COVID-19 and coaching

Discussion in 'Coach' started by elessar78, Jun 27, 2020.

  1. elessar78

    elessar78 Moderator
    Staff Member

    May 12, 2010
    Club:
    Arsenal FC
    Wanted to make a separate thread for this. Don't want this to be a political thread. Please share your sources if you make a claim. Please be civil.

    I'm seeing a lot of variability in how clubs are approaching this if they have reopened. Even variability within clubs depending on who the coach is. Some are social distancing, some partly (so is that no social distancing?, and some are just saying F-it and no protocol at all.

    My personal experience is my club is doing a small setting: 5v5 scrimmages. Kids are spaced apart during breaks. They get in and out—no congregating before or after. It adheres to our area hospital, state health Dept guidelines. Our county is lightly affected by Covid. Our local hospital had two cases (jumped to 8 last night). Adjacent counties to the north are very quiet, while counties south have growing case counts still. Now with air travel increasing and people getting back out.

    Looking at National and regional trends, not sure if even playing Travel ( playing clubs in other counties) is going to be wise in the fall. We opened for summer because the case counts locally were almost zero.

    here's an interesting article from NPR about YMCA childcare centers across the country staying open during the early days of the pandemic. They watched the 40,000 children of essential workers and had no infection clusters.
    https://www.npr.org/2020/06/24/8823...are-centers-that-stayed-open-during-lockdowns
     
  2. rca2

    rca2 Member+

    Nov 25, 2005
    The pandemic is a perfect excuse to keep parents away.
     
    ko242 repped this.
  3. stphnsn

    stphnsn Member+

    Jan 30, 2009
    Good luck with that. The "I know my rights" crowd are just looking for a fight over this.

    Our club isn't active in the summer, but we have opened registration for the fall season to begin mid-August. At this point, though, I wonder if that's even going to happen with the current rise in cases. In my area, it feels like people think we're done with the virus so another wave is likely sooner than later.
     
  4. jmnva

    jmnva Member

    Feb 10, 2007
    Arlington, VA
    Club:
    DC United
    My state association (VA) just released Phase 3 guidelines today. For travel players our club has been following the guidelines very closely. The one difference is that since my county was a little behind the rest of the state in moving to Phase 2, the club is being very careful and might delay a week or so before moving to Phase 3.

    For Rec we don't have summer programming but have opened registration for the fall with a lot of caveats about how the fall season may end up looking different than a typical season
     
    elessar78 repped this.
  5. elessar78

    elessar78 Moderator
    Staff Member

    May 12, 2010
    Club:
    Arsenal FC
    For reference, what do the phases mean in your state? Is 2 better than 3?
     
  6. jmnva

    jmnva Member

    Feb 10, 2007
    Arlington, VA
    Club:
    DC United
    The opposite-- Phase 3 is better than phase 2.

    In phase 2 teams could practice but had to continue to social distance.
    In phase 3 games are allowed.
     
  7. elessar78

    elessar78 Moderator
    Staff Member

    May 12, 2010
    Club:
    Arsenal FC
    Any limits? Here we are capped at 10 on field participants, Inthink.
     
  8. jmnva

    jmnva Member

    Feb 10, 2007
    Arlington, VA
    Club:
    DC United
    For practices players are supposed to stay 10 feet apart.
    Beyond that I don't know of any limits.

    TBH- I'm not engaged on the rules yet because all activity is on the travel side of the house. Rec is still dormant
     
  9. NewDadaCoach

    NewDadaCoach Member

    Tottenham Hotspur
    United States
    Sep 28, 2019
    Most of the youth clubs around here have cancelled the upcoming season, citing an increase in cases, not yet released guidelines from US Soccer, unopened municipal fields, and undue burden on coaches to implement guidelines.
     
  10. Buckingham Badger

    May 28, 2003
    Here is US Soccer's explanation of Phase 1 - Phase 2 - phase 3 and phase 4.
    https://www.ussoccer.com/playon

    I only see phase 1 and 2 which is ok as my state is in phase 2 but my county we just moved back to phase 1.
    General guidelines are:
    Phase 1 - social distancing, no contact - 6 ft apart, minimum #s together (under 6 /coach or field) - We as a club to be a good community member will not practice under those guidelines as we should stay at home if our community is in that.
    Phase 2 - teams can start to practice together, but social distancing rules apply when not at play. No picking up ball for throw ins, balls cleaned before/after practice.
    Phase 3 - games can occur (not sure of format/spectators, etc
    Phase 4 - back to normal, no restrictions.

    Our club had been holding out hope to do tryouts (had to be done by mid-July with offers out then) but we ended up cancelling them. We only had rec for U9/U10 and split rec and competitive at U11. We've pushed that to U13- so U11 and U12 will be by age. Some parents are really upset. meh- the kids will be happy