Assessment · 8 min · 30 July 2026

What RFEF assessors actually look for

Six things, and only two of them are about football.

I have sat with assessors after enough courses to know what gets written down. Here is what they are marking, in the order it seems to matter.

1. Can you organise thirty people

Before anything technical. If the practice takes six minutes to set up and players are standing around, nothing after that recovers it.

2. Do you know why

You will be asked. Not 'what are you doing' — 'why this and not something else'. Have an answer that is not 'it worked last week'.

3. Do you intervene at the right moment

Too early and you are coaching your plan instead of the session. Too late and the moment is gone. Assessors watch this more closely than anything else.

4. Is the session for these players

A brilliant U19 practice run with U12s is a fail. Age-appropriateness is marked explicitly and people lose on it constantly.

5. Do players get better in the hour

Visibly. Something that could not be done at the start should be happening by the end, even slightly.

6. Are you safe and organised

Safeguarding, kit, the state of the pitch, whether you did a check. Dull, and it is the fastest way to fail a course you would otherwise pass.