With one of my teams last weekend I decided not to coach while the ball was in play. The team had played a tournament the previous weekend and they had heard enough from me :-). I wanted them to take total ownership of the game and make their own decisions whenever the ball was in play. I also didn't want to break their focus on the game so I stayed out of their way. This is something I've done in the past but not with this team so it seemed like a great … [Read more...]
#118 Avoiding Common Coaching Mistakes
This weekend I'm taking my girls teams to Iowa for a tournament. This year I split up my teams and took the boys to one tournament and the girls to another. This gives me more time with the players and families away from the field. These are the only two out of town trips I'll do with my teams this fall. We have so many good teams come into town that we don't really need to travel but the players enjoy these types of trips and as I said last week, there are … [Read more...]
#116 Drills Don’t Make Players Better
Our club has started a program called, 'RecConnect' to provide a resource for recreational coaches. Five of our club's premier coaches have 'adopted' a 2nd grade boys or girls division. We send out weekly tips and suggestions, make ourselves available to answer questions and attend the games on the weekend. This helps create a stronger link between the rec and premier side of our club and shares the experience of the premier coaches with parents who may not … [Read more...]
#115 Deciding the Game
I'm working with five different teams this year, U9 boys, U10 boys, U11 girls, U13 boys and U16 girls. That may seem like too many teams but I'm able to schedule the practices easily since we have lighted fields and the league and tournament scheduler does a great job making sure I don't have any conflicts. Putting them all in the tournament this weekend gave me 17 games over the three days of the tournament which was a lot for me but it was great for the … [Read more...]
#114 Do You Have the Courage to be Patient
I was watching the US Open Cup game last night with Sporting KC vs San Jose. The game went to PK’s and it got me thinking about the differences between youth and adult PKs. The goalkeepers are usually much smaller in relation to the goal so the things that will work for young players will not be effective for professions. I tell my youth players to keep the ball on the ground and aim for one side of the goalkeeper or the other. They don't need to put it in … [Read more...]
#113 Early Season Training Sessions
After two weeks of training my teams are getting ready for their first games. I'm starting to get an idea of how the teams fit together. The formations I use for small-sided soccer keep it pretty simple. I always use a 2-3-1 for teams playing 7 v 7 and 4-3-1 for playing 9 v 9 games. I've found that these formations are effective, easy to teach and create a great pathway to the 11-a-side game. They allow me to teach the principles that the players will use … [Read more...]
#111 Do Good Players Make Good Coaches?
This is the last week before our club starts training for the fall season. The weather in the midwest has been incredibly hot and humid. Fortunately, the heatwave is going break over the weekend and next week won't be as hot. The first few weeks of training are always inconsistent because families are taking the opportunity to travel before the summer is over. That means that I won't have everyone at training for the first week or so. Because of this, I … [Read more...]
#108 Set the Tone for Your Season
With tryouts behind me I've had a nice break from coaching. It's given me more time to attend and watch some professional games. Unfortunately, the international leagues have finished but the Confederations Cup has had some good games. I was watching the Mexico v New Zealand game when an incident happened in the box that made me ask the question, "Who's responsibility is it to stop the game?" This follows up on my thoughts on dubious penalty kicks and how we … [Read more...]
#103 Why Your Players are Bored
Coaching my games this weekend and covering for a couple of other coaches the "kickball" being played by some of the teams we played against was killing me. It was hard to play against because anytime we build the play up if the opponent won the ball they just kicked it as far up the field as they could. Don't get me wrong, I don't think that my way of coaching the game is the only way. We've had coaches on this podcast that have a wide variety of methods … [Read more...]
#102 Differentiated Coaching
The weather was so bad in the midwest last weekend that we weren't able to play most of our games. It rained pretty much non stop from Friday morning through Sunday morning. They had it even worse in St Louis where many of their fields are built in 100 year floodplains that flooded much more recently than that. These are photos of the St Louis Soccer Complex during the flooding. Obviously many people were impacted by the flooding and I don't mean to … [Read more...]
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