[Poose]

My 16 year old daughter plays on a select team and also for her high school. Her high school coach will have several practices in a row where they NEVER touch a ball, no ball is even brought to practice. All they do is run. Distances, sprints, whatever.

I go to the park and see teams practicing and they run drill after drill without a ball.

Why is this considered good coaching? I coach my son's 6th grade team and we can go through an entire 2 hour practice and EVERY drill involves passing or dribbling or some kind of ball control skill.

As a coach, we are there to teach. Making kids run is not teaching them anything about the game os soccer, IMHO. I saw a select coach standing in the middle of the field with a stopwatch as his team ran laps hollering "FASTER, FASTER". Is this coaching?

Any thoughts?

[fidlerre]

Originally posted by Poose
My 16 year old daughter plays on a select team and also for her high school. Her high school coach will have several practices in a row where they NEVER touch a ball, no ball is even brought to practice. All they do is run. Distances, sprints, whatever.

I go to the park and see teams practicing and they run drill after drill without a ball.

Why is this considered good coaching? I coach my son's 6th grade team and we can go through an entire 2 hour practice and EVERY drill involves passing or dribbling or some kind of ball control skill.

As a coach, we are there to teach. Making kids run is not teaching them anything about the game os soccer, IMHO. I saw a select coach standing in the middle of the field with a stopwatch as his team ran laps hollering "FASTER, FASTER". Is this coaching?

Any thoughts?

agreed.

if you want them to run to get in shape fine, but have them run the field wth a ball at their feet the whole time, dribbling back and forth from foot to foot...

[UncleSam527]

You can get into shape without just running. A simple full field scrimmage will do that.

PS Running is no fun by itself.

[Manifesto]

These coaches are from the "Rocky"-school of coaching....yes, complete with full-on flashbacks of Apollo Creed running wind-sprints on the beach....

Anyways, I can understand a bit of conditioning practice during certain instances of the season, but the best way to get into game shape is making sure that nearly every drill/scrimmage is played at full-pace....

[uniteo]

and in a game, the ball can run for you.

[Richie]

Every practice without the ball? Bad coaching, you don't need any ball skills to play without the ball. Maybe he can't teach skills that involve the ball.

I guess he truly does take the money and run.

Richie

[JohnW]

Originally posted by Poose
...As a coach, we are there to teach. Making kids run is not teaching them anything about the game os soccer, IMHO. I saw a select coach standing in the middle of the field with a stopwatch as his team ran laps hollering "FASTER, FASTER". Is this coaching?

Select coach: It's coaching, just probably not good coaching--then again, I don't really know this coach, what else he does in practices, what results he gets, etc.

High school coach: I honestly can't imagine why a coach would hold multiple practices (or even one practice) without having the kids touch the ball--especially a high school team.

So, I would tend to agree that's poor coaching.

This, of course, is one reason why your better players often value club participation more than playing in high school. They realize that their development is sometimes hindered (or certainly not helped or accelerated) by the coaching there.

Your team: Kudos for having your son's team combine conditioning with touches on the ball. At that age level, I would assert that they need the touches as much or more than the conditioning.

jgw

[saabrian]

Originally posted by Poose
I saw a select coach standing in the middle of the field with a stopwatch as his team ran laps hollering "FASTER, FASTER". Is this coaching? Any thoughts?

Amen. I posted a thread to this effect earlier this week. I believe that within the context of practice, they can do most running with the ball at their feet. It gives them the cardio AND gives them more ball touches which all players can use.

[Native Aztexan]

If I was a coach, I want the kids to learn dribbling, passing, controling the ball and shooting as well as having mini 5v5 or 3v3 games. Running all day without the use of the ball takes away the creativity and technical skills needed for a soccer player. It also takes away the fun and joy of playing the beautiful game.

[soccrgrlk13s8]

Coming from a current youth player, I enjoy drills where you run with the ball. Just like you all have said, one cannot play soccer without the skills.
We are expected to run in the offseason and come into the season in shape. For preseason, I agree with a few fitness tests. It shows the coach how dedicated and hard working a player is if they come into the season in good shape. Fitness can also push a player mentally. That can help late in a game when a player doesn't want to make that run upfield or recover on defense, but pushes his/her self to do it.
It also helps the team aspect, because, at least in the practices I have been a part of, the players are all encouraging each other to keep working hard. It instills the value that a player will not only work hard for themselves but for the team they're on as well.

Now I certainly do not agree with whole practices without touching the ball, that's ludacris. Some fitness though, is very beneficial.