Help! What should I do?

I completely understand. I have made it my personal mission on our team to try to convince the parents that our girls our playing great and dominating even though we just lost 2-0 to a kickball team with a 6 foot tall forward who outran us to get to a couple clearances. They seem to be slowly coming around. It helps that the coach really doesn't care at all what they have to say and is intent on developing them.

This is a different coach for them this year and a lot of new players joined their team. I can't tell you how nice it has been to watch players actually try to play a ball under pressure and not get yanked if they fail. Keep up the pressure from your end an hopefully you will see an end result. Good luck.

Thanks for sharing. Partridge puts in words some of my own recent thoughts. I also enjoyed the presentation on Iceland that was included in the comments to the article.

It really is all about educating the parents, isn't it? The clubs simply respond to that population, ignorant as that population might be (not willfully so, and I'm not being pejorative).

If this were baseball, and my kid's team won 15-14, because the opposing team had ten errors and we only had 9, you'd expect our parents to be fairly concerned if not downright upset, because they know that was bad baseball, and the coach "better start teaching our boys the fundamentals." Would they be happy about the victory? Of course, but the conversation wouldn't end there.

Unfortunately it does end there for soccer, because 90% of the parents don't know that their kid isn't learning proper soccer.

My buddy's daughter plays for the same club as mine, one year lower. He's constantly telling me about one dad who chews his ear off every weekend, demanding to know why the coach can't adequately describe to him what their "offensive philosophy" is. He feels his daughter would be a better player if she understood this mysterious philosophy. Seriously? Here's the problem with that kind of thinking, and that kind of parent:

1. Offensive philosophy is such an American thing, borne in basketball, football, etc...and is much less important in soccer because soccer is fundamentally a players' game, not so much a coaches' game
2. They're only 9 years old, for crying out loud!!
3. What difference does it make what their philosophy is (assuming there was one anyway) when no one on the team (especially this dad's kid) has the technical skill to execute anything

And yet, the coach (same coach as ours), although he won't indulge the philosophy question, really does dumb down the game to winning or losing and perpetuates the cycle every time they lose because then the same questions start.


So, good luck to you as well. We all need it. Keep the faith.

Many parents assume that in youth soccer is about the team way too early IMO. They expect the coach to teach them to pass the ball with precision like pro teams. In reality that wont happen and it is not that beneficial to each player's development at the u-littles. The same parents talk to me about how excited they were when they so a particular pro player dribble and score an amazing individual goal. I ask why aren't they expecting that to happen at U10 for example and be excited when it does happen? Sure, scoring goals after combination play with multiple passes and players involved is exciting also, but let's not prevent young players from their individuality. Many times we say that in a tight/close pro game, it's individual brilliance that can bring solution to the stalemate. That individual brilliance is acquired and developed at the youngest ages, i.e U-littles.

That is 100% correct, but unfortunately because as de kromme mentioned earlier parents in this country don't have a good grasp of soccer, too many times when a child shows that they can dribble, the other parents complain constantly about what a ball hog the child is. This is then passed to other parents and kids and the little Messi that was developing turns into a kickball player.

I think that we have made much progress in this country since I was a child playing, but I believe it will be at least another generation or two of players until the game is truly understood here. I hope I am wrong.

Both me and my spouse play and watch soccer, and all my kids have played, one at a "high level". Not to be repetitive, but frankly the number of hours necessary to learn a sport is not 5 or less per week (3 hours of practice and at most two 60-minute games). Compare to other sports, where 10 or 15 hours per week, on the same team or in the same program, is the norm (swimming, gymnastics, in particular). Couple this with parents who never watch soccer or take their kids to a pro game, and you've got a lot of miseducation possible.

There is NO way, with all the problems we have with coaches actually coaching well, you can saddle individual skill development on youth coaches. My son currently has 5 hours of soccer practice per week, off season, and less than an hour of it is scrimmage. He has teammates who are missing the one 90-minute winter practice, regularly, and don't play soccer in the winter at all. I cannot and will not subject my son, who is dedicated to soccer, to a coach who panders to non-committed players who can't find the time outside of team training to develop their individual skills.

I agree that player evaluations are very important, and frankly should be done mid-year so that players who are "below average" (compared to the team" know that they should be getting excess training or should be looking for a more appropriate level team.

