What we've done, and mind you this is in high school so the kids and stakes are a little different, is both play everyone and switch around positions since we're playing 11v11. Last year we had a game that was getting out of hand and on top of putting in all our "further down the bench" folks and resting our starters we had any of the starters we couldn't sub playing on the back line. We also swapped out our goalie and let him run around. You do have to be careful not to put kids in situations where they could injure or get injured (I'm amazed at how badly some of our forwards tackle when they're put on the back line for example, even though they tackle just fine as forwards). This has the added benefit of getting kids to work on skills they might not use as often. Again, this works well at 11v11, probably not so at much smaller sides. One thing I'm always cautious of is making it obvious that you're taking it easy on them, particularly by calling anything out verbally that the other team can hear - that can be more demoralizing than just getting soundly beaten. Kids have a way of figuring out things if you're too obvious - in the end, even in HS, it's about developing all the players, not just those on your own team IMO.
Age - It was U11 Girls team - so 9 v. 9 How big of a blowout - The game finished 17-0 The problem we have run into is our league has become very watered down. We need to move to a different league but my parents won't commit to a 75-90 minute drive for away games. I appreciate the advice. My other question would be how you balance not running up the score with not making it obvious you aren't running up the score. We had 11 of 13 players score in this game so we did well in that regard. We also moved back the line of confrontation to half. I think next time I will discreetly start playing down a player or two. if it was up to me I would have called the game at half and just mixed the teams and let them play for fun. Moving to two touch and everyone must touch the ball did exactly what you said. It made us play better. Because they started playing back and switching the field quicker.
Damn!! 17-0 is a whipping. When you move to 11v11 next year- does your league get more or less competitive? Is this a rec league or competitive/club?
It is a competitive league. Unfortunately the larger clubs have stolen players from the smaller clubs and watered down talent. We would be considered a smaller club but none of our players have left for the larger club so our team is very good. The larger clubs have left this local league and travel to play in a more competitive league. I don't see the competition level improving in this league. I continue to try to get our parents to buy into the extra travel but as of now it is a no go.
This is the first year in a long time my team has the advantage. I felt bad that we might win every game this season so I rotated my 3 less skilled players to the top of the rotation so they would get the most opportunity to score. one of them did score, one of them didn't but had a lot of fun trying. the other they pushed to the ground because he was a little slow on the ball, and then stepped on him, he came out of the first half crying and didn't want to go back on offense in the second half for fear that they would do it again, so he played defense. I put a mid-tier player in his place who also hadn't scored yet this season. Odd thing, if they would have just defended him normally, they probably would have won... Only so much I can do. Some times things are just meant to be a certain way and there's only so much you can do to be a good sport. 9 players on my team have scored this season, after only 3 games, just good kids helping each other have success.
Another question: To give context I coach U11 girls I see a lot of talk on here about players in set positions. At what age do you begin to do that? I rotate all 13 of my players through all 9 positions including playing keeper. Nobody on my team specializes in one position. There are certainly positions they prefer and play better than others , but they never play just one position. Should I be having them start to play a set position at this time?
As a learning experience, I'm beginning to think that subbing out then going back in in a new position isn't optimal for learning. What I have started doing this season, is they go into a position, I sub them out and we talk and give pointers, then send them back into the same position. Then I check if they are displaying understanding. Otherwise, we send them back into a different context. Sometimes, the coaching points can be universal. But again, a central tenet of mine is to set them up for success. And it goes along with another approach that we do in practice: if we are doing a drill and I give you a coaching point/correction, I send you back to the front of the line to immediately apply the correction.
Words Matter soap box I dislike the word "drill". It's so jargon-y. Means nothing in relation to the physical object. Also dislike the word "activity"—it connotes, well, activity but NOT purpose. "Habituation"- the act of habit formation "Instill"- used as a noun, in lieu of "activity" or "drill". I watched a documentary, where the Navy SEALS call it an "evolution"
Depends on what you are trying to teach. I had them play in two different lines every game to prepare them for the next step in tactical development--interchanging between lines. I want mental adaptability and familiarity with different areas of the field. You don't want players who are disoriented when moving forwards or backwards. You want players who can integrate into the lines seamlessly. In the full game players will be in a number of different "positions" as circumstances change. It isn't just some holistic baloney.
