THIRTY Richmond players sit on the floor of the indoor training room, eyes on a screen.

Some take notes, some nod, some wriggle and squirm, some pick at the floor, like people in any classroom around the world.

Occasionally one of the players will roll into a stretch, still listening intently to the presentation.

This is footy school. This is the Skills Hothouse.

The last few months have seen Damian Farrow, the AFL's football innovation manager and a professor of skill acquisition, take AFLW coaches and players around the country through a program that focuses on the teaching of teaching skill.

The sessions started with small groups of coaches and a handful of keen players coming into AFL House, but has since expanded into club incursions with entire playing groups and coaches completing a second session.

"It bore out the AFLW growth strategy, where amongst other pillars, the development of skill within the game was a key pillar. From there, it was around what are some of the other things we can do in that space, recognising the skill level of the game was progressively increasing anyway, and the talent coming is highly skilled," Farrow told AFL.com.au.

"It was more around this notion that we could still develop a community, a practice, where coaches and players start to appreciate and share what it means to be skilled, and how growth can occur in the game. 

"They're the content experts. They know what a drop punt is, and whatever else. For me, skill learning is around the conditions that create the most effective practice of the skills of the game. 

"A lot of the topics we went into delved into that, going into the stronger underpinnings of learning, so then coaches can apply it however they want. Footy environments are always time-pressured, and you can always practice something and think you're going to get gain from it, when the likelihood is you won't, based on learning theory."

Back to Punt Road, and the session that new coach Jarrad Donders and head of footy Jane Woodlands-Thomson had deliberately booked in for the "induction week" of pre-season, which is filled with physical testing and meetings to set players up for the season ahead.

Farrow takes players through the concept of learning drills (skills practice) and performance drills (maximising skills), and ties that in with an athlete's best and worst weapon – perfectionism.

There's a time and place for perfectionism, and for most athletes it has driven the work ethic that has got them where they are. But in the context of learning or developing a skill, perfectionism can be counter-productive, to say the least.

"Football is a game of errors, the team who wins is the one who adapts the best," Farrow tells the players and coaches.

"The whole game is around solving the problem that's right in front of you, at that moment.

"The definition of skill is technique plus adaptability, divided by pressure."

Creating a safe environment for players to fail – where perfectionism doesn't rear its unneeded head – is a key component of coaching, particularly in the AFLW. 

Farrow hones in on ground balls, showing a video comprised entirely of clips of the ball on the ground from the second quarter of Richmond's loss to Melbourne last year, then asks the players to break up into small groups to discuss what they see.

Mon Conti and Ellie McKenzie grab a footy to help their chat, Libby Graham actively moves her body to give examples of how players pick up ground balls.

Gab Seymour works with first-year Baia Pugh and second-year Issy Bacon.

There's an all-in discussion about the height of various ground balls, and why different players (inside mid v key forward) might prioritise practicing different ground balls (literally on the ground v bouncing away at a high height).

Then Farrow calls out Poppy Kelly, getting the ruck to answer some basic times tables. She gets faster and faster in her answers as he repeats the same couple of questions, but when he switches things up, she falters.

It was an example of why coaches may repeat drills, or quickly swap between them, testing different things. The concept that was to be imparted to players was to give them an understanding of how people learn, and why errors are made. 

There's another discussion point around "gamification", and making training fun, creating a safe environment to fail and practice skills.

Then Max Viney – brother of Melbourne champion Jack and a high-performance grappling coach with a background in Ju Jitsu – takes over, running the players through a tackling session, with noted tackler Sarah Hosking a keen co-demonstrator.

The more observant of the players may have realised that Viney conducted his session in a framework that reflected Farrow's principles, clearly articulating whether a drill was for practice, repetition or nailing a skill, with a few more enjoyable contests to finish (the gamification).

For the rest of the day, Farrow works directly with Richmond's coaching staff, and the players are released for their gym work and other meetings.

"Often we do coaching education in some format. This is a better way of doing it – getting out to them, doing another lap of the track – but I think the engagement of the playing group has been a feature of it," Farrow said.

"They're the ones living it on a weekly basis, they have insights that coaches used to have but have probably forgotten. So, drawing that directly from them, and getting them to reflect on how skill works has been a real feature of it. I didn't know how that'd go, but the feedback from the players has been really positive."

The breakdown on the type and height of ground balls was deliberate by Farrow and he is discussing it at all clubs.

"One of the things we're trying to evaluate is the impact – it's one thing to have coaches say it's great, and players have equally said they've learnt a lot, but how does that transfer? There's a couple of things," Farrow said.

"I'm going to Essendon for a day (after the coaches came in for a session earlier this year). I would expect, the way they've designed their sessions and the way they're engaging their players within that, the mentality the players are taking into that, they're all tangible things I'll be able to look at and say, 'you're doing what we've discussed, you're actioning what we've talked about'. 

"We're also collecting statistics from the game from season 10 that we'll compare with (the upcoming) season 11. One of big areas we focused the coaches on was ground balls. I talk about the specificity of practice being really important, and I felt from my observations at training and what you see within the game, it wasn't being done as well as it could have. 

"Many coaches, once they saw the footage and statistics on the nature of ground balls in the game, have realised it's a bit different. That's changed what they do and what they practice. In turn, I hope ground-ball efficiency – for want of a better term – is enhanced this season.

"It's a game of error, which we talk about. To be able to recreate that so we're more efficient in cleaning up the mess, so to speak, we should be able to see it, and it should transfer to a more attractive style of play."

After this pre-season and the "second lap" of clubs is completed, Farrow is keen to expand the program.

"We're now looking at doing this with community coaches, and I'd love to attract the current playing group to be the facilitators of that, rather than always coming back to the same people," he said.

"That will help build the community of practice and gets the pathway going."