Exclusive Interview: East Kent Mavericks’ Head Coach John Moore
Sunday March 24th 2024 – Coldhams Common, Cambridge
Cambridgeshire Cats and the East Kent Mavericks combined forces at the end of March to finish fine tuning their preparations for the 2024 season.
East Kent arrived in Cambridge with a large squad of players, looking to impress against us.
The controlled scrimmage allowed both teams to work on focus skills, group practice, all before an 11-on-11 joint game.
Both teams showed quality throughout the session and everyone enjoyed the work put in.
We had a great opportunity to catch up with East Kent’s Head Coach John Moore after the scrimmage.
1. What are your thoughts on your team’s performance in today’s scrimmage against the Cambridgeshire Cats?
Overall. Really pleased with how we performed as a team today. I think we got to see how we might be successful moving the ball and how our Team defense ethos is bedding in.
2. Were there any particular challenges your team faced during the scrimmage?
Perhaps our biggest challenge coming in was integrating all our new coaches and players. We have recruited really well. We now have Mavs vets, University players from Kent Falcons and Canterbury Christchurch Chargers as well as newcomers. We are starting to see how they will gel together into a competitive Div 1 team.
3. Which players from your team impressed you the most during the scrimmage?
I won’t single out any particular players for mention. Today was about the team playing together for the first time.
4. Did you implement any specific strategies or tactics for this scrimmage, and if so, how well do you think they worked?
On offense we scripted what we wanted to see and moved some players around to see what they could give us in slightly different positions. On defense we unveiled a newly installed Blitz package which was at times successful. The players enjoyed that aspect as we have had them on a leash a little as out new DC Jacob Maxted implements a new defense scheme .
5. What do you see as your team’s strengths and areas for improvement moving forward?
As the HC I’m excited to see GB Adult Coordinator Adam Lillis unleash his fast paced offense. As always we need to improve on our basic execution and we will carry on working on that between now and beginning of the season.
6. How do you plan to address any weaknesses identified in this scrimmage before the start of the season?
We will just keep grinding. We are the new team to a very tough division. The Division contains 3 play off teams from last year and one team down from the Premiership. We have our work cut out for sure.
We are really grateful for todays scrimmage against Cambridge, their high powered offense and drilled Defense gave is a real test.
You can find East Kent at https://www.ekmavericks.co.uk or on Instagram @eastkentmavericks or on Facebook here.