What would serve all competitive youth players and coaches is to have player agreements (yes, I understand I will need to pursue additional training or may need to leave the team if my evaluation is below average; yes, I know that if I miss more than 10% of games or 20% of practices I may be cut from the team, etc.), and spell out what the team requirements are. The WAAC may add "yes I know that I may have NO playing time if the coach feels my level is not up to that of the team" and "yes I know that I will have no choice in what position I play and how I play it".

When I was growing up, there were kids who tossed around the football or baseball daily, and there were games several time per week as long as it wasn't snowing (and sometimes when it was). This just doesn't happen as much for soccer. An athlete is not a soccer player, and someone who has money for a premier team isn't necessary the best player.


(And getting back to the OP, fact is, you have to decide what's more important to your child's development, AND happiness. My son is very happy with his coach as a person and as a coach, and though sometimes he is WAAC, the fact that he is not abusive to players and does give them all a chance depending on the circumstances, is huge. With your U9 daughter's case, yeah maybe set plays are not the best thing to spend a lot of time on, but they will have to learn some time. It's really hard for a U9 girl to go to soccer training and learn set plays - it only can be done in a team environment.)

But see, isn't that part of the problem? Why do we care how they handle set plays? Isn't that something they can learn at 16? Yes they need to know some basics, but they can learn as much about set plays from watching the game as they do playing it. The hours spent watching are sometimes just as valuable as those spent playing. As far as practice goes, I would rather the coach roll out a ball and let them play as opposed to spending any more than 2 minutes on set pieces.

When parents enroll their children onto sports teams, they want their children to benefit from the team experience - the "we all work together to win the game" mindset. When you suggest that it should be about the individual they get really confused and some get pretty hot under the collar. They immediately think that if the focus is taken off team and it becomes about the individual, some individuals are going suffer while others reap all the rewards.....which is basically what happens anyway when team success becomes the focus at too early an age.

IMG Academy had a way of explaining it so people can easily understand. Unfortunately I don't have the link, but what they basically said is that learning a sport starts with the individual learning technique and tactics, moves to the group and then eventually to the team EXCEPT when it comes to sports psychology, then you start with the team move to the group and eventually you end with the individual. So all those benefits parents are looking for in team participation should still be a part of the experience for young athletes even while everything else is geared to the individual.

Taking this one more step, I had seen an older coach suggest that this is the perfect time for players to understand team psychology includes making sacrifices for the team. This is exactly why he believed in equal playing time for young teams. Under the team first mindset, the best players play and the lesser players watch, but if you want to instill in players, ALL the players, this characteristic of sacrificing for the team, then even though your best players spending time on the bench may lose the team games, it is important that those players understand that they are making a sacrifice so their teammates can play and learn the game too. Just thought that was an interesting viewpoint on the subject of playing time.

How old is your son?

What is WAAC?

Set plays???

Do you watch American football at all? Do you really think that Pop Warner football is about giving one kid the ball, then he decides to run it, throw it, or hand it off?

Yes, watching the game helps a lot. And no, I wasn't talking about spending more than 10 - 20% of the time on set pieces (10% would be 9 minutes of a 90 minute practice, 20% would be 18 minutes). 2 minutes wouldn't give them time to start to talk about what the drill is.

No, they can't learn it at 16, if they've been playing since 8. At 12, my son's coach was teaching them four specific setups to take when they get a corner kick. At the highest level, knowing how and what to do when there are set plays is very important. At the least competitive level, players need to at least know what a throw-in, free kick, corner kick are, and how the team should respond to each call. This could actually take a while, 30 minutes initially to talk about what each call is, and what their team should do and what the other team may do.

I would be upset if my son's coach spent more than 30 minutes per session on set plays at age 14, but 10 minutes per session on average would be acceptable for a competitive team, more or less for a rec level team depending on whether the kids are panicking when there is a corner or free kick.

My son is U14. WAAC = "win-at-all-costs", which in soccer tends to be a coach who yells at the kids, plays a core set of starters full games and gives little or no time to subs, and doesn't feel that there is any lesson if his team loses.

