Latvian-made digital tool for sports team management
CoachSet, a platform replacing Excel and paper notes for coaching, has been developed in Latvia by coach Sandis Mežaraups with support from the StartSchool program. Initial versions target hockey and floorball.
A new digital tool for sports team planning, called CoachSet, has been created in Latvia. It aims to replace common methods such as Excel spreadsheets, paper notes, and WhatsApp chats by integrating all tasks into a single platform.
The platform allows coaches to create teams, add players, prepare lineups, and share them as images or shareable links. Players can view training and game schedules and mark their availability, helping coaches anticipate the roster.
Developer Sandis Mežaraups says the idea came from his own experience coaching multiple teams. He encountered problems with lineup changes scattered across different chats and tables, leading to errors. Participation in the StartSchool program helped analyze the problem, structure it, and turn it into a usable product.
The first version of CoachSet is designed for hockey and floorball – sports requiring line changes and player positioning. For hockey, it includes forward and defender distribution, as well as power play and penalty kill planning. The floorball version was adapted based on coach feedback during testing. More than ten coaches in Latvia were consulted during development.
StartSchool co-founder Anna Andersone notes that the value of an idea becomes clear when real people start using it. The CoachSet team works with a specific user group and already sees interest from clubs before the season, helping to evaluate further development.
The next potential direction is baseball – coaches in the US have expressed interest, where youth and amateur sports are on a much larger scale than in Latvia. The first season with clubs will be the main test to determine the most needed features and the future direction of the tool.
