I was made to take a roster of 14 players and for my 14th player I chose a girl who was/is still deficient in field player skills. But she is a pretty good goalie. To get everyone equal playing time on my travel team each player plays the equivalent of a half. In 16 of her 24 minutes is spent in goal and the rest on the field. You need a gk, but be fair to her and coach her up as a gk AND as a field player. With that said, since she only plays 16 of 48 in goal I needed to develop keepers for the other 32 minutes of the match. So I did that. First I take those willing to play keeper. I talk to parents who are tall and tell them that genetically their kid may be good at keeper. Then I talk to parents and players who play basketball or some other hand sport, that I think their kid would be good at keeper. -I had my 2 assistants join me at a gk course done by my state assoc. Now we have coaches who can work with keepers. Now we can give them the tools to be successful -Make it attractive for them to play gk, praise your gk, be the first to defend them when things go wrong. Give them a fancy gk jersey and gloves. Hot pink one worked well for my girls, who wouldn't want to wear that? -Try not to put new keepers into a game where they will be tested. When the game is out of hand or against a considerably weaker opponent. Give them time to settle into the position and see success. -Get your defensive house in order. Immediate Chase/Pressure/Cover<-- learn what this means and your goalie will probably be bored. -Most kids are sitting ducks. They stand on their line, smack dab in the middle of the goal. That's the WORST place for a keeper to be 99% of the time. Overall my impression is that goalie is not a hard position at this age. Give them the basic tools and they'll do fine. Make everybody do it and tell them ahead of time that they'll be going in goal, so they can physically and mentally prepare for it.
I'd add that maybe your top keeper and your second keeper might be receptive to going to a keeper camp this summer? Developing as a keeper depends on learning proper form. jumping up, diving, catching are all dependant on proper form. Good form is crucial at this age and will hold them in the upper ages. It is where all develpment comes from regardless of position. It will also keep them from getting hurt and add to their enjoyment. Make sure it is a keeper camp and not a field player camp with some poor HS kid teaching them for an hour...that does more harm than good. Also keep in mind that being a good keeper is as much about mental toughness as it is about ability.
There is a lot of great information in this thread and I thank all of you for such great posts. I am learning a lot here about youth keepers. I just wanted to add a personal post here. Like I mentioned before, my son is a keeper, wants to be a keeper and could not think of playing another possition. With that, he does play the field during games which I believe is crucial for the development of a youth keeper. Last season, for the first time in his young travel career, he was playing left wing, he made a little move on a defender, nothing fancy, looked kinda funny because he is goofy that way, and took a shot from outside the 18 and scored. The look on his face was priceless! I guess he thought he would never be able to move the ball around a defender and score. It was one of the best moments for him. This would never had happened if it was not for the field training he gets 3 days a week with his club team. Since then, he realizes how important it is to practice and play other than a keeper.
I was u11 coach last year, and u12 next year. I happen to have a superb GK. Best I've seen at this age in the Province. He loves GK and wants to specialize in it. He is given professional GK training x1/week, and GK-specific training for part of another practice. So basically he is strictly GK for 1.5 of the practices, and the remaining 1.5 are divided up amongst outfield play and maybe putting him in goal for an SSG. I will not let him JUST be a GK. His outfield play is developing and growing, and the boys trust passing to him, so they pass back to him 10x a game, minimum - and he loves being part of the attack. The odd game I put him out as a forward and he really appreciates the change, but is eager to get back in goal. At u12 I will continue training him the same. At u13 he'll probably get 2 GK-specific sessions and a third session divided between outfield/technique and being in goal for an SSG. After u13 he'll train at least x2/week as a GK and the third will be mostly GK but yes, the outfield must always be developed too. Edwin Van Der Sar didn't get that good with his distribution by standing in the goal from age 8. It was great of you to contact the DA GK coaches. They are right - don't focus on GK at that age. Just put kids in net who want to be there, or rotate everyone equally if you didn't pick a GK for your squad.
Wouln't hurt for those interested parties to function as ball boy at behind the net so as to see what the older kids are doing, see the game from that prespective
Specialize as a goalkeeper? Here's my daughter and her situation. She has been playing select since 9u. She was named full time goalkeeper at age 10. She is 12 now and attracts all kinds of attention at any camp she does. She played the field 2 times this season and scored and had an assist within a few minutes during a tournament. The second time she was on the older girls team age 14 and played the field and had a goal and assist. She helped them win the tournament. Can I say I will stop her from being keeper? Nope. She is already getting tons of attention so isn't that the point ? She sees things as a keeper that helps her on field. look I wish you all the best but hope solo constantly wonders what it would be like if she concentrated on being keeper at a younger age. Doesn't that say something? I think if there is something special then go with it. Train as a player and keeper but dont fear being the teams full time keeper. Use it to be seen and get recruited. Or one day be ready to play the field if you choose.
