Wilfried Nancy brings joy, safe environment to Columbus Crew
FORT LAUDERDALE, Florida — When Wilfried Nancy began preseason with the Crew, he immediately noticed the tension of his new team.
“In the beginning, everyone was standing up like this,” Nancy said, squeezing his arms close to his body and adopting a stiff, tense posture. “We didn’t move.”
Now, after six weeks of preseason training, Nancy has brought the Crew a newfound lightness. When asked what the highlight of preseason had been, it didn’t take Nancy long to find his answer.
“Joy,” Nancy said. “More joy. This is a big part of what I believe with the staff. We believe that if we train and if we do our job with joy, they’re going to be able to be better, quickly, and with less pressure, with less anxiety and everything. … Step by step, they saw that, OK, yes, we’re going to be really demanding with the players, but also we need to train in a safe environment. For us, safe environment (means) they can make mistakes.”
The impact of the new environment has been felt across the roster; players laugh more in training than they did in the beginning, and everyone’s smiles are wider. When Nancy is calling instructions across the field, his tone is relentlessly positive — “Yes!” and “Good!” may well be the two most common words.
Even players like Christian Ramirez, who joined the Crew during preseason in January, can feel the new spirit. He didn’t experience the energy around the Crew prior to Nancy’s arrival, but he can tell his longer-tenured teammates have undergone a change.
“It’s a group that I feel is fresh, based on everything I’ve seen so far,” Ramirez said. “Wilfried’s really given everybody his trust, and now it’s what we do with it to make sure we repay him for that. He doesn’t have many rules. Just wants us to be — every day, challenging us to be a better person, both on and off the pitch. It’s a good relationship that he’s building.”
For the Crew’s young players, like Sean Zawadzki and Jacen Russell-Rowe, the new approach has been particularly invigorating. Nancy isn’t a believer in looking at the past — he meticulously researches his players, but he works to prevent that knowledge from influencing his decisions in the present — and that forward-looking approach has brought a fresh start.
“He’s only been able to see me through film and hear that I was scoring a lot of goals on the second team last year and I made some appearances with the first team,” Russell-Rowe said. “It’s definitely different when you learn who I am as a person, alongside as a player, and my mannerisms and how you’re able to coach me and how I react and things like that. In a way, it does feel like a fresh start.”
Age of a player matters little to Nancy when it comes to giving them opportunities. He wants to play his best players on any given day, with broad acceptance — and even encouragement — of the mistakes that come with learning.
“He wants you to take more risks going forward,” Zawadzki told The Dispatch. “He wants you to make mistakes. He’s really emphasized that. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes. … In the past, you were scared to do too much because then you would have some negative repercussions coming your way. It’s just kind of refreshing to have someone who wants you — who encourages you to make mistakes.”
Nancy delights in the delight of his players, who have steadily grown more comfortable with the freedom of expression they have under their new manager.
It took several weeks for the message to truly sink in, but as the Crew make their final preparations to begin the season at Philadelphia on Saturday, Nancy has seen major progress from his group.
“It’s getting better,” Nancy said. “I’m really happy for that. I can see the progression during every game that we did. (Against Miami on Feb. 11), we were able to have moments on the pitch where I saw audacity, but also pleasure to try to take the challenge. For me, this is a big step ahead.”
Get more Columbus Crew news by listening to our podcasts
Read More: Wilfried Nancy brings joy, safe environment to Columbus Crew