

The Canadian Press





TORONTO -- As Leicester City continues its unlikely assault on the English Premier League title, one Toronto FC staffer is watching with particular interest.

Tom Williams, TFC's head of strength and conditioning, spent close to three years in the same position with the Leicester academy before joining the MLS club in February.

The 29-year-old from Aberystwyth, Wales, is not surprised at Leicester's turnaround, from battling relegation to vaulting past the likes of Arsenal, Manchester United and Manchester City.

"They've been building for this for years," he said. "From where they were last year, they were playing really well and losing every game. And then it just clicked.

"That momentum just kept going, going, going. But it's not something that's just happened overnight. (Former manager) Nigel Pearson did a fantastic job of recruiting players. He recruited personalties. It wasn't a case of 'We're going to get a 30-goal-a-season striker.' It was 'We're going to get a guy who will die for the club.' That's what they've got. A very tight-knit group of players."

He believes Leicester's academy will help maintain that success. Now he's hoping to help leave a legacy in Toronto.

Williams' networking brought him in contact with Jeremy Bettle, now the Maple Leafs' director of sports science and performance, when Bettle was strength and conditioning coach and director of nutrition for the Brooklyn Nets. Bettle, in turn, recommended him to Jim Liston, Toronto FC's director of sport science.

Liston was interested. After getting resumes from as far afield as Brazil and Qatar, his top candidate to head up TFC's strength and conditioning elected last July to stay with his existing club. So he was on the hunt again.

"In the end (Williams) was our obvious choice," said Liston.

"It was a fantastic opportunity," Williams said of Toronto. "Even though the guys at Leicester were flying."

"I'm quite keen on new challenges," he added.

Williams' career choice was simple. He was always a soccer aficionado and "took a shine to fitness."

Williams has packed a lot into a resume that includes stints as a first team rehabilitation therapist (Sheffield United), development coach (Nottingham Forest), first team sport scientist (Mansfield Town) and academy coach and scout (Derby County).

He left home at 15 "just to try and get ahead and do something. I knocked on a lot of doors."

In the past, one used to think of the strength and conditioning coach as the beefy guy in the gym. No more.

"It's everything," said Williams.

"We're very much a fluid department," he added, referring to TFC's sports science division. "So we'll roll in and out of different areas. For me, I think that's something specific to here that's really good. There's not just the rehab guy or the physio, We're all a performance department and we all know what's going on."

Liston, who was a strength and conditioning coach with the Los Angeles Galaxy, Columbus Crew and Chivas USA, runs a sport science group that includes Williams, director of rehabilitation Brian Lee, head athletic therapist Carmelo Lobue, assistant therapist Marcelo Casal and massage therapist/accupuncturist Shohei Miyauchi. The USL club and academy, which has six teams, also have assigned staff.

The department covers everything from nutrition to rehabilitation. The team even monitors sleep patterns.

Williams also has his UEFA B license in coaching and coaching goalkeepers. He used to coach part-time at Derby and Nottingham Forest, helping pay for his studies at Loughborough College.

"I think it gave me a really good background to the requirements of the players," he said.

He grew up a Cardiff City fan. "My blood runs blue," he said with a laugh.

And now, wearing Toronto FC colours, it is back to running red. Williams is already high on TFC.

"The communication here is fantastic," he said. "Our performance team is a very tight-knit group ... From my experience working in professional sport, trying to communicate with the coaches, with the players, a lot of messages get lost. But here it's very clear what we're look to do. We're trying to be one club and not separate ourselves from the academy or the USL (team)."

At Leicester, he worked with players aged from nine to 21. With the youngsters, the goal was to help them move better.

"It's a totally different scale from what we do with the first team but the underlying foundations stay the same."

The lean-looking Williams arrives at work at 7 a.m. to ensure he gets his own workout in. His department meets to discuss the day and then its off to supervise warmups and help at training, with gym work as scheduled. After practice, there is data analysis before seeing the coaches to program the rest of the week.