# End of Season Review Template for Coaches

The season is over. Results are in, final sessions have been delivered, and players are heading off for a break.

This is the moment most coaches breathe a sigh of relief and move straight on to thinking about next season. New signings, new formations, new ideas. The temptation to look forward is strong.

But if you skip the review, you miss the single most valuable development opportunity of your coaching year.

An end of season review is not something reserved for professional coaches with performance analysts and video departments. It is for every coach at every level. Grassroots, academy, club, school, community. If you coached a group of athletes through a season, you owe it to yourself and to them to look back honestly before you look forward.

I have done this at the end of every season for years now, and I can tell you the difference it makes is significant. Not just to the next season's planning, but to your own development as a coach. The patterns you spot in a structured review are things you simply cannot see in the day-to-day grind of the season.

This article gives you a complete template you can use straight away. It is designed for any sport, any level, and any experience. It should take you between one and three hours to complete properly, and it will be worth every minute.

Key Takeaways

An end of season review is the most valuable development exercise a coach can do each year
This template covers five areas: team performance, player development, your coaching, relationships, and next season planning
You do not need data or statistics to do a meaningful review. Honest reflection works
If you have kept session reflections during the season, the review becomes dramatically easier
Share relevant sections with your club, committee, or parents to build trust and professionalism

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Why Season Reviews Matter at Every Level

There is a common misconception that season reviews are a professional-level exercise. Something that academy directors and performance managers do with spreadsheets and video clips.

In my experience, the opposite is true. Professional coaches have support staff who track things throughout the season. It is grassroots and community coaches who need the structured review most, precisely because nobody else is doing that analysis for them.

Without a review, you carry a vague impression of the season into the next one. "It went okay." "We had a tough start but finished well." "The new players took a while to settle."

Vague impressions lead to vague planning. Structured reviews lead to targeted improvement.

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The Template

Work through each section in order. Write your answers rather than just thinking about them. The act of writing forces honesty and specificity that mental reflection alone does not.

Section 1: Team Performance

This is the big picture view of how your group performed as a unit.

Results and outcomes

What was the overall record? (wins, losses, draws if applicable)
How does this compare to last season or your pre-season expectations?
Were there distinct phases to the season? (strong start/weak finish, slow build, consistent throughout)

Playing identity

Did the team develop a recognisable playing identity or style?
Can you describe in one sentence how your team plays? Could your players describe it?
Were there moments where the identity was really visible? When did it break down?

Strengths and weaknesses

What were the team's three biggest strengths this season?
What were the three biggest weaknesses?
Which of those weaknesses are fixable through coaching, and which are squad limitations?

Key moments

What were the defining moments of the season, positive and negative?
Did the team show resilience under pressure? When?
Were there turning points that shifted momentum?

Section 2: Individual Player Development

This section is about the athletes you coached, not the results they produced.

Development across the group

Which players made the most progress this season? In what areas?
Which players did not develop as much as you expected? What held them back?
Did any players surprise you, positively or negatively?

Attention distribution

Which players received the most coaching attention? Why?
Which players were you least attentive to? What can you do differently?
Did you have favourites, even unconsciously? How might that have affected the group?

Individual highlights

For each player (or at least the core group), note one specific area of growth and one area for next season
This does not need to be detailed. A sentence each is enough. The value is in thinking about every player, not just the standouts

Retention

Did you lose any players during the season? Why?
Were there players who disengaged even if they stayed? What happened?
What would you do differently to retain or re-engage those athletes?

Section 3: Your Coaching Development

This is the most important section, and the one coaches most often skip.

Coaching quality

What was your best session of the season? What made it work?
What was your worst? What went wrong?
If you could re-coach three sessions from the season, which would they be and what would you change?

Your development areas

What did you learn about coaching this season?
Which coaching skills improved? (Communication, session design, game management, player relationships, adaptability)
Which areas still need work?
Did you complete any courses, read any books, or seek out any mentoring?

Coaching behaviour

Did you talk too much in sessions? (Be honest)
How was your emotional regulation during competition? Any moments you regret?
Did you model the behaviour and values you asked of your players?

Time and energy

How did your energy levels hold up across the season?
Did you experience burnout at any point? When and why?
What was the impact on your coaching when energy was low?

