CHAD BARTLOMÉ

I grew up playing youth soccer in the Sacramento, California area and played college ball at Oregon State University for 4 years. After that, I played professional indoor for the California Cougars in the MISL. I also had a small stint with the Portland Timbers when they were in the USL. However, during my 2nd season with the California Cougars, I was able to organize a tryout with Swiss giants FC Basel, so I packed up my things and shipped out to Switzerland. Although I didn't receive the contract with Basel, I was seen by some 2nd division clubs and was picked up. For the next 7 years, I played in Switzerland. Bouncing around a bit from 2nd and 3rd division clubs but gaining a ton of experience and really developing my game in ways that I never would've in the U.S.

I came back to Sacramento to play the inaugural season for the Sacramento Republic FC in 2014. We won the USL Championship that year. After taking a break from the game in 2015, I moved back to Switzerland to play for one of my old clubs in the Swiss 3rd division. I also started Bartlomé Soccer Academy at this time. After things started picking up with BSA, I realized that I would not be able to simultaneously give both playing and coaching the proper focus that they both deserve, so I decided to step back a bit from playing and focus on BSA full time. Now I play in the Swiss 6th division mostly just for fun. Most of my career has been as a striker, however, at some point or another I have played just about every other position on the field!

I’ve been coaching since I was 16. I’ve always done private sessions on the side throughout my whole career. I’ve easily logged in a few hundred private sessions over the years with dozens and dozens of youth players. I love working with passionate players and I love passing down my knowledge and experience. It’s so rewarding to see players develop and succeed knowing that you've helped them achieve their goals.

I’ve also coached local International School teams here in Basel and worked dozens of soccer camps and team clinics. I also designed, started and led an after school program back in 2012 for my club here in Basel, aimed towards giving young players who can’t find a club an opportunity to get professional style training twice a week for free. The program gets upwards of 50-60 players per session and was picked up for a time by FC Basel and is funded by the state and still runs today. Although it was difficult to do a lot of coaching while leading a professional playing career, I always tried to stay involved in coaching and hope to start working on my badges again and get my UEFA B license next year.

I’ve always thought about doing something like this as soon as I was done with my playing career. I have always felt that you can be so much more impactful to so many more players in a 1 on 1 or small group environment. The knowledge I give my players is much more personal and custom tailored to what they need in order to take those next steps toward their goals.

When you're coaching a team, you have a more broad influence on all of the players but when you coach a player 1 on 1, you become like a mentor to them and you can really make a difference in that one player’s development. You can build a much better relationship with that player and build their trust so that they will work harder for you than they ever would for their club coach. This is when the real work gets done and you see a lot of development. It’s truly very rewarding work and I consider my self very lucky to have the opportunity to be able to do it for a living.

BSA is truly in its infancy still, only being officially here in Switzerland for 1 year now. I hope to work with more professional players in the future but at the moment, the only professional player I’ve worked with that people will recognize is Timm Klose of Norwich City and the Swiss National team. He’s a fantastic player, a true professional and a class act.

I’ve worked with a number of semi-professional players from the 3rd division here in Switzerland and many of my teammates in the past. I also had the opportunity of working together with Next Level Footballers Academy this last December in San Diego, California. We collaborated to work with professional player Meg Crosson. BSA is an inclusive program, meaning we try to work with any player that is passionate about the game and about getting better whatever level their game is at. We are confident that we can give them the tools they need to raise that level and elevate their game!

I touched on this a bit above, as well, but one of the main things I see is players need some extra, specific work that they just aren't getting in the training sessions with their club team. This can be in any position really: defenders aren’t getting enough 1v1 closing down situations, midfielders aren’t getting enough opportunities to work on their long ball, goalkeepers aren’t getting enough shot blocking, etc. As a striker, I’ve had times where I’ll go a whole week of training without getting more than 5 or 6 quality chances on goal…. that's crazy! But sometimes, depending on the design of the training sessions by the Head Coach, things just aren’t planned out with every player’s needs in mind, or maybe you're just not getting the right kind of service during training. This can cause players to lack a bit in certain areas of their game whatever that might be, in turn they tend to lose a bit of confidence because of it or lose sharpness.

We can take a good look at those issues in their game and attack them, work them out and keep working on it until it becomes automatic, building the muscle memory until they can't get it wrong! This, in turn, builds their confidence and they feel better knowing they've put in the extra work that the other guy or girl hasn’t. On top of all of that, my sessions always involve plenty of speed & agility, injury prevention, footwork, balance and other exercises that work on their overall athleticism as footballers. These are things that tend to get left out of normal team sessions due to lack of time, knowledge or the proper equipment.

Youth players in Switzerland eat, breathe, sleep and just live Soccer. That’s all they do and they do it year round. Most of them don't play any other sports either, they play at school, they play after school and then they also play when they train with their club 3-4 times a week. Things are definitely changing in the U.S. and Soccer is growing and becoming more serious and more professional opportunities are available for players coming out of the youth ranks. But over here, it is still on another level and has been for a long time. This creates very technically and tactically sound players, very intelligent players who know the game inside and out.

What they lack here in Switzerland is quality performance training. Youth players in the U.S. are much more athletic and are willing to put in the extra work on the performance side whether it be strength training, speed & agility or plyometrics. Performance training is still very new over here and most of Switzerland is far behind what Athletes are doing in the U.S. Teams and individual players are really just starting to implement proper performance training into their training programs.