1. Coach Herod, first of all, welcome to DoDDS-Europe football. Tell us about your background and how you came to be the football coach at Filton. Tell us about your team.

Like a lot of British kids I started out playing Rugby. My father was my coach and I just really enjoyed contact sports. In the early 80's (yes older than I look) my dad started watching American Football on TV. British TV would show highlights of the NFL (Joe Montana and the 49ers with Ronnie Lott and Roger Craig were our favorites) and I started to prefer the game to Rugby and soccer. By 14 my dad had me playing for a local community team with my friends and I went on to be relatively successful playing for Great Britain under 19's for 4 years including two tours of the USA. Whilst on tour we would stay with host families and it was their amazing generosity that allowed me to go back and visit for extended periods of time and get to play some High School football in Wisconsin. My playing days were cut short after some tentative scholarship offers to play College Football in the USA by a series of injuries and I played in England until I was 23 years old. For the past ten years I have been coaching. I have only coached this age group that entire time and have loved every second of it. I was fortunate enough to coach with Team England Youth in the past and was the coach of the Bristol Aztecs Youth Team since 2003. It was Principle Kevin Hamblin of Filton College that brought me in to coach the PRIDE. I would like to think it was because I was a good coach but I think it was just being in the right place at the right time. He is a true champion of sports. He has set up Filton to run Academies of sport recruiting not only local kids but kids from all over the country to play the different sports here. Unlike other schools the sport to which you are recruited in for at Filton is the only one you are allowed to play for. Once your season is over you are pushed into the weights room and athletics track to make you better for the following year. He asked me to set up an American Football Academy from scratch two years ago and I think with the support of the Head of Academies, Simon Panes and Jon Wyse who is are charge of AASE we have done a great job so far. This is our second season and last year we played just two games. In one of those we did upset our under 19's national team 8 - 6. Whilst I am the only employed coach on staff I am very blessed to have a good friend in Pete Jones who donates his time twice a week and game days to coach our line and call our defense. He has a solid background in the sport having played center for Great Britain Adults in several major championships. Our team this year has very little experience. Some having never really played before - some just a handful of games and some just having played 5 on 5 football. I think we have just four guys with more than one years experience.

2. What have been your first impressions with DoDDS-Europe football?

Firstly it’s the hospitality of the teams we have played. It has been fantastic. From Coach Martinez at Lakenheath to Stan Kyle at K-Town and Karen Seadore at the league everyone has been so welcoming and so helpful. It has been tough getting used to the amount of information needed to get onto the bases but well worth it. The level of football we have faced has been far greater than that in our domestic leagues which was exactly the reason we wanted to challenge our team with this league. The officials to have been top class. They have taken time to explain things to us on the sideline and our players on the field and have done a top class job of protecting the kids first and foremost with the way in which they call the games. I have nothing but good things to say so far about our experiences. Oh and all the kids seem to love Popeyes on the bases!

3. Your team is 2-0 and has averaged 32 points a game in the first two games. Are you surprised? What did you expect?

In all honesty I am very surprised. We have not practiced well this year compared with last but they switch on in games and have started fast just like I have asked them too. I don't think it will continue though. Part of this is an element of no one knowing what to expect from us. It will have been virtually impossible for teams to have seen footage on us as we hadn't played any games; where as to get information on our opponents has been far easier for me. The second time we play these teams will be the test, I expect those games to be far tougher. Part of our success so far has been the excellent play of our offensive line. The guys running the ball will most likely get the headlines but our line has been terrific. That comes down to their work ethic in the gym and the hard work that Coach Pete Jones has put in with them.

4. We read somewhere that you only have 24 players. Does your lack of numbers concern you?

It does yes. I think we actually only have 23. 1 is injured and missed all the games so far and another has played just two plays due to injury. They are very tough though. Despite having played in such tough games we seem to be handling it well. They have never played week in week out before though as in our national league they'll get around 6 - 8 games spread out over 3 - 4 months. The tail end of the season the other teams will have a big advantage over us there. That's where our strength trainer Josh Sampson will really earn his money.

5. Who are your best players?

This is a really tough one to answer as our success so far has been such a team effort. I'd also hate to get the stick for not mentioning one of my guys on here. Our best group so far though has been our offensive line so Captains Shane Prosser and Elliot McMahon along with Jack Lloyd, Jack Sly, Mike Lock, Stephen Ives and Fernando Carvalho all deserve mention here.

6. What were your goals for this first season in DoDDS-Europe?

Our number one goal is to just be competitive. We want to try and pass the football, something that at our level in British Football is rare. So we are desperately trying to develop that side of our game. Against K-Town Jamie Cunningham & Jordan Eaton helped us to more than 250 yards passing which was good. Our next goal is to be respected. This will come down to the way in which we play on the field and the way in which we act off the field. I don't want teams ever questioning the leagues decision to let us in.

7. What else would you like everyone to know about you and your program?

I think the biggest thing is to quash any idea that we have unfair advantage due to the size of our school or the amount of hours we train. Firstly, our school is large and has many male students that are the right age to play. However we don't recruit from this pool as they are all here for other reasons. Our school being an Academy means that they are all attached to other things such as Rugby or Basketball or performing arts or music etc. So our squad won't fluctuate much from what we have recruited in at August each year. This year that is 23 guys and 5 or 6 that are too old to play in our fixtures from last season who help us film etc. The second thing is our training schedule. We train 3 times a week. Monday, Wednesday and Friday. We also did not train more than 10 days leading into the season. We did meet up for several conditioning days and took days out to run sand dunes etc to team build but our football time was limited. Part of this is due to our team not being with us as a whole until September when school started. All our guys have to take part in a normal school timetable on top of their American Football so at times when the work load is high our kids have to miss practices as well. Their education must come first.