Section 4: Relationships and Communication

Coaching does not happen in isolation. This section examines the relationships around your programme.

Players

How would your players describe their relationship with you?
Did you build genuine connections, or was it purely transactional?
Were there players you struggled to connect with? What will you try differently?

Parents and guardians

How was your communication with parents this season?
Were there difficult conversations? How did they go?
What feedback, formal or informal, did you receive from parents?

Club and organisation

How was your relationship with the wider club or organisation?
Did you feel supported? What support was lacking?
Did you contribute beyond your own team?

Other coaches

Did you collaborate with or learn from other coaches this season?
Could you have benefited from more connection with peers?
Is there a mentor or coaching group you should seek out?

Section 5: Planning for Next Season

Now you can look forward, but informed by everything above.

Priorities

Based on your review, what are the three most important things to improve next season?
Be specific. "Improve defending" is too vague. "Develop pressing triggers from a mid-block" is actionable
Which of these priorities is within your current capability, and which requires you to develop new knowledge?

Session planning

What types of sessions worked best this season?
What session formats will you use more of? Less of?
Are there new approaches you want to try?

Your own development plan

What courses, books, podcasts, or mentors will you pursue in the off-season?
What is one coaching skill you want to significantly improve?
How will you measure whether you have improved?

Practical changes

Do you need new equipment?
Are there logistical changes to make? (Session times, locations, squad size)
What administrative improvements would make your life easier?

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How to Complete This Without It Taking All Day

The template above is comprehensive. You do not need to answer every question in depth.

Here is a practical approach:

Block two hours. Find a quiet space. No phone. Treat it like a coaching session for yourself
Skim all sections first. Get a sense of the whole review before diving in
Start with Section 3 (your coaching). This is the section most likely to surface genuinely useful insights
Write in bullet points. You are not writing an essay. Short, honest statements are more useful than polished paragraphs
Be brutally honest. Nobody else needs to see this. The value is in the honesty

If you have been keeping session reflections throughout the season, this review becomes dramatically easier. Instead of relying on memory for an entire season, you can review your reflection history and pull out themes, patterns, and specific examples.

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Using Data from the Season

You do not need a statistics department to bring data into your review. Here are simple data points that most coaches have access to:

Results: Win/loss record, points per game, goals or points for and against
Attendance: Which players attended consistently? Who dropped off?
Your reflections: If you have been reflecting after sessions, review the themes
Player feedback: Even informal conversations count as data
Fixture details: Home vs away performance, performance against strong vs weak opposition

The data is not the review. It supports the review. Use it to check your impressions against reality. You might think the season finished strongly, but the results might tell a different story. You might think a particular player was consistent, but your reflections might show they were only mentioned twice all season.

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Sharing Your Review

Parts of your review are useful to share. Parts are private.

Share with your club or committee:

Team performance summary (Section 1)
Key priorities for next season (Section 5)
Practical needs and requests

Share with parents (if appropriate):

General team development overview
Philosophy and direction for next season
How they can support

Keep private:

Your coaching self-assessment (Section 3)
Individual player notes (unless in a formal 1-to-1 setting)
Relationship reflections (Section 4)

Sharing a professional, structured review with your club builds enormous trust. It shows you take the role seriously, and it gives committees confidence in your planning.

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The Review Nobody Does

I will be direct: most coaches do not do a season review. They finish the season, take a break, and start the next one with good intentions and vague memories.

That is how coaching stays the same year after year. The same problems recur. The same weaknesses persist. The same frustrations surface.

A structured review breaks that cycle. It converts a season of experience into specific, actionable insights that directly improve your next season.

Two hours of honest reflection. That is what separates a coach who has coached for ten seasons from a coach who has coached the same season ten times.

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Make Next Season's Review Easier

The hardest part of a season review is remembering specifics from months ago. By April, what happened in September feels like a different lifetime.

The solution is simple: reflect throughout the season, not just at the end. Even brief post-session reflections, captured consistently, give you a detailed record to review.

When your end of season review is a compilation of fifty session reflections rather than a memory exercise, the quality of insight is incomparable.

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Coach Reflection tracks your session reflections and surfaces patterns across your season automatically. When it comes time for your end of season review, your data is already there. Try it free at [coachreflection.com](https://coachreflection.com).

End of Season Review Template for Coaches