I never said it was holistic baloney. The goal is learning and you need to have a constant frame of reference to check if they are learning. In a game, a kid plays a new position every 5-8 minutes. They face different opponent, they have different responsibilities, their view of the field is different. If your coaching point on the bench was about running with the ball, for example, strikers and center backs are going to have different opportunities to try your pointers when they go back in the game. The technique is the same but the decisions may be very different. Give them continuity to help learning take place. And it's not for the whole games that I do this. 1 round of subs at most. By the third rotation they are in a different position than the last 2 times.
@elessar78, with U10s I deliberately chose a simple system where 9 of the field "positions" performed in the same manner just in different locations relative to each other. So the only difference was where on the field they were located. Keeper and sweeper had slightly different roles, essentially primarily providing cover/depth. So there was no great difference or confusion as one might expect. I don't believe in using "role player" positions during the early phases of player development. (Aside from "sweeper" which allowed me to keep the system very simple.) In the keeper and sweeper positions I only rotated a few players that I was sure would be comfortable in those positions. My objective was not to develop keepers, but rather field players.
From a parent's perspective, I would encourage that you continue to rotate for as long as your team is demonstrating that they are learning and applying what you are teaching them about positional roles. Good for development and equal opportunity for the players.
it depends what your goals are. i rotated a lot of my 19U players' positions this spring because 14 of my 18 play as attackers for their HS teams. i wasn't as concerned with winning games as i was with pushing everyone to the next level. i think i would continue rotating players until you're playing to win. at that point, put players where they can help the team win now at the risk of losing some of their long term overall development. this spring we're looking at a couple tournaments. i think i will continue to rotate players and give equal playing time throughout our league games, but i'm going to play our best 11 and play to win in the tournament games. on another note, our high school state tournament started this week. this week is better than march madness for me. my 19Us played for 6 different high school teams in 5 different sectionals. i had all of my players in action last night with 5 teams playing simultaneously. our local sports reporters and team managers did a great job with updates on twitter. i was following all those games plus the IU/UK game was on tv. my wife went to bed early. unfortunately, only 2 of our teams survived to the sectional finals saturday. my alma mater lost to a team they should have beat, and now they haven't won a sectional for 9 years after winning 15 of the first 16 while i was growing up and playing. it's super frustrating to watch a program i've been so invested in for so long be mired in mediocrity.
I find tournaments to be so antithetical to "development" for academy-age players. Even more so if you have to drive several hours away to the tournament. My main beef with this one in particular is that the "build-out line" was put in place as a development tool but shit teams just use it as another cudgel to beat teams at young ages. At home, there's a tacit agreement between clubs that this is not the case. We don't "blitz" each other with 2/3 the team to create turnovers in the defensive third. Referees are instructed to enforce the spirit of the build out line, not just the letter. Also, when you spend your time predominantly on technical stuff in training, then the tactical "whole-team" stuff doesn't get as much attention. We did fine this weekend. 1-1-1. But we could've gotten this same experience at home. Complete and utter waste of time, IMO.
Besides technical, fundamentals include the principles of play too. If a player understands the principles of play, they can be successful in 11v11. Most of the time spent on "whole team" stuff is teaching a specific system or game plan, which is useless if the players don't understand the principles of play. It also tends to be mostly functional training, which should come after fundamentals. Then for youth soccer too many coaches teach special tactics designed to win youth matches. It just confuses the players in the long run. (Stacking the build out line is an example. Better tactically and developmentally to have depth.) In the 80's, we used to conceptually divide up tactics into individual tactics, (small) group tactics, and team tactics. I don't hear people talk about individual tactics any more. My concept of developmental coaching is that everything builds progressively, 1v1 to line v line, to team v team.