Any club that would have a 10 year-old specialize as keeper, to me, has some seriously questionable values. This goes back to what we say about American youth soccer over and over, it's way too focused on winning and not nearly focused enough on player development.
Unless you're pretty sure that your kid will grow to be at least 6'-2", based on your family genes, then I would keep him playing a field position. Good clubs keep their keepers playing field positions so they can possess the ball as well as any other player. I've seen many goalies who come in to play forward and can score quite often. But you can't coach height, and short keepers are going to be very limited.
My son would never make to a decent comp level team with his foot skills level. He is better than many rec players, but still stiff verses his comp teammates. But he is way better than any of them in the goal, as a shot stopper and 1v1 stopper he is excellent, and he is doing it technically right just naturally. The club develops his foot skills during training times and plays him as a gk during game matches. He also plays a year up with an older team. As a field player he would never make a try-out to this club, so he would never get a quality coaching. The only option would be playing rec level and hoping that his foot skills just pop-out some day out of the blue. His club does not allow him to boot the ball in, ALWAYS roll in and pass to the defender. They make a whole team play through the back using the goalkeeper all the time. Sometimes we lose because we got cut up playing by our goal for too long, and mistakes cost us goals.
Timely topic for my son. Ever since the World Cup, especially after watching Tim Howard vs. Belgium, he's wanted to play GK. His team moved to U9 this fall, and this is the first season they'll play full field with GKs. Because he's wanted to play GK, I've worked with him after practice (I'm not the coach. I just work with him on our own time). In training, it's evident he's best GK on the team, and it's not really close. Over the weekend, he had his first two games. The team is essentially a Silver-level team playing in the Gold division. Neither game was pretty. My son did as well as he could have, keeping the team in the game in the second half. He played the first three halves in goal and then a bit in the second half of the second game. He came out and played a little midfield. That's when we discovered a new problem. While my son is one of the slowest players on the team (think of Billy Butler playing soccer), he's one of the best dribblers and about the only kid who understood positional play. While most of the boys played magnet-ball, my son made some good runs in the open field when the ball was elsewhere. He could have scored a couple goals had a couple passes to him managed to slide by the defense. I already told my son I don't want him being a full-time goalie, that Tim Howard wasn't a full-time goalie when he was 8. But the kid sure loves playing back there, and he didn't let all those goals he allowed bother him (most weren't his fault). Even the parents on the team were complimenting my son on how he played at GK.
Hey @Roman Spur A lot of people who posted have great commentary. I would also like to suggest in my humble opinion, That your son continue to develop as a field player as well as a goal keeper. Goal keepers playing at the highest level have technical ball skills that rival the best players on the team. Other than that it sounds like hes on a great path. All the best, Andy.
Alright . . . I need some help here. My daughter is a U9 player who is an excellent field player but was moved to goalie at the beginning of the year and - who knew it - is just flat out unstoppable in goal. She's having a huge impact on the team, absolutely loves playing goalie and the team is winning. She is so dominate in goal that the coach doesn't feel comfortable playing anyone else and she's know the full time goal - in part because she really is outstanding and in part because no one else can or wants to play in the goal. I would save that the difference between her in goal and any of the other players on the team in goal is somewhere between 3-5 goals per game. Still ... I can't help but feel that at a U9 she is WAY too young to specialize and that her field game will start to decline if she doesn't play in the field. On the other hand ... she just loves loves loves playing goalie, she is getting a lot of attention which she likes from playing in the goal and she really is having a huge impact on the outcome of the game. I also understand the coach's dilemma. We are playing high-level premier youth soccer and having my daughter in goal is the difference between winning/being competitive against top competition and getting smoked. Any advice? Should I go to the coach. Tell my daughter to ask to play in the field when she wants to play in goal? Or just go with it? Thanks in advance!
This is the "eat your veggies" argument. It's good for her to play in goal and be out in the field. I'm currently coaching U11 but have pretty much coached all the age groups. A problem with a lot of goalkeepers is they don't have good footskills and they can't pass and receive. If she's going to be on any team of any quality in the future she's going to need to be a passing option for her fullbacks. It's not on her to keep the team competitive in games and win games.
In today's game, her foot skills will be key to her future success as a goalie. Before U12 is clearly too early to specialize 100% IMHO as a former coach. At a minimum, your coach should get her out of the goal and into the field for every minute possible.
