I’m usually pretty calm. I try to find the coach pre-game and shake hands, talk about the season a bit, talk about whatever crazy thing is happening in our soccer community. But I’ve had 2 interactions this year with other coaches that weren’t very friendly. Likely my fault. 1. Summer tournament. Coach was berating an AR for most of the 2nd half. Really petty stuff. Bagging on where the AR played in college. Saying things like “you don’t talk to me, you’re just an AR.” I told the AR he should toss the guy. I told the center ref after the game what a dickhead the coach was and that he should file a report. I told the coach he has no class. We got into a bit of a “discussion”. We’ve played him twice this year. And he’s gotten tossed out of one other game for being a jerk. In our next game (league) we tied 0-0. I had a player get a head injury in the closing minute. No foul. No big deal. Girl fell and hit her head while attacking. Game ended with her down on the ground. Teams shook hands. Coach didn’t. He walked off. He didn’t ask how my player was. Next game a few weeks later. They had a girl with a head injury. Our attacker coming at their defender. Our attacker knocked her down. Wasn’t dirty, but was definitely a foul. Coach was in the handshake line. I asked if she was ok. His response was “no. She’s at the hospital”. I told him I hope she’s ok. He just walked off. (They had a short bench and played a man down for a few because of a girl with a knee issue. She came back on a few minuteslater. If he wasn’t such a jerk, I probably would have pulled a player off until she returned). 2. Game this past weekend. We are 2nd place. Playing 1st place team. They beat us 3-1 two months ago. Coach was very nice and we both complimented each other on how the game was played. Very good team that plays very good soccer. In this game, I have 1/2 a sub. Girl who is coming back from injury and can only play about 10 minutes in a row is my sub. (Long story with weird injuries this season). They have a guest coach. We exchange handshakes pre-game. We are getting outplayed, but hanging with a 0-0 tie through most of the 1st half. With about 10 minutes left in the half, one of my girls gets beat on the wing about 30 yards out. She grabs ahold of the player’s jersey and ref calls a foul. Coach starts screaming for a yellow card. (I wouldn’t have protested if he had given it. But he didnt). Half ends with us down 1-0. In the 2nd half, about halfway through we are down 2-1. Ball at midfield. Challenge for the ball. We foul their player. Nothing out of the ordinary. Might have been a trip or a push. Don’t really remember. Refs blows the whistle for a foul. Coach starts screaming and waving her hand for a yellow card. Over and over again. Ref isn’t going for a card. She keeps screaming for it. I yell over “oh shut up. He’s got it under control” She didn’t like that. (And I don’t blame her. I was out of line). She says “you can’t talk to me like that”. I say “let the ref call the game and shut up”. She got very upset. Game ended with us losing 3-2. I was planning to apologize during the post game handshake. But she didn’t stick around while our teams shook hands. Lesson learned for me- keep quiet and worry about your own team. Am I the only idiot that’s done this?