When I see the phrase "set plays", I think anything that stops the run-of-play. In general, the ball is moving when the clock is running. However, if the ball goes out of bounds, or someone is fouled more than a little, the ref will call a throw-in, corner kick, or goal kick, or a free kick. Teaching an overview of set plays is very important, and there are statistics on how many pro goals are scored and given up on set plays. I've seen numbers as high as 2:1, or even 5:1, goals scored on set plays as compared to goals scored in the run of play.

The question with any coach your child has is whether the child is developing, as a person and a player.

Our argument here is part of the problem with soccer in America. We all see things differently and all believe ours is the correct solution.

That's way too much time spent on set plays or set pieces. From my experience, the top girls teams in the country might address this once of twice during an entire season.

Here's the thing though. Youth teams who spend the time on that kind of stuff often have young teams that win, but you are sacrificing individual player development for team success. Eventually it is going to bite you in the behind.

I see what you are hinting on. I agree that individual improvement goes beyond regular team practices. For the player to develop his/her individual ability a lot of extra work is necessary in addition to the 2 or 3 practices per week. But how many parents are willing to accept the truth that little Johny or Maria need to spend more time with the ball? Not many.

See, someone has to explain to the parents that there is difference between team spirit and team playing style. One occurs even when you focus on the individual improvement and the other one happens as a result of improved individuals.

When kids are young, they are usually very self-centered and selfish and coaches have to use that characteristic and work with it, rather than against it. Later, as the kids become more aware and mature, they develop more "group" mentality and the opinions/views of their peers becomes important for them. That's when the focus can start shifting more towards small group improvements, but not without prior individual focus. And even then there are ways to focus on individuality within a group setting.

I know a director of an elite youth soccer club in my area, with whom I've talked about various things, one of which is exactly this process. At this elite club, contrary to many outside people's beliefs, they focus on individual improvement even up until U15. But that doesn't prevent them from having a great team spirit, attitude and mentality. The philosophy is well explained to all parents, even the ones I know of who previously couldn't understand it, and they all have "eaten it like warm fresh bread". Does the fact that the explanation comes form this director of an elite club, help the parents understand the concept better even when is used for older ages groups? Possibly, but it shouldn't be so difficult to understand it and accept it earlier when kids are younger.

Having good team spirit, attitude, mentality and environment doesn't exclude or prevent focusing on the individual improvements. Without strong individuals there is no good team "anything".

There is a guy that posts here that has the moniker of "Strike" and I am sure that many of you have read his posts. I've been on his website (at least I think that it is his website) for the Westwood Soccer Academy. There are a lot of good and helpful links on the site and some of you here may want to check it out. That aside, I'd like to get back to the original poster's question within this thread and what he should do for his young child. On Strike's website, he states the philosphy of the Westwood Soccer Academy and I really wish that more clubs in the States had similar philosophies. Here is what is listed on the website and it is so simple that it is brilliant:

[FONT=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif]"The WSA [/FONT][FONT=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif]Ball-Hog[/FONT][FONT=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif] Philosophy:[/FONT]

[FONT=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif]WSA believes in technical development over the current and unfortunate trend of [/FONT][FONT=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif]winning at all cost[/FONT][FONT=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif] found in many youth programs. We are dedicated to reversing the "kick & run" approach used to attract families and generate revenue to survive in leagues at the sacrifice of player development. We encourage creativity over [/FONT][FONT=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif]giving the ball away[/FONT][FONT=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif]as a first option when faced with a challenge.[/FONT][FONT=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif] These are the years we want our children[/FONT][FONT=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif] to play with confidence & control. [/FONT]

[FONT=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif]We believe in nurturing the player that wants to dribble the ball and explore their options on the field. It's a fact, no child wants to play soccer when he's always being told to give the ball away. WSA players will be ready for the competitive level because they are trained to be effective, technically proficient soccer players from an early age.[/FONT]

[FONT=Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif]Many programs believe in advanced tactics, strength conditioning and the long-ball at the youth level. While these are important lessons, we believe they are not a priority or even necessary at this age. We believe in creativity, ball control and patience. We believe our focus on technical development will lead to a more well-rounded player and a stronger soccer IQ."[/FONT]

I hope that Strike doesn't mind that I have posted all of this here. But if more clubs were like-minded, we have a lot more skillful and imaginative players and there would not be parents becoming disgruntled and looking for new clubs for their children as the OP is doing. This philosophy will take along time to become ingrained here though because so many parents equate success with winning. They think that if a team is not winning that the players are not developing. A lot of parent education is going to be needed before anything like this catches on but I think that kids, prior to about the age of 12, should be playing and learning the game in the fashion that is explained above. Someone mentioned set plays earlier. Set plays? Get serious!!