I know everyone else will say it's too young, so let me provide an alternate view. I'm not going to debate this with you or anyone else. I just want to provide some food for thought. 1. Losing/not keeping up with foot skills isn't a given. My son started specializing in goal at about that same age. Now as a USSF Academy keeper, he still has strong enough foot skills to make his academy team as a field player. Just don't forego team practices to attend only keeper training. This means that she typically has about 50% more practice time every week than the rest of the team, but if she wants to be a high level keeper, that's what it takes. 2. If she really is good and has (or will likely have) the requisite size to be a top-level keeper, the game experience in goal will benefit her more than game experience in the field. I don't know of any top level keeper who didn't start specializing at a young age. I'm sure they are out there, but unless my region is unique, they are rare. 3. Everyone in and around soccer is focused on development. However, the odds say your daughter won't play soccer in high school, much less in college or elsewhere. It doesn't have to be about the future. If she loves playing keeper and enjoys winning more games than she otherwise would, let her do what she loves. It's not your job to get her a college scholarship or build the future of soccer in America. Let her decide.
I spoke with the coach and last game he played my daughter half in goal and half in field. She was best player on field when she got back out there so hopefully this half in goalie half in field thing will continue. Unfortunately her back up in goal let in 3 easy goals and we lost game. But this got me thinking - why don't leagues have a rule for u9 thru u11 that kids can only spend half a game in goal. There is a tremendous competitive advantage to going to a full time goalie with the younger kids even though it's not good for play r development. Many coaches will choose winning over player development. Why not implement a rule to protect the kids until they get to u12. Would make so much sense.
A player has to really want to be a keeper to be a keeper. Also the future keeper is the sweeper/keeper not a stay at home keeper. What you want is a guy that can play the field like a great sweeper besides being a keeper. Which will make your team numbers up on defense. You need to have great foot skills to play like that. He has to be able to have the timing to get to threw passes before the opponents attackers. So they most play in the field first before going out for a keeper.
15 if they expressly say it. I dont think they should have to make that choice if they don't want to until later. The thing thought that is hard is that alot of kids look like you shot their dog when you put them in as keeper. As a coach it hard not to go to your 1 or 2 kids that want it.
15 is not a bad age. I think it is a mistake to exclusively play that position before a child hits puberty and you have an idea how the player will physically develop. As long as you have some experience in goal, it not that hard to move to goal from the field. It is very difficult to go in the other direction.
Sort of a related question to goalkeepers.. My son is 14 yrs old and just the last year-and-a-half has decided to hang up his basketball shoes and concentrate on being a keeper full-time. After last year on the middle school team as the keeper, we decided to enter him into one of the local clubs to help further his development. The past two games that the team lost, after the game he came up to me and said that the coach directly blamed him for the loss having allowed two goals. They ended up losing 5-3 after leading part of the game. Last time I checked there were 11 players on the team and they should all share in the victories as well as the losses. One thing I have noticed is that quite a few of the teams have scored on headers off of corner kicks but the coach has yet to devote any practice time to defending corners. I'm not sure whether to say something to the team manager or just let this year slide and look forward to next year with a different coach when my son moves up an age group. What are your thoughts on "negative" coaching? Thanks!
In general, I’d say let it slide for now…one second-hand account/incidence is not enough in my book to say something…it probably and hopefully isn’t going to be a big deal… I know I’ve gotten all worked up over a lot of things my kid’s coaches have said and done…in the end, most of them end up being a simple misunderstanding or just a pretty minor issue that gets forgotten after a few days/weeks… I would also say that late middle school and into HS, coaches are going to stop being all rainbows and unicorns…they are going to expect more, demand more, and speak more frankly and bluntly to their players…this can come across as negative coaching to many players and parents…by that age, a lot of coaches are going to be “tough” on their players; and it can be a fine line between tough and negative… Directly blaming one player for a lose is BS…and if your son continues to believe that is happening, then I would say something…
Your coach needs to go. I am a coach as well and would never blame a kid for a loss. I literally would call this coach and chew him out my self if you asked me too.
The problem is, he is getting told what happened second hand…maybe this coach did directly blame his son…or maybe his kid misinterpreted tough, but otherwise appropriate criticism…in either case, going off half-cocked and aggressively is terrible, terrible advice… Mark C, if you feel you need to talk the this coach(and start there, not immediately over his head – more bad advice), DON’T go into it confrontationally…more than likely this coach is going to claim he didn’t directly blame your son…
Thanks guys! I was a bit taken aback when my some told me this after the last game.. I think I'll observe the interactions for awhile longer and if it's repeated then I'll bring my concerns forward. Thanks again!