Here's where I bring up "if USSF were serious..." they'd enforce page 26 of the PDI presentation - travel < 1 hr, no standings, festivals wth predetermined number of games not brackets - by denying sanctioning to tournaments that didn't abide. Of course I'm just kidding, I don't want to find glass shards in my omelette the next time I step to the midlevel hotel breakfast buffet....
When you are expecting players to build out of the back and created a build-out line to facilitate this exploration—it needs a "whole team" level of attention. Not 50% of practice mind you, but maybe 20% of practice needs to address this. At 7v7, everyone can almost be directly be involved in play, if not, then definitely within one pass. Everyone needs to execute on a good understanding of principles of play. Again, PoP, is a beast unto itself to teach.
A tournament, by definition, is geared toward deciding a winner. If I'm giving equal playing time and rotating players, using 4 GKs, playing out of the back—we're at a severe disadvantage. If we say we are doing this for fun, then let's do festivals. It didn't happen this year, but the brackets are an inexact science at best. You have teams that sandbag, because they want a "fun" tourney, take home a trophy, and beat up on everyone. Last time I was on the good end of that—I was embarrassed—we didn't have good results in the league (because of development focus) so we got placed by tournament based on league record in the lower bracket and we crushed everyone. The opposing (North London Derby coach, CoachP) rightfully was pissed after the Final, thinking we sandbagged but I told him we were placed there. We were beating up on teams that were not as athletic, not as skilled—my players were happy, but we weren't really challenged.
Agreed re: preferring festivals to tourneys. I suspect parts get more from tournaments then players do.
Late to the season to post here but looking for guidance. First year coaching but grew up playing at a fairly high level 20 years ago (ODP, travel). Coaching in a local U10 (7v7)league for my oldest and getting back into the game (that I love). Due to declining numbers our club has switched back to grade level to hopefully retain more players to be with their friends. My team was not good last year going 1-7 in the spring. We lost 2 of the better kids to them wanting more competition and playing up and added 5 new kids (3 of which had played in house but took a year-off) and 2 completely new to the sport. We are 0-5-1 on the season and while I see glimmers of what I am coaching I still see lots of bunching up (lack of trust), etc. We generally are getting beat 4-0 (worst was 12-0 and best was tie 4-4). I took a Grassroots coaching this August when I learned I would be coaching and while I like the aspect of Play-Practice-Play but I think its too advanced for my team. I have several kids who cannot kick with both legs, toe bash, etc so we spend the middles of practice doing fundamental skills. In theory the idea of spacing from a 3v3 game should lead to them learning to get space but I don't see my kids learning from that. The first couple of weeks practice was 20 minutes small side game (3v3 or 4v4)- 20 minutes of a skill - 20 minutes of a full game of something like 6v4 with 2 goals to try and teach switching the field. I've started to abandon the first 20 minute of small games to focus more on individual skills. A drill that has worked best for us as of late is a 3v2 (started with 4v2 but too much standing by my offense) where the 2 defenders play the ball out from the end line to one of the 3 spots and then its on to goal. The defenders are required to choose any player. It forces my defenders to drive the ball down the field (some kids cannot kick with either distance or accuracy), communicate among themselves of who takes the ball. The offense is slowly rounding into shape with this because they often try to pass. Guess I am looking for any guidance of am I doing it wrong or right or any suggestions to try.
you're in a tough position, but it sounds like you're focused on the right areas. players must have the techniques before they can learn more advanced concepts. part of coaching in a grassroots (or "rec") program is accepting that the kids aren't there to compete. they're there to play. that means you teach them the basics and hope they develop into competent players who can enjoy playing as they grow up. focus on making sure they have fun at training, and don't worry about results on game days. if they're enjoying it, they will keep coming back.