Double post. My bad.

Thank you to everyone that contributed to this thread, it has been very helpful for me as I learn to navigate through the subculture of youth soccer.

I have a new set of questions, based on changing circumstances, that some of you with more experience might be able to help me with. My 8 year old, almost 9, is still with the same team. They have improved somewhat and I took the route of talking with them and the club about my concerns and they have been fairly receptive.

However, they still encourage the kids to pass first, "two touches, two touches!" have long talks about tactics and seem generally more concerned with winning (team performance), over development, (individual improvement). This was particularly evident against our last opponent, when every one of their players took someone on and attempted a move nearly every time they touched they ball. In contrast to our team who passed it immediately to our lone forward, who then took on 2-3 defenders.

Also the team is U9, but plays in a U10 league, I don't know that it matters, but I felt it might be pertinent information. There are two other U10 teams in the club and our team practices jointly with one of them, more on that in a sec.

So, I am not a big fan of the general philosophy still, however, my daughter is that forward they are booting it to and in terms of her development I think it is proving beneficial. She is being encouraged to take players on and dribble, she has learned to shield really well and lay it off, she is really playing great and having a lot of fun.

My concern though, is this truly beneficial for her? If she were at a different club would she learn more? There is almost zero time really spent on individual technique in practices. They do some drills and play a couple of games every practice and then they scrimmage against the U10 team I mentioned earlier, the scrimmage is always a full game of 8 on 8 with goalies, which is okay I guess, but does not provide the benefits I personally believe small sided games would.

On the other hand is that just expecting too much from any club team? Do they train kids on technique, or is that my responsibility and do I just need to continue working with her myself on that as I have been?

Another thing, so there are two U10 teams and my daughters U9 team at the club, they all play games in the same league, in the same U10 bracket. One of the U10 teams is coahed by a guy who I feel is superior and has a philosophy much more in alignment with mine, I think I mentioned this earlier in the thread.

Anyway, my daughter practices with his team once a week and prior to the spring season 3 of the girls from the U9 team demanded to leave and join his team, before they left for his team he had asked if my daughter wanted to join his team, as he had coached her indoor team as well. I am a generally nice guy I think and didn't want to be a dick, so I stuck with our current team. Then these three other girls left to join his team, which is now why my daughter is pretty much the go to player.

Meanwhile the DOC, who was the only really accredited and accomplished soccer coach in the entire club, took a sweet coaching gig in another state, so the entire club has no real direction or leadership and is pretty much a mess.

Now my big dilema. The two U10 teams move up to U11 next fall and they will have tryouts this month, to form one competitive team and one developmental team. They U9 coaches are encouraging me to keep her with the current team and the U10 coaches are encouraging me to have her tryout for the U11 competitive team.

So basically, should I have her stay with the current team, tryout for U11, or ditch the entire club and find somewhere better? Sorry this was so long.

Ditch the club if there are reasonable options in your area. Sounds like there is no leadership or direction at your current place. Don't ever worry about being a jag. Do what is best for your child.

At U10 it is far more important to have a good coach. If you have another club in the area where the philosphy is consistent throughout the club, then great, make the switch. But if the choices are more of the same, stick with the coach who has the right outlook. A few more years of working on skill and you can pick the team you want when she gets to U13 or U14.

I have U12 (fall season) girls who are fast, understand the game and see the field very well. What they lack are the foot skills. I love their coach, but the club at their age group lacks a full committed team. I want to use this next year to concentrate on foot skills, but I lack the soccer knowledge to help them. We are in located in North/Northwest suburbs of Chicago. I would like foot skills year round. Coever offers skill camps in the summer near us, but I would like a consistant year round program. Any suggestions? THanks

The kind of program described in the article has been implemented by my son's club (MLS) starting last season. The club identified the top players from its U11 through U14 teams and also invited elite players from other affiliated clubs in the area. They provided fast paced technical training once a week, free of charge with their top coaches, which included the technical director of the pro team. The club also evaluates all players twice yearly, grading them; both the club and parents keep copies of the evaluations.