expect the goalkeeper and the centre backs maybe to be the beasts in the gym but is there a secret weapon or two in the gym somebody who you would look at and think maybe isn't quite shifting the bigger numbers they are in the gym um isn't quite shifting we haven't gym work this season has been difficult to obviously do with the amount of games we've had so it's been really kind of maintenance sessions um so nothing stands out really from this year um last year Nathan Akke was very good very good you know he worked closely with our strength coach Ben Donakie and you know was in a really good place um but then obviously Covid here etc etc so yeah Ian Hensman from Australia has asked a question he's asked about sleep which you've already answered he is also asking your top three meals for nutrition what would they be? it's difficult it depends on the timing really it depends are you looking at recovery are you looking at you know loading for the game depending on what the outcome is or what we're preparing for what about you if you were to choose your top three that you wanted to eat me personally um um my kids favourite meal is salmon rice and broccoli believe it or not um spot the children of a sports scientist or somebody involved in nutrition honestly you wouldn't believe it so yeah that's one of the top dishes in my house and yeah they are also big fans of sushi honestly would you believe it I can't believe I'm saying that live on podcast um Rob on Twitter AFCB Rob says and this is one thing we haven't touched too much on obviously injuries you know a crossover I guess between yourself and the medical department we're seeing a lot of hamstring injuries in football this season with the schedule and after restart with the the schedule and Bournemouth weren't obviously strangers to that either one of the key things that you use to assess a player's likelihood of a muscle injury can you assess a player's likelihood of a muscle injury I think you can do certain things which might you know help condition players or inform you of the status of where they're at currently we try and expose our players to regular Nordics which is an eccentric hamstring exercise um which is you know research is shown to help prevent hamstring injuries we're also big on on max speed and ensuring that players kind of hit their threshold their individual threshold for max speed um sort of every 10 days or so if they don't get it in a game so that that's also an important dose or been shown to be an important dose for preventing those kind of injuries um and like I said that the readiness testing that we do where we look at the hamstring we look at groins and looking at their thresholds how strong are they at that point how well recovered are they from that game all these kind of things kind of help us to inform sorry help to inform us of where players are at and the kind of risks that might come down right at the start of this podcast you spoke about how you knew quite quickly that you weren't going to become a professional footballer I think you said now just obviously when there's an in-house game I know that people like you to be on their side and I certainly heard people in my department say if he's on the opposite side we need to kick him early on just tell us about how how frustrating it was and just tell us a little bit about your career as a footballer yeah I didn't really have a career as a footballer to be honest with you I like every boy in the world played played younger and really into my football my my uncle was actually a professional footballer Glen Hodges so football was a really big thing in our house and in our family so me and my brother played a lot I I realized probably at university that I wasn't as good as I thought I probably was I played for university team and tried to play a couple of semi-pro games whilst at university but I didn't really do anything I think I had one or two appearances which was slightly embarrassing the players here will absolutely batter me but I did have a little stint at Crystal Palace when I was I think under 12 to under 14s again I think that was a story Neil that I might have done with you interview me for the echo absolutely annihilated for that and I still haven't lived that down but now it's just recreational you know when there's staff games I love I love playing I can be seen to be very very weak mentally and people can get in my head quite easily and that can influence how well I play but yeah you just briefly touched on your uncle Glen there I mean he had some playing career and those of a certain age will remember the crazy gang of Wimbledon very well and I know that he was a part of that and a Wales international so how important was he in your career coming into football if you like and just tell us how much do you know about his playing days because they probably would have been when you were very young if even born no I remember him I remember him playing obviously not probably not at the peak of his career like you said at Wimbledon in Oxford and Wales but I remember going with my dad as a kid to watch him play one big memory is watching him warm up and then I was cold I think sitting in the stands and he came running over to me and gave me his drill top when he was playing for Sheffield United and obviously it was the awe of everyone around me taking his drill top off one of the players on the pitch but he's yeah he's a big influence in terms of how I got into football and he's always readily available for advice on football I speak with him very regularly he him and his wife and my cousins up there housed me when I went to Manchester City and put me up you know and I lived with them for a period of time I can't speak highly enough of how he's helped me and the advice that he's given me it's brilliant and a brilliant knowledge to a brilliant person to know and ultimately love as my uncle so yeah I can't speak highly enough Uncle Glen Uncle Glen I think is a very good place to finish we've had you for nearly an hour Dan I know you've got lots of things going on behind the scenes so we'll leave it there for now hopefully it's been really insightful for you guys listening at home Dan it's been great to listen to I guess the process is not just about for your career but how things get to a match day and how those 11 in red and black turn out on a Saturday afternoon so thank you so much for joining us on the podcast No problem Chris, Neil thank you for having me I really enjoyed it Well Neil I don't know about you but over the last hour I have learnt plenty about what goes on behind the scenes of the Sports Science Department Absolutely fascinating insight Chris like I said in the podcast we've gone from absolutely having nothing to do with sports science even in the early 90s like you said it was one man and his job I remember Joe Roach used to run the youth academy all on his own and Sean would run all the physiotherapy side all on his own and now everywhere in football you've got sports scientists and analysts and medical staff it's just such a growing industry and such an important industry and a fascinating insight from Dan there into the workings of it I guess as players have got faster and stronger and the game has moved on so much in terms of the technology available to all these guys as well it just means you have to keep pace don't you with everybody it can be the difference small margins and all that how have things gone it used to be a cup of tea at half time a little bit of deep heat before you went out and that was about it certainly that was what it was like on a Sunday morning I don't know whether that was like a professional but like I said I mean you've got the chef cooking on the coach and we talked about the nutrition I remember the days when they stopped at a fish and chip shop and got cod and chips on the way home Chris it wasn't that long ago cod and chips twice times 11 thank you very much Neil great to have you back alongside on this episode of the podcast if you are listening on your podcast platform don't forget to subscribe and give us a rating you can share us on social media as well just make sure you include the hashtag AFCB pod for all of your club updates remember to go to the club website which is AFCB.co.uk which is also where you'll be able to find out when to listen to the next edition of the official AFC Bournemouth podcast don't forget also to purchase your match pass to watch the upcoming games live on AFCB TV but for myself Chris Temple Neil Parrott and our guest Dan Hodges thanks for listening until next time