"You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink." I'm having a hard time getting concepts from drills and restricted situations to show up in scrimmages (and consequently games). Not across the board, but particularly with younger boys, U11 and U12. Decent, competitive players, but as soon as you go to open play, everything from the last hour disappears and bunch ball, mindless kicking and bad habits come storming back. I have been particularly frustrated the past couple weeks with my current U11B team (B team in our club), but have had similar issues with U11-12 boys in the past. They can certainly execute the skills/tactics in isolation, and with regular success in build-up activities (as soccer-like as possible, just limiting numbers--say, 2v2 or 3v3). But come scrimmage time, forget it. Any suggestions? Or just the nature of the beast?
I actually asked my u11s the question last year: "How come we work for possession for an hour (it looks great) and when it gets to the scrimmage I don't see any of it." The general answer is "it's not fun". Basically, they see the scrimmage as their reward and free play. We see the training session as a build up of simple to complex, but they don't see it that way. They gotta put up with skills training and SSG to get to the scrimmage where they can play freely. The fix, somewhat, is I started setting the expectation that i expect scrimmage play to look like what we worked on. They can do it but it's a question of a) do they want to and b) do they understand why they should. I also concede that it oculd be a function of the age—our 14 and older teams seem to knock the ball around pretty well. I literally say, "I expect you guys to play in the scrimmage like you have in the last drill". Otherwise, it's dumb---- play. Players dribbling into defenders. Passes banged upfield indiscriminately. Maybe, if they played a daily equivalent of street soccer (unrestricted play) they can get their YouTube/FIFA style play out of the way and could actually be expected to knock the ball around. Another theory that I like is that self-control is a chemically-based activity. Through the course of a day you use up your self-control fuel (glucose) and are less able to practice restraint. Think about their day: school, then homework, then practice... the scrimmage probably comes at the very end of their self-restraint requirments. http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1088868307303030
I understand the frustration. I never saw the combination play (a 1-2) used in a match, but I included it in every U10 and U12 training session. I felt like a failure, but years later I realized that the kids actually played very well, using the fundamentals. Just not the 1-2 combination play I was looking for. When I played with adult novices, they would chase the ball so I would never use a 1-2 in that situation either. (Its a 2v1 play and just not on with novices.) My suggestion is to look at the play in terms of fundamentals: ball skills, good positioning, good decision making. Its one of those "half empty or half full" things. I bet you will find things that they do well. You may have to wait a while, but reinforce the good play as it occurs during the scrimmages. I bet somebody on every team is doing something right. Praise does work. Anybody else and I would suggest maybe that they need a better progression from the isolated movement exercise to the game conditions exercise, but I am confident that you guys are using best practices. Keep working on fundamentals because if they do that well, then the rest will come later. PS: elessar78, the comment "its not fun" bothers me. Use your imagination and find some way to add some fun to the warm up and first exercise. Water balloon tag? Rank the pinnies' colors and award the colors based on best performance. Silly hats. (Hat could be a forfeit for the coach should players meet an expectation.) A special color pinnie. I regret to admit that 1 year I used pieces of candy as incentive. (It really worked besides elevating the late afternoon blood sugar level. But I stopped doing it.) The first rule of teaching is to keep the kids engaged. Good luck to you both.
I dont' think the warm-up, 1v1, SSG, isn't fun. They're into it, it's highly competitive, they're screaming and cheering for each other. They, I think, feel constrained. I think I need to make the scrimmage into a winner-based game. Usually we just play till the end of practice indifferent to score.
Glad it's not just me! Since I've had much less problem with girls and older teams, I'll chalk it up to the gender/age group. Yeah, I praise things when they do it right, especially when it works--"Hey, that was an amazing give-and-go, you almost scored! Isn't it fun to have a play like that?!" Some of it is just paying attention. They're so focused on the ball, they can't see (for example) that they're standing two yards from a defender. As soon as I point it out, they fix it right away, because we've talked about where to find the space and the run to use to get there. But they just don't think of it in the moment. I guess that's part of the gender/age group thing too. I think elessar is getting closer with the "competitive" comment. As soon as I add scoring into an activity, especially if it's to goal, the quality of play drops. All they can see is "score now!" and lack the patience (10yo boys patient?! ) to try the stuff that might actually lead to that score. I occasionally trot out a "points for good stuff" game. Play a small sided scrimmage, but award a point for everything they do you've worked on in practice: a give-and-go, good patient defending, first touch to space, switch, what have you. That does run the risk of them doing something just to do it, rather than do it when it's actually appropriate, but maybe it's time to pull that one out of the hat.
Also, add the time or scenario component. I think it was CoachKev from the old board that I gleaned this from. It can be arbitrary play for, say, 5 minutes. Have one team losing by 1 goal with 5 minutes left to play. It adds a strategic dimension to both teams' play. Adds urgency. but yeah I like the bonus points. They get to play normally and they're rewarded for the things you want to bring out.
I think of it as an "economist" method of soccer coaching. Using incentives to extract the behavior you want to see.
I recently saw a session plan where the club is trying this order: free-play skills-SSG scrimmage instead of: individual work small combos-SSG scrimmage To get the kids energized early when they get to the session instead of having them do "boring" skill work (even if you mix up the activities). It looked interesting; might be worth a try in your case.
