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While there still are and will be "parent type" goalie coaches here in Finland who have never played as goalies themselves the majority of our goalie coaches have playing background. I would say that when you move to older groups almost all of the goalie coaches have playing background. You only see a few of those without proper background at the very young age groups.
It' still great that federation gives training to those youth coaches without background, but even bigger difference to North America is the fact that those goalie coaches with playing background do almost always go through certified training when they start coaching goalies. This way they don't just teach/repeat the same mistakes they have been doing during their career.
I have several goalie coaches that work at my camps & events and I give them continuous training so that I know the people I use do teach the right way and are updated on latest developments. As an example I am using Ale Jääskeläinen as the other coach on the goalie sessions this week. Some of you may remember Ale from the 2003 Rochester clinic as he did join us on that event. I run the other end with Sulander and Bäckström in the net and Ale runs the other end with Flueler (ZSC) and Härmä (KooKoo) at the other end. We use this week as teaching for Ale as well and I design the workouts and help Ale also to analyze and correct his goalies.
Overall the biggest difference between North America and Finland in goalie coaching can be summarized to these few points:
1) Sheer # of trained goalie coaches
2) Well coordinated educational program for goalie coaches
3) Youth/junior hockey organizations value goalie coaching and are willing to invest to it (pay for coaches and pay for their education).
4) Ability to attract ex goalies to coach.
My younger son is a good example. He plays as a goalie for GrIFK Jun A team and when he joined this club last spring they also asked him if he would be interested to coach goalies for the clubs -98 team. They do pay for him for each session he participates at + they are also paying for him to go through the coaches training program. This is also very typical scenario. Older active goalies often help and coach 1-2 times per week clubs younger tenders.
Jukka
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