All about ballerz

Guy Branston discusses a great initiative he has set up to help players of all levels find clubs.

As part of Sky Sports' League Two spotlight, Chris Burton catches up with Plymouth Argyle defender Guy Branston.

The 2012/13 campaign is about to enter the final straight, with promotion pushes and relegation battles now in full swing. Here at Sky Sports, we continue to take you to the very heart of the Football League, with our Spotlight features intended to give you a greater insight into the clubs and players that keep us on the edge of our seats. We are hoping to bring you the views and thoughts of a representative from each of the 72 teams over the course of the season, with those involved asked to give their take on the division they compete in, the club that pays their wages and those we should all be keeping an eye on. Next in our hot seat is Plymouth's Guy Branston, with the experienced centre-half taking time out to discuss a great new initiative he has set up to help players find clubs and the Pilgrims' return to form with Chris Burton. Tell me about your website allaboutballerz.com and what it is intended to do? It's about passing on my experience. Passing on my experience to anyone who thinks they have got a chance to be a professional footballer. Not totally professional, it's grass roots as well. It's about getting the lower league lads into the Football League as well, it's about keeping the Football League lads in a job. Showcasing yourself as a footballer isn't a bad thing to do. I'm not saying advertise yourself as available when you're not, I'm not saying that at all. It's about being professional, looking after your own product - which is yourself. As a footballer you are self-employed. You work for a football club until they tell you otherwise and then you have to go somewhere else. It's such a cut-throat business these days that showcasing yourself and showcasing your season as a professional footballer should be the new thing that lads do. You don't always get the press, you don't always get the media and you don't always get people chatting about you that sometimes you think you should. I've built the website allaboutballerz.com to give you that opportunity to showcase yourself. It's picking up speed, massive speed, and it's going to be the end of the season soon and the biggest period - where the lads from the UK load up the clips and showcase themselves to football clubs, managers, agents and scouts out there that want players for the following season. It gives an alternative to sending out scouts, which costs a fortune, hiring agents. Check out allaboutballerz and have a look at what Guy has managed to achieve by clicking here. How have things been going so far? I have had people from the Premier League all the way down to Ryman Prem getting in touch with the site and people wanting to get that kind of exposure for their football club. For the Premier League clubs, it gives them a great outlet for the lads that they release. Most Premier League clubs are signing 40 or 50 youth team scholars and then releasing 80 per cent of them, 90 per cent of them. Now it's about giving them an option of where to go next. I think allaboutballerz is that option. It is run by a professional footballer, which I think is important for the football clubs because they are passing them on to a footballer who has experience in all the divisions - apart from the Ryman Prem and Evo-Stick. But I've played non-league football with Kettering. It's offering a wake-up call that there is other leagues out there for them to play football, not just stop playing football. The pros that are in the game, it gives them another option to build up a contact base and put themselves in the shop window if they are out of contract. There are different ways this website could go, there are so many different avenues, and how it's helping footballers is phenomenal. I'm doing deals - I got a kid from Norway to the Championship for a trial. It's phenomenal. I've had exposure from the Premiership with endorsements from Darren Bent, Shay Given, Andy Marshall - the Villa boys, saying they like the site and providing clips to show they have endorsed it. All the stuff that has been happening with the site has been phenomenal and if I can help any lads out there that need helping out, absolutely great. Is this something you have been planning for a while? Is it an area which interests you - a form of agency work? I don't want to be a football agent, I want to be somebody who helps lads get into football clubs. I want the site to work organically and grow and be a successful database of football clips that players can load up to and trust and know that it's effective. I don't want to set subscription charges, write contracts, fill in forms and make the system that is already out there online. I didn't want to do that, I want to do something different and get exposure to the site that there is something out there that lads can use between themselves and get in contact with each other and maybe find the players they need at a local club in the region, but also cut out expensive charges of agents. Football clubs can source local-based players as well. There are so many different avenues that this site can help football. It's a different avenue for me because I'd had the idea for three or four years, because I have been in the situation. I had to drop into the non-league because of a Football League ruling and I was disappointed. But I brewed this idea in my head that it has to be easier to get noticed. As a defender, dropping into the non-leagues is a scary thing because if the team isn't keeping clean sheets and doing well around you, you get forgotten. I was playing well and I was ringing up scouts personally, ringing up agents, ringing up managers and saying 'I'm playing well here, I know I'm doing well'. I was playing well and I knew my own ability. I was big enough to ring people up and say 'I need a bit of help here, are you going to come and watch me?' I was sending DVDs and waiting back for returned calls, it was a long, slow process week after week. I thought it has got to be easier. I was loading clips up to YouTube, but they weren't getting noticed either. I was transferring the clips across and I thought there has got to be a system where the clips are online and you can incorporate every facility out there and take a bit of an idea from each of them. The social media element of the site, you can get in touch with these players. The advertising side of it, the marketing side of it, there were all these things that had to be incorporated together. Being a lower league footballer, you need a big bundle of money to set these things up because you aren't going to get backing from big industries. I have had to build it up myself slowly and I've had to build a pot of money up to get the thing off the floor. Now big companies are saying, 'This is a great idea Guy, can we get involved with you?' The companies getting involved are amazing, but now I'm starting to realise that there are different avenues and open doors to make it even more exciting. It's been an amazing experience up to now.