What works best depends on the topic and age of the players. "Free play" if meant to be uncoached is not acceptable for older players who must warmup to prevent injury and maximize the benefits of training. The trick with the youngest ages is to make the entire session seem like free play and to keep them engaged, avoiding unplanned downtime (i.e., recovery and hydration times is planned). Monitor their heart rates (respiration actually) while pushing the work rate to maintain aerobic benefit as a floor. If the exercises are too structured, players won't learn to manage their tactics and oxygen debt recovery. Players who chase the ball all over the field and then are subbed out to rest don't learn to be efficient and to anticipate. There is so much coaching in how we manage things. How we structure the training is so much more important than instructions.
We had some good improvement over a couple of weeks, then backslid a bit. The boys played well and thrashed a weaker opponent 6-0, then got up on another team 4-1 before the desire to score made the bad habits come crashing back in, and a 4-1 lead turned into a 5-5 draw at the end. So my approach this week is to skip most of the technical or un-soccer-like tactical activities entirely (we're okay there for now in any case). Almost everything is a game with direction and goals: 1v1, 2v2, 3v3, 4v4, up to 6v6. No restrictions. We work on shape, movement, runs, defensive organization etc. within the game. I think I'm seeing a more realistic picture of where they are this way, and they get to make corrections in a game context. We'll see how it goes.
@GKbenji I thought it interesting to rephrase what you are doing as: Change the coaching focus from 1st attacker and defender roles to 2nd and 3rd attacker and defender roles. Everybody loves to scores goals and tackle the ball away. That coaches don't have to teach. Love for good supporting play I think is more learned than instinctive and requires nurture. Coaching focus on supporting play is an opportunity for positive reinforcement. I feel a little silly saying these things to a keeper, but sometimes an outsider's perspective helps.
You're certainly correct that supporting play requires more training. Although, tbh, I feel that *good* 1st defender role needs to be taught as well--it's about being in control, proper distance and often *not* tackling the ball, which is more instinctual. We've had to work on pressure, cover AND balance. Obviously, you can run a practice on each of these in isolation on build from one to the next, but that's what I already tried. Now it's more "integrative" and "coaching in the game", which was a real push of some coaching education organizations a while back. Aside from defense, I was also looking at some attacking decision-making, especially with regard to using negative space. So for this past weekend, we set an in-game goal: at least 10 passes using negative space in each 30min half. We achieved it in the first half, not in the second, but overall I think it helped focus them and we played much better on both sides of the ball. (1-1 draw against a better team than last week.)
@GKbenji A lot of parents don't appreciate the value of a negative pass in creating space between the lines. I think the kids pick it up from the SSG keep away games--how to stretch the defense and create space. It is especially important for creating space centrally. You guys have come a long way. When I was coaching U10s in the mid 90s, the club was intentionally teaching them to play kick and chase bunch ball. I stuck with fundamentals and was surprised at how well the kids did when we played a well coached team. Fundamentals work universally. They did real well. The same club today has an A license DOC. Hopefully they listen to him!
After getting dismantled by a far superior team last week we're moving from a diamond back for to a flat back four and dropping our center mid into a more defensive role (there's more going on, but those are the big moving parts). The head coach took the starters to show them what the shape would look like and I got the subs to run drills with. Rather than playing simple passing drills like they usually do I put them in a 5-v-2 rondo and really emphasized the defensive action - pressure and support, reading the man with the ball and the defender so you know where to provide support. I had to cajole them a little bit into moving as much on defense as you have to (including stepping in and doing it myself for several minutes then reminding them that I'm double their age so they have the energy to do it too ). We took a quick break before a scrimmage and talked a little more about the flat back four. One of the starters said he was still a little confused by the roles and I explained it as starting with continuous pairs of pressure and support (I skipped the role of the other defenders at the time to keep from confusing things more) and that seemed to help them make sense of the formation. As we walked to grab water one of the kids I'd been running the rondo with said, "so it's a lot like what we just worked on then?" I said, "that may have just been intentional." It's always nice when kids see how non-game exercises map directly to in-game situations.
I'm struggling with the training style mix right now. My u8s are physically overmatched and their technique individually on the ball is still pretty raw. IMO, they're "blacking out" because of all the pressure, variables, and options that are available to them during a 7v7 match. On one hand, they're very young and technique needs to be the focus anyway. Or give them exposure to directional soccer-like games like 1v1/2v2/3v3/4v4/7v7?
Hello, Does anyone have resources/info/videos/articles that covers basics on defending and attacking corner kicks. I coach U12/2006 and U8/2009. Thank you for your time and help.
@Isaul Rivas I don't know what your field size is, but, if the field is very large for the age group, I just have the kids restart play as soon as possible and attack normally. Defending depends a lot on how many people are on a side. If its 4v4 I just have them defend normally per the system. I never had 7 a side, but I suspect I would have them defend normally per the system as well. 11 a side I used players defending the posts, per convention. Since there is no heading allowed, it doesn't make any sense IMO to teach special plays for corner kicks.
Technique before tactics. You can focus on technique while they are playing SSGs. I didn't worry about match play because the players were improving every match as they gained experience. (I just kept with my season plan, concentrating on fundamentals.) After 3 games they finally "got" team pressing zone defense and it was like flipping a light switch. (I am sure it was learning to read the game.) They became extremely enthusiastic defenders after that, and the excitement carried over to their possession. I had no trouble with parents after they saw the result of the training (how quickly and systematically they won the ball back).