Carr Reveals Pre-Season Programme

The players reported back after their summer break in late June and spent three weeks training at Failand, as well as facing local opposition Hengrove Athletic and Yeovil Town in friendlies.

This week the surroundings are rather different – warm weather training in La Manga – but Carr says the work itself will follow along the same lines.

“The work isn’t too dissimilar,” he told City's official YouTube channel. “We put together a pre-season programme at the start – it’s a template that we follow but it’s fluid depending on how the players are coping with it.

“The beginning is more aerobic, but if we feel they come back with a good base to work from, which they did this year, it helps us get on to the speed endurance anaerobic work a bit quicker – that’s where we are now.

“We’ve got a template but it’s built around the games as well. We’ve got two games this week so the training won’t be horrendously hard for the lads, but they’ll still be put through their paces.”

Advances in technology means the players can now be closely monitored by Carr and his team.

“We’ve got coaches here who want to know about the information we can give them,” he added.

“Most clubs have got the GPS vests nowadays, which give us an idea of how hard the lads are working – it gives us their distances from the training session, how much of it is high speed and how fatigued they are.

“Not every player is the same, so it’s a way of managing the load we’re placing on them.

“Our main job is to not only get the players fit, but also keep them fit so the gaffer has a full squad to pick from on a Saturday.”

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