Tottenham Hotspur Women Appoint New Coach Rehanne Skinner
By Aaron Coe
Less than 24 hours after the somewhat surprising dismissal of Co-coaches Hills and Amoros, Tottenham Hotspur Women have named Rehanne Skinner new coach.
After dropping two points last to last place Bristol City and then falling in penalties to Arsenal the two-person coaching initiative under Karen Hills and Juan Amoros is over. Less than 24 hours after their dismissal “with immediate effect” a new leader has been appointed in Rehanne Skinner. In Skinner Tottenham Women are bringing in a coach maybe a bit light on recent head coaching experience, but extremely adept in multiple facets of the women’s game, which she has been coaching in for the better part of 15 years.
Skinner retired from playing football and immediately went into coaching with Leicester City back in 2006. In an interview with the FA Skinner noted that during her four years at Leicester she learned “a lot about how to work with players and involve them in the journey,” taking “psychology courses to help me to drive performance in individuals and as a team”. It was through that experience that Skinner “realized quickly it couldn’t be me driving the bus all the time if we were going to compete in the top league.”
That philosophy she was developing at Leicester City must have worked as from 2006 until 2010 Skinner and the Leicester City Women earned four consecutive promotions up the league tiers. It was at this point in 2010 that Skinner went for something new and moved to Arsenal, who were – and maybe still are – the tops in the women’s game in England.
It was during this time at Arsenal that Skinner was really exposed to experienced, world class footballers, who “had over 500 caps between them and were competing for Champions League” creating high expectations which Skinner loved. In three seasons with Arsenal, Skinner was an assistant on a side that won five trophies and reached two Champions League semi-finals. Two of those five trophies were two of the first three inaugural seasons of the WSL.
In a series of moves that should excite the ladies within the Tottenham Women’s academy Skinner went and worked with women’s youth in the US for three years. That work at Massive Soccer Academy included a lot of work with the U.S. Olympic Development Program as well. That move followed a short stint as Great Britain coach for the World University Student Games. That focus on youth and development has been a big part of Skinner’s work since then.
Returning to the UK in 2016, Skinner has been part of the FA National Team set-up ever since, working primarily with the younger teams, as head coach of the U-19 Lionesses and U-17 Assistant Coach, before becoming the Head coach for a combined U-18 – U-21 team. Just over a month ago Skinner joined up with Phil Neville as the new assistant for the Senior side, participating in one camp before this opportunity with Tottenham.
Ultimately, Tottenham presents a chance for Skinner to be a head coach again as well as continue her developmental focus given growing role of the Tottenham Women’s Academy. Now Skinner gets the chance to coach world superstars like Alex Morgan and Alanna Kennedy as well as up and coming, promising youth like Captain Josie Green.
It will be great to see if Skinner can bring that same next level mentality to the Women’s team Jose Mourinho has brought to the men. To that endeavor, we say good luck and welcome to Tottenham Coach Skinner.