Since the November tour, Fabien Galthié and his staff have called on a psychologist the day after a match, in order to smooth the relationship between its members and evacuate what remains unsaid. One of the obvious lessons from a still recent past…
Whether we fully adhere to the discourse of “high performance” or whether we prefer to trivially qualify it as the Mexican army, there remains a reality regarding the staff composed by Fabien Galthié. Namely that, on match days, there are more people supervising the players than there are players themselves… Avant-garde? Exaggerated? Everyone will have their humble opinion on the subject. The fact is that in terms of human resources, the management of the French XV presents on paper as many “chances” of dysfunction as the group of players with strong egos that it must manage. “The staff is a team of 32 people, underlines the coach of the XV of France in the interview he gave us (read on pages 2 and 3). The work that we do with those on the ground, we must do with those in management, myself included. I must not neglect anyone. Before collaborating all together, even if I took a lot of care in choosing each member of the staff. […] But even if the feeling is good, you can never be sure of anything until we have gone through a storm together.” An obvious fact which the last tour in Argentina allowed Fabien Galthié to realize, which only had the consequence of exploding the unsaid and other resentments, when it comes to measuring the degree of responsibility of each person…
Galthié: “Reducing the cognitive cost in a stable framework”
This is why, at the time of the debriefing of the misadventures of the Blues in the pampas, Fabien Galthié did not hesitate to call on a psychologist who could play mediator between individuals, and put the grievances of some on the table through maieutics. towards others. “Yes and there were tensions, disappointments, lively discussions, Galthié frankly admits. […] These meetings with the mental preparation staff, that’s what we use them for. So that everyone becomes aware of what they should do or not do.”
-An approach that was not necessarily well received at first by some, but which nevertheless continued throughout the November tour, with the staff using dedicated time during the day on Sunday for this collective therapy work. All for the results it seems beneficial, since Galthié and his men have decided to continue their introspection until the end of the Tournament, at least. “This allows us to have “warnings” on rough edges, problems that are not well addressed and to improve. […] The gain is what I call the cognitive cost because the emotional overload can impact decision-making. This approach allows us to reduce this cognitive cost, all within a stable framework.” Everything but superfluous, if we remember that one of the reasons for the failure of the World Cup is also attributable to the divergent points of view regarding human and strategic choices between members of the staff…
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