Glenn Hoag: I don't know before the season if I'm going to get to Final Four.

Polish fans remember you mostly from 2010, when you have been there with ACH Volley Bled during Final Four of Champions League. After this quite good season with Bled, you moved to Turkey. Why you decided to change?

Glenn Hoag: Well, that was just a new challenge for me. The work is interesting here because the proposition was also to work with kids, we have a 700 kids in the club, men and women. They wanted me to be technical director, coach the senior team okay, but also develop the coaches and kids. That was really interesting project for me, it's really in line what I like to do, so I wanted to do some mentoring, helping the coaches. At the same proposition was very interesting, the structure of the club is really nice, we have two gyms, so I brought my assistant form Bled, Tilen Kozamernik, who is coaching Slovenian women national team, he is very knowledgeable, so with him we are working on the structure of all levels, so it's really interesting project. That's kind of the reason I came here.



Fans are saying now it's almost a tradition that when the Final Four is in Poland, Glenn Hoag is coming with his team. They also say your team again is a "cinderella" of the tournament. Do you think you have more chances with this team to win medal?

It's kind of the same situation. Our team is composed from different style of players, but they are really young, the most experienced is Joao Paulo Bravo, who has a lot of experience from Italy, Brazilian national team. He is the real leader, he is the guy who keeps the team together, he is very intelligent young man. Also we have Kevin Hansen, who has a very much american mentality or being very competitive person, very intelligent setter, a good fellow. We have Agamez who is still young player and this year he came out, it took him a while but now he is understanding hard work is important, because before I think he had just very good potential, but now learning to work and trying to bring out that potential. We have some young Turkish national team players, we have some young players. So it's kind of the same, maybe I would say not as talented as Bled, but on the other and the team is growing nicely. I don't like compare teams and seasons, because there is always something new and I'm trying to look at the potential I have, strengths and weaknesses and think what can I do? There are so many factors that affect performance - physical factors, technical factors, tactical factors, psychological factors. Those are the ones that coach can try to make some adjustments, to develop also. You have to think long term, so this is my approach, I don't know before the season if I'm going to get to Final Four. I'm trying work with the logic. Success is measured for me by performance, how the team performs, it's not winning or loosing, that's important for the club, but how the players and the team grow. We can see after bunch of performance if we are on the right track, this is more my approach.



You have mentioned psychological factor. I'm always curious in situations like the once Arkas had, lost first match against Novosibirsk and had to win match and then golden set to get to the Final Four, what do you say after lost and what did you say during the second game, when you were loosing 0:2?


First in Novosibirsk we played not good, we could have won one or two sets, we just didn't play our game. First thing I said was "You know we can win this, but we have to play smarter". We were very undisciplined in our system block - defence and if you are undisciplined in this element against Russians, you lose points, you can't play a physical game, you have to play a little bit different. That what I said after the match and then, here in Turkey they played so good two first sets. We were playing good too, but they were just better. I made some tactical adjustments, it took a while for me to figure out what to do, but I was able to do it, we did some switch blocking, we did some adjustments in defence and setting and slowly we came back. At that level is not easy, it's all point by point, but that's one of the things I believe: you need to play the moment. I'm a strong believer that if something happened it comes to past, you don't focus on it, because it just happened and there is nothing you can do about it. Only thing you can do about it is to learn from it. And then you've on to the next point. That's they way I try to coach, I'm trying not to get excited, I'm trying to focus on what can I do to help the team, do I have to do substitution or change something else. This came to me form the book "The Power of Now" by Eckhart Tolle and that was something that helped me realise that focusing on the past doesn't bring anything, you can't do anything about it. It's the past, it's gone. So when the point it's finished, okay, I learnt something from it, but then I need to go to the next one, I can't focus on it anymore.



After the match on Thursday many fans complained about the spiker, who went on court to disturb the Russians, also about the boys who pass the ball and of course referees.

Referees had maybe one or two wrong calls, but we've had the same treatment in Novosibirsk. About the speaker I didn't agree with did, but there was not much I could do… There were 5000 people, gym was packed… This is Turkey (laugh).




Is it always like that? Gym packed even on matches during the week?

You should see the hall, is just ride across my apartment, it's always crazy! They love the sport. They are so passionate about the sport.



What you can say about level and organisation of the Turkish league?

They could improve, the level this year is so much lower than the last season. The new limit of the foreign players 2+1 (2 foreign players on court + 1 in match squad) was an idea to give young turkish players chance to play. I don't find them competitive enough to develop the players they have. Last season the league was good, this year is much weaker, there is much more difference between the top teams and the ones from the bottom of classification. They could improve organisation too. The schedule is not very good, they always give us schedule at the last minute. For me, who likes to plan everything, it's very difficult, like now we don't know exactly when the play-offs start, I know that in April, but I have to come back to Canada to prepare the team for the olympic qualifier and I don't when. It's the same with Hansen. This for me is difficult. At least they could prepare at the beginning whole schedule and then make some changes. But there is a lot of potential, Turkey has a demographic boom, they got a lot of kids, so if they will invest time to develop kids and coaches they can lead in development of sport.



Is the limit of foreign players a big problem for you? Do you think they will change it in next season?

I hope so. Just to help the teams grow, you need the better level. The better level you play faster, more complex in the the defence, block-defence, then you can improve, because you face this competition every day. Id you don't you beat the bottom teams so easily, it's not even funny. Of course I always prepare my team as they have to face the best team, but sometimes game is too easy.




A while ago you have been leader of the championship, now you are on the fourth place. What is your goal for the team this season?

It's very new for the club to go so far in the Champions League. This year was the World Cup, Bravo and Hansen have been there and I was expecting the injuries. Bravo was injured, so I decided that in some games I will put younger guys in front of stronger teams. Not that you want to lose on purpose, but sometimes you have to make a choices, because of the conditions of your players. That didn't help us to keep position of the leader, but now we have a little bit more time. We have been playing two matches a week since December or January and the problem is that you don't have a time to rest your players, we do fitness and that kind of stuff, but it's always difficult in the year of World Cup. So now we have a little bit more time, so probably I will give some rest to Bravo and Agamez. Then we have some bigger matches. I think we can finish regular season third, but it's going to be difficult to finish the league first.




Do you agree with the opinions that formula of Champions League run out and European Cups should be recreated? There was a problem for example to find a club who will be able to organise Final Four and finally Skra did it.

I never thought about it. I don't have opinion on that, maybe the economic situation in Europe make it harder for some clubs. But when you say recreating the European Cups, what do you mean?




I heard about project, the idea of creating league with over a dozen best teams in Europe.

I see, something like basketball does?




Something like that. Next year there is gonna be a problem with the Final Four I guess, because who will decide to organise it? Trento again? Skra again?

Maybe we? (laugh). I think I've heard this project before. But I really don't have an opinion about this. I don't know enough but may be interesting concept, because probably what is going to happen, economic is slowing down in Europe, clubs are trying to dealing more careful with the finances, so I'm sure they are looking for the solution.


Source: http://blokaut.net/aktualnosc/1139

#ChampionsLeague201112 #ArkasSporIzmir #GlennHoag