Sadly, we've probably all been there. (and many have been on the both sides) Here are my 2: 1. Last year I was the assistant coach for my sons U9 team. Head coach was gone so I was head. Ref is probably 12-14 (he told me its his first time being a center before the game). Game is fine for the most part as they are young - we are up 2-0 early but down 2-3 at half. Not the issue. We had 2 kids go off with injury in the early part of the first half which isn't that surprising at that age as kids are not in much control of their body. However when the 3rd kid came off the parent on my team yelled at the ref about the kid who elbowed her son in the face (he had a bloody nose). So I watched him a little more and I realized the kid was super aggressive but I realized that he was being dirty away from the ball. At half I go talk to the ref as he has not blown his whistle once and I tell him he's doing fine but to call penalties as that is how the kids are going to learn and that frankly I didn't want any more injuries. I then told him that all my kids were injured by the same kid and that he was aggressive but that is ok. Second half starts and within 2 minutes he trips a kid from behind. Ref blows whistle and shows the kid a card. Funny part is the kid tried to take the card. None of the kids knew what a card was and I made a comment to the other teams coaches that it was cute that the kid wanted it. Situation over. Ref calls a few more fouls in the second half and we lose but no injuries. Fine. We go thru handshake line and being at the end I hear a kid saying. "You suck. We won. etc..." I get to the other coach and grab the assistant and tell him what I just heard as I would want to know if its my kid and there is no place for that. He tells me that it didn't happen and I was just upset that we lost. 10 minutes later we are clearing the field for the next game and i realize its his kid. Wonder where the kid gets it from. 2. This year as HC we are playing a team that was added late to our league so they part of the agreement is that the league says they have to pay all ref fees for both home and away games (2nd game of year). We play them at our home and they pay the refs. I go and introduce myself and welcome them and ask how the season is going. They are a husband and wife and not very talkative but the wife spends a few minutes telling me its not fair that they have to pay the fees because the club signed them up late. Whatever, not my issue so I listen and nod. Game itself is fine. My team is young (all 3rd graders 8 and 9 yo) so we are undersized as leagues is U10 (most are mix of 3rd and 4th graders) - they are huge looking back at it with 2-3 kids that i would be shocked if they are really in 3rd grade. We lose 3-0 with all 3 goals by two of their bigger kids. We had 2 kids get minor injuries in the game but nothing major. They had one kid who pushed a lot but just a kid who tried to go thru kids to get the ball. I thought nothing of it. That kid got injured late in the second half as he hit his head (eye) on the ground - I didn't see it and when he was coming off I asked the coach if he needed any first aid or ice pack as I have it in my kit. After we shake hands the female coach comes over after the kids leave and bitches to me about the ref since it was our field and i still don't know if she thought we were dirty or the ref was bad. 3. Last one, we are playng same team as in #2 but 3 weeks later at their home. No issues on the field but there were 2 Dads on the sideline yelling at the kids on both teams and the refs. I really didn't notice it in the first half as I was busy and they were on the other side of the field. One of my parents comes over at half to drop off a Gatorade for her kid but asks me what I thought about the one Dad. I proceed to listen to it for 10 minutes in the second half and the ref called an offside on them. The 2 Dads just scream at the ref, a young girl and I see her shaking. I go over to their coach and ask if she is going to do anything. Nope. So I walk accross the field (ball is out) and probably make a spectacle of myself but I confront these 2 asses and tell them to leave as they were embarrassing everyone. Go ask the ref is she is ok and if she wants to continue. We finish the game and I go to the ref after the game and I tell her that I will be filing a notice with the league and she needs to as well. I tell the other teams coach as well and she acts like nothing happened. Turns out this is the second complaint about the fans of this team when I get call back from league. Let the kids play. (isn't is supposed to be fun)
Fortunately not. A vast majority of the coaches in the league seem to exhibit a good bit of professionalism. Some of them can be jerks that run up the score but when it comes to player safety or the refs they’re usually pretty good. I coach at club level, travel was where things were more touchy. There were teams where their coaching was limited to “run more, run faster, try harder and be more aggressive.”
I like to say that attitudes are contagious. Setting the right tone as an example for a group is a very effective leadership strategy. I am not talking about just players on one team as the group, but everyone at the event, especially those over whom you have no formal authority. The concept is called "moral power".
I haven't gotten into it with coaches, but I did have one (high school aged) player who clearly had issues. After an indoor game where they were far more physical than they should have been (and, IIRC, received at least one yellow for their troubles which is almost unheard of at this place) one of his kids was swearing at my players in the handshake line. I called to him and told him to cut it out and show some class. He tried to walk through me while staring through my chest as if I weren't even there - he would have chest pushed me if he was even close to my size. I just said, "dude, just don't" and let him finally decide to walk around me. After the game I saw their coach, who's a nice enough guy, and I struck up a conversation with him. I complimented him on the talent of several of his players and said that it was a pity that some of them had such bad attitudes. He shrugs it off and says "they're just teenagers". Just then this same kid intentionally walks into me through my back trying to knock me over. He takes three steps past me, turns around, and says "what, you wanna fight?" as I'm staring at him aghast at his behavior. I just smiled and shook my head wondering what kind of future this kid is going to have living like this. Their coach, instead of doing something about it just says "kids". Mind you, in all this I'm 6-8" taller and about 50+lbs heavier than this kid. How he thought he could bully someone that much larger I have no idea, and how his coach saw no need to do anything about it is utterly beyond me.
