It’s day two and I’m standing on a pitch in the Cotswolds, genuinely nervous, coaching a group of U11s I met yesterday, using a method I barely understand. I have two rugby balls and I’ve been told to “reward the right decision.” One player charges into a wall of defenders for the third time. But three teammates have drifted wide, reading the space the defence has left behind. They’re communicating, pointing, organising — nobody told them to do this. I play the second ball to the wide group. They go forward and score. By the end of the session, the player who kept running into contact is looking for support before the collision, not after. Something has shifted, and I feel an energy I haven’t felt coaching before. This is what I came for.
Le Plaisir du Mouvement — The Pleasure of Movement — is a coaching philosophy developed by Pierre Villepreux, the former French international and Toulouse coach. If you’ve watched Toulouse dismantle defences with that almost casual fluidity, or noticed, at least in recent seasons, Northampton Saints playing a brand of rugby that looks like organised chaos, you’ve seen LPM in action. What looks like a team exploiting random opportunities is actually the product of deliberate defensive manipulation to create space. The chaos is the plan — and LPM gives coaches a framework of principles to teach the plan that creates the chaos.
The LPM UK course is a 5-day-long residential immersion. A few hundred players from U11 to U18, ten lead coaches — several with direct ties to Toulouse and French rugby — animateurs managing the off-pitch experience, and four or five student coaches. That last group is where I came in: a club-level junior coach with an RFU coaching award, a long-forgotten playing background that wouldn’t trouble any selectors, and a nagging suspicion that there was a gap between the structured, play-by-numbers coaching I knew and the total rugby I admired but couldn’t teach. There’s no LPM manual. No certificate. I went because I’m rugby curious, on a friend’s recommendation and a leap of faith.
I arrived on Monday with textbook imposter syndrome. I didn’t know what “student coach” meant in practice. The coaches had worked professionally across the globe — from the UK, South Africa, France, and the Netherlands. I’m an amateur. I was braced to be found out. The reality was the opposite. These were people who love rugby and want others to love it too. Turning up was qualification enough. The welcome extended beyond the pitch to communal meals, a first-night pub visit, midweek beers and pizza at the local rugby club — where I observed an LPM coach take a senior first-team session using the same philosophy — and a final dinner that felt like saying goodbye to friends, not colleagues.
But it was on the pitch that the real learning happened. Strip away the warmth and the camaraderie, and at its core LPM teaches a set of principles that, once you see them, change how you understand the game.
It starts with one question: “Where am I most useful right now?” That’s the Utility Principle, and it underpins everything. Players stop waiting for the ball. They read the game, reposition, every phase, every moment. Offload and reassess. See space and move to it. LPM teaches this from U11. It’s not instinct. It’s coachable.
Two other principles clicked early: Go Forward and Same Way. They sound simple because they are. Get over the gain line. Then keep the ball moving in the same direction. What I hadn’t appreciated until I watched it happen with the U13s on Wednesday is what this does to a defence. You go forward, you go the same way, and the defence starts chasing. Phase after phase in the same direction, and suddenly most of their players are clustered, and spaces start to open up. That’s not luck. That’s method.
The real shift in my thinking came with the LPM families. In most coaching, “support the ball carrier” or “structures” are the default instructions — and the result is players converging on the same breakdown, support remaining static, and defences adjusting. In LPM, players organise into four families based on their position relative to the ball. Life of the Ball — the ball carrier and close support — goes forward and fights to keep the ball alive. The Early family moves into space, stretching the defence, offering immediate support. The Late family, arriving from the previous phase, supports either group, further threatening the defence. The Deep family provides depth.
Each player’s utility and role changes as the ball moves: Early becomes Life of the Ball; the prior Life of the Ball asks, “Where am I most useful?” Early or Late? The Deep family is a constant threat. What looks chaotic from the sideline is actually fifteen players reading the game, asking where they are most useful, and manipulating the defence.
Every player is told to Keep the Ball Alive. Going forward, in contact, after the pass, the priority is the ball. The families are at the heart of this, creating options through quick ball, good positioning, and runners adjusting lines to turn a single break into multiple threats. The flowing rugby that opens defences isn’t flair or talent. It’s a set of principles. And it’s coachable.
The coach’s primary tool is the second ball. When a player runs into contact while teammates have correctly identified the space, the coach plays the second ball to the group that made the right decision. The game doesn’t stop. Nobody gets a lecture. The method rewards intelligence over physicality, space over contact, decision-making over rehearsed moves — and the learning happens inside the game.
The eureka moment comes on day two or three — for players and student coaches. Players who arrived on Monday running into defenders start lifting their heads, finding support, going wide — not because they’ve been told to, but because the game has taught them. The good individual player discovers they’re better as part of a team. The coach starts to understand the principles, embrace the language, and see the game and the coach’s role differently.
Looking back, there are three things I wish I’d known before Monday morning.
Jump in early. You’ll face a choice on Monday: observe from the sideline, shadow a coach, or ask to coach alongside one. All three have value, but commit to coaching with a group from day one. Your eureka moment will mirror your players’ — you learn LPM by doing it, not watching it. Once squads and relationships form, it gets harder to join. If I designed the week, I’d assign student coaches with a group for days one and two, shadow a different age group on day three for a fresh perspective, then return to your group on day four with new ideas.
Learn the principles. LPM has its own framework — utility, the four families, go forward, same way, keep the ball alive — and its own feedback language. Phrases like “play where it is easy,” “look for another,” and “look to the future” sound abstract at first. Then you see them land with players, and they stop being phrases and start being coaching.
Adapt. During a breakout session, I sat with two French coaches — both vastly experienced, one speaking French, the other translating — and we talked at length about what makes a good coach. Knowledge, planning, and game understanding. At the end, the more experienced coach said one word: adaptez. Adapt to the environment. Adapt to the players. Adapt to the challenge. Bring an open mind, allow yourself to be changed, and you will grow.
It changed how I think about the game, how I approach coaching, and how I watch rugby. What I didn’t expect was what lasted beyond the week: the WhatsApp group that’s still active, the coaches who check in, the shared language that connects people across countries and experience levels. I went to the Cotswolds to become a better coach. I returned home as part of a group of people who see the game the same way — and a simpler, more pleasurable, more playful way of seeing it.