So it's shaping up to be a busy summer for you then, given how many players will find themselves without a club come the end of the season? Busy summer for myself personally trying to get a football club, my contract runs out on 28th April, but also working with these lads, chatting with these lads, and trying to offer them advice if I can. That's what the site does, it offers you a direct link to a professional footballer who has been in your shoes - he can handle it, he can understand it and I might be able to help these people. Kids off the street, a dad off the street who has a kid in the back garden who doesn't know what to do because he isn't been watched at his Sunday side can get in touch with the site, have a chat and load his son's clip up. I individually watch every clip and they can then build a rapport with a professional footballer. I don't think that's out there and I think that was new and exciting for a lot of people who are getting involved in the site. They do have a direct link with me, they can chat to me on social media, I will get back to them and won't ignore them. A lot of the industry ignores the so-called little person and that annoys me. I'm a very open person, I'm happy to chat with anybody and I do a lot of community club stuff where I go and chat with kids and stuff like that outside of football. I thought to bring that on social media and bring it on the environment that everyone is using these days, it would give them an outlet and make it effective and good value. Hopefully it will work without the high subscription charges and the over-exuberant charges that some of those lads have fallen into the trap of. A lot of companies are selling these stories that they can get them trials. I'm not selling anything, I say use the site and you will get seen by managers, agencies. I'm making sure I promote it enough and I believe it will grow organically as a centralised database. That's what I genuinely believe it will be. If I was a footballer looking for a different way of advertising myself, I would use allaboutballerz. If I was a manager and I needed local players in the area, I would use allaboutballerz. Hopefully I will become a football manager, and I will use allaboutballerz because there will be players on there from my region who need a club. I will be able to use my budget to get those players through the door to have a look at them. If they are being recommended by a professional footballer, what more will a manager from a football team need? On a personal level, are you hoping you will still be at Plymouth next season? Definitely. I have got to impress in every game, I'm 34 and I have got to show that I have got the legs to last until the end of the season without any injuries - which I haven't had this season. I've had a few little niggles, but no serious injuries. I want to promote myself as much as I can because I'm a footballer who still wants to work, who still wants to train every day and I'm not about taking my foot off the peddle. I want to keep going like Giggsy and hopefully be of Football League standard until I'm 40. That would be unbelievable, but I think I can achieve it with my body and the way I look after myself. I can go on all day about promoting myself, that's what I do. I know I'm a commodity to the football club, I know I'm an aging commodity to the football club, but what I bring in age I also bring in experience and nous about what to do in certain situations which sometimes the young lads don't have. I think I'm a good commodity to have at a football club, and that's why I think I should stay if I'm offered a contract. But you've moved around enough in your career haven't you to appreciate that if something doesn't arise at Plymouth, you turn your attention elsewhere? Definitely. If it's not Plymouth, it's somewhere else. I know the game and I know that the gaffer might have other ideas next season. He might have brought me in for a short period, and I have been in that situation before where I have had to deal with it and get myself out of it. I'm not afraid to do that. That's why I set up my business, because I have been in precarious positions where I have been out of contract and I know that about football. It's very important that you showcase yourself and advertise yourself if there is an opportunity. But until you have left that football club and been told you won't be getting another contract, then you have got to do the honourable thing and work hard for the club that pays you and the fans that pay you. It's not something where you can think, 'I'm not going to get a contract at the end of the season', you have got to work hard until your contract finishes and you have to act right and act professional. That's probably why I've had so many clubs, they employ me because they know I'm going to do a professional job for them and work for the club that I play for. Things have improved dramatically for Plymouth over recent weeks, you've found a bit of form at just the right time haven't you? We are having a very good time. It was very important that we got the wins under the new gaffer. We have picked up some good points and I think we are top of the form table now. The gaffer is up for manager of the month, players are being celebrated rather than heckled now and it's a really good place to be at the minute. The wins have been coming and people are seeing light at the end of the tunnel. I think four points out of the next few