I had read that as you were 6'8". Haha. I'm like this kid's got balls to step to someone he could never realistically land a punch on.
Yeah if he'd tried I honestly could have just put my hand on top of his head and held him at arm's length while he flailed away wildly. That would have been funny... I was more aghast that his coach felt there was nothing for him to do in all this.
Back in my playing days. I saw an opponent confront (invited him to step outside kinda thing) a ref after a game, opposite scenario kid was a well built older teen and the ref was an older, not-physically imposing guy. I think the indoor facility called the cops on the kid.
25 years ago when I was playing we were in State Cup semifinal game (U14s) as all our parents were there. Game was 90 minutes from where we lived. Game was intense until a kid on my team got taken down via a slide tackle on a 2v1 to their goal. No foul was called and my teammate had a hot head. Ball heads up the field and my teammate and the other kid kick at each other as they go to get up. I missed it what happened next but the next thing I know if the parents on the other team are sprinting across the field. My teammate was on top of him just throwing punches into the head and body. Gets a red and crowd seperates back to the sideline. Ref calls a much tighter game and there are 6-8 more cards and 1 more red for each team. We end the game 9v10 and lose in penalties. Oh yeah. The parents on the sideline got into a fight due to some of the cards on the field. Neither of us were allowed to play in the state cup the following year. Our league game the following year was rough. I remember atleast 1 or 2 balls inbounded right into another players face.
Before the great age group shift, my sons were only 1 year apart. When my oldest was u12, I had him on one of 2 B teams at my club. My youngest was on the u11 C team. We're relatively large for our district so we tend to have pure single year teams. Neighboring clubs usually have a single year A team and a mixed age B team. that particular year u12 d5 had two brackets, u12 d6 was one bracket and all the u11s were put there. So in the fall, mixed age B team whomps the younger son's team 12-0. Parents are laughing, kids are laughing, it's a grand old time. This club "only has full sized goals" and, shockingly, their u11/12 teams all are very good at stopping in the box and scooping shots up to that 7-8ft are where few 12 year old keepers can reach. The same kids that started as attackers ended as attackers, etc. For their trouble of rolling the predominantly u11 teams in the fall, mixed age B team gets promoted to u12 lower division, where my team wound up for the spring after an uninspiring 1-4-2 fall season. In the first 10 minutes, my winger, who could hit rockets from 30 yards, had a hat trick. WHen I took him off to start blowout mitigation, he says "that ball is a rock, I can't do anything with it." I said "you have a hat trick on your first 3 shots..." but anyway. I had a kid with one of those growth spurt related bone issues that couldn't run, he alternated between keeper for a half and a couple of shifts at striker. Never was much of a threat in games, but in scrimmage he'd poach like crazy, far post runs, folliowing other kids shots, etc. He bagged his first 3 goals ever in the 2nd half. I suppose I should have known... So after his 3rd goal, making it like 8-0, their assistant goes "sure, have your fun today, run up the score, it will catch up to you eventually". So I let slip "Oh, like you beat our u11 team 12-0 in the fall? Is that what you mean by running up the score?"
I dislike when opposing coaches keep whining about wanting a yellow card. Give it one good ask to the referee, then let it go. Might not get it that foul, but at least now you have it on the ref's mind for the next. Anymore whining and you jeopardize making the referee hate (strong word, I know) you, and by association, your players.
i can't say i remember arguing with an opposing coach, but i can remember laughing at nonsense i overheard them telling their players or shouting at the referee. i particularly love the demands for offside from the opposite side of the field where there's no way in hell they can really tell given the angle.