I have play-practice-play in my repertoire but, personally, would only use it in the most recreational of circumstances due to some of the reasons you outlined. I like the progressive model better: warm-up, phase 1, phase 2, scrimmage but even then I've departed from that model and do my own thing based on how I want my teams to develop: ball mastery and 1v1 moves review in warm-ups, 1v1 game, rondo, orchestration, scrimmage. The whole point of coaching education is to eventually become a professor (of sorts) and not necessarily just tell you how to teach and what to teach. So anyway, my outlook for beginners: -it starts with 1v0, players have to get comfortable manipulating the ball with their feet. Starting, stopping, changing directions, moving the ball from left foot to right foot (and vice versa), and shielding. -then 1v1. Learning to beat defenders in front, coming from the side or behind. Learning moves in each "move family": attacking moves, change of direction moves, stops and starts, and 270s. Conversely, teach them how to defend 1v1 too (restraint, not stabbing, etc) -then 2v1. In the new United Soccer Coaches journal Bill Dooley has got a great article. 2v1—I can beat you myself or use my teammate to beat you. And when you dig into positional play (Barca, Man City, Chelsea etc) the ultimate goals are to get a "qualitative superiority" (1v1) or "quantitative superiority" (at least a 2v1). This stuff above is all/mostly Coerver-based stuff One thing (among many) I've adopted from 3four3 coaching is their use of orchestration. Basically, lay out your 7 players and walk them through where the ball should go and how every player needs to move when the ball moves. A lot of American coaches HATE this idea because they consider this spoon feeding and creates "dull" players. But in my research this stuff is normal in Argentine professional academies like Newell's and 3four3 got it from their study in Latin America (particularly following Bielsa) and they continue to do it with LA Galaxy Academy teams. Orchestration will be slow and frustrating. If you choose to use it, be patient. Use it only in manageable chunks 10-15 minutes. Then move on to actual playing. The way US Soccer wants you to do it is to let kids discover but it's highly inefficient and I don't believe actually works. If every kid out there is being "creative" and doing their own thing—that's just chaos. IMO, there needs to be structure and patterns with creativity—solving soccer problems in a way that defenders do not expect—coming in bursts, deviating from the pattern for maximum effect. Messi and the players at Man City now all work within pretty rigid structures and patterns which certain players are allowed to "break" and only in certain situations. Further, in the recent World Cup Spain played with a lot of passing structure BUT their goals came when they broke structure—played a long ball or dribbled a defender.
@elessar78 Interesting explanation of the orchestration concept. I really detest pattern passing exercises for their rigidity and lack of decision making, but I did use shadow play to introduce big picture team tactical concepts. Which I understand is what you do. ("Introduce" as in preparation for less restricted exercises that follow.) I guess the coaching key is getting the right mix of patterns and use of pattern variations to solve tactical problems. I suspect there are two factors in play. First if players have multi-sport experience, they are tactically smarter than soccer only players. (Not going to explain it, I have just accepted it as fact.) Second, pattern recognition is how everyone thinks creatively, i.e, seeing new patterns and using old patterns in new ways. Some people are better at pattern recognition than others, but it is something that can be trained. In music how it is trained is that players practice patterns (of melody and rhythm), then deliberately practice variations of the patterns, and then in compositions apply pattern variations in a musical way to support the song. (In drumming we call how we spread patterns around the drum kit "orchestration". Like a composer scoring a song choosing the parts which instruments play to support the song.) That was an excellent explanation of "orchestration" but I still think 3four3's concentrating on orchestration and "possession" soccer for 8-year-olds is a mistaken curriculum.
Something I've found helpful with the shadow play. I'm assuming if you're playing 7v7 you have about 10 on the roster. Once you walk them through the shape and how the ball and they should move, start sending in the 3 kids that weren't in the shape to defend. I use a 5 second stagger, so 15 seconds in we'd be playing 7v3. If you have parents that are capable, have some of them walk in. no tackling, just clog up lanes, try to intercept passes. If you have the luxury of a full field, slowly work up to after N passes move to the next half. I'd do 5 zones with the condition that our shape had to be in 2 adjacent zones. 5 passes and we could move fromzones 1&2 to zone 2&3, etc. The 5 zone thing also worked well in scrimmage, to prevent bootball - you "pass" more than 2 zones and your teammate has to play it back a zone. That also gets them thinking, not everything has to go forward all the time. slowly you will start to see them resetting when it's not on.