games should keep us safe, but we have got to try and win every game and set things up for the following season. You are now three points clear of the relegation zone with a game in hand - that's what you want isn't it, for your fate to be in your own hands? Definitely. You don't want to go into games worrying about playing the game, but also worrying about other people winning to keep you down. You want to go out there just thinking about your own game. Now we have got ourselves in that position, we can go out there and play and enjoy ourselves. That's a plus for a footballer, playing with no pressure to win a football match brings the best of you. We have got Burton on Saturday, they have got pressure on to try and keep their promotion hopes alive and also play-off hopes. It's going to be an exciting game and I'm looking forward to it. I like playing under pressure. I turn up when the game's on and the pressure is on. You've picked up three clean sheets in your last four as well, you are giving yourselves more of a chance to win games aren't you? Clean sheets are massive. The whole team has worked hard in training and the gaffer has made sure that we're compact and not getting dragged out of position. He goes mad on the sidelines when lads are swapping over and defenders are being dragged into midfield. He gets mad at you, but he is on your case in the right way. He speaks to you correctly in the dressing room and around the place and you feel like you can't make a mistake in the right way because you have that pressure on you. That's a good thing as a footballer because you can't be lackadaisical as a footballer. There are a lot of lads that think they can relax in training and just mess around. Football is a business, football is a job and football is very important at all levels. Lads need to realise that it's not turn up for work and play heads and volleys, it's turn up for work and work. That's what the gaffer is all about, work rate and especially pitch organisation. He is all about getting lads in the right positions at the right time, that's what he has definitely brought to the football club. You've seen plenty of League Two down the years, do you think the standard has improved year on year? Massively. Bradford have been the flag bearers this season for the standard of football in the Football League, they have played against some of the top sides. Fair dos to Bradford, they are hopefully going to get in the play-offs as well, and having been involved with them last season, that was one of the highlights of my career. Hopefully they will fly the flag again and getting into the play-offs shows the standard around this league. We have definitely improved as a team with the standard of players that the gaffer has brought to the club and the players have had to improve within the club to stay in the team. Player changeover at football clubs is a positive thing, players need to realise that you have to be on your toes at all times. I think football in general has improved over the last few years, by getting the ball down - which might be the Barcelona effect. The way we watch football nowadays, we all want to play passing football and I'm a big advocate of that - I think the only way to play football is on the floor. We try to do that at Plymouth because the gaffer was a footballer - he played in two World Cups, won the League Cup, scored in the League Cup final. You have got to respect the man for that. Finally, who has really impressed you at Plymouth this season? Any of the young lads? Curtis has had a bit of a tough time with an injury, Curtis Nelson. He's only 19, he was captain on Saturday, he's a big old unit and I've raved about him for a few years. I watched him when he was very young for Plymouth when I was at Torquay, he was only 17 then, but I saw him bully Lee Hughes and I saw him as a good centre-half for the future. He's a future star, the U19s he's played for as well with England. Jason Banton, I wish his work rate was more, but he's got bags of ability. If he just steps it up one more level, he will be a top, top Championship player. His work rate is something he needs to work on and that's probably why they (Crystal Palace) have sent him out on loan to this level, to get someone on his case constantly and get in his ear. He will be a top footballer. The captain we've had as well, Conor (Hourihane), he's 6ft 1in, a midfielder that gets around the box, gets around the football pitch and gets tackles in. Again, there is bags of improvement in him. That's why I came to Plymouth, with a young side and a side that has got a lot of ability but didn't know how to direct it. With the gaffer coming in, he's directed it well and woke these kids up. That's why I think he's brought myself in, Charlesy (Anthony Charles) in, all the boys in - there are lads now that are waking the young lads up and saying you have got bags ability but it's not just about that, it's not just about running round, it's about adding those two together and making a good player. That's what Jason is learning, that's what Curtis is learning, that's what Connor is learning and they are going to be top players in their careers. Hopefully my experience, Wottos (Paul Wotton) experience, Charlesys experience can add to their already considerable ability, and who knows what can happen. Check out allaboutballerz by clicking here and catch Guy on the Football League hour on Sky Sports News Radio later on Thursday.