Master's study as a professional footballer (with Millwall FC's Jake Cooper) transcript

00:00

I'm Jake Cooper. I'm a professional footballer here at Millwall Football Club - I have been for eight seasons now. And I'm studying football science at at Solent University. My career goals were to obviously play football and obviously I want to stay in football when I finish, so you've got to have certain experience in that and you've got to go and do the the right courses and things that lead you to the paths that you want to take in the future. And yeah our careers are only short and we have to think about what comes after football and you know when you get to a certain age I think that starts coming to your mind. So I was more interested in the football side of things and came across the the course at Solent and um obviously it's a master's level as well so I realised that with my experience in football I could get into the course. There are great facilities actually, that I thought when I first arrived. Test Park, the training facility, I've used the the 3G pitch there and the classrooms available. Lovely place to go and do your studies. So I'm doing two modules at the minute. One which is on football periodisation - the breaking down of a season into periods, into cycles and breaking down what kind of what kind of training needs are are scheduled in for that certain block. And management and leadership in football, so, you know, managing up with the the leadership side of things and then managing training schedules. I look forward to doing my own research on things. I have a lot of things to use here at the club that I can put into some good research topics, I think. And yeah, I'm just looking forward to working with the guys, you know. I'm just enjoying doing the course on on the side of playing football. the the course has been really flexible with my job. I think they understand the field I work in. And, yeah, they've changed assessment dates around for me and they've been really good at calling me from home and making sure everything's right and I'm ready for my studies. Yeah I couldn't ask for any more help from them guys. It's been good. It's been hard work; I think a lot goes into doing it full-time - something people have to think about. But we get a lot of time after training and on the coach and in the hotel so, yeah, I think I'm getting everything out of it that I can I wish for. I want a job in football when I retire um from playing and the physical side of the game is something that interests me a lot. It's just been about, you know, realising how much attention to detail goes into what we do on a day-to-day basis. I think what the guys look into, you know, all the performance metrics that are assessed, is something that I didn't realise before so it's been good to learn that kind of side of things. The coaching side is coming as well but I have more interest in the physical side of things at the minute so I think this course kind of suits that with an intention for my post career work. I've been PFA rep um for the last few years here at Millwall and I look after the boys here and as a as a link between the PFA and and the club but, yeah, they've supported me in the studies. The PFA are great - they help all the lads who want to study they help give some funding to the to the lads and, yeah, they funded uh a good part of my course this year so you can't ask for much more help from them. I think this course especially can lead people down all different routes in football I think. We've got analysis on their coaches and all different people which have a route they want to take after their careers and I think for players you you really get helped by the team here so it's something that they should definitely look at if they want to want a career in football still when they finish playing.

Jake Cooper is talking to camera with his team mates training in the background. This is interspersed with shots of Jake playing a football match and training will his team mates.

03:36

Image fades to white, a red wave animation appears, and revels the red circle of the Southampton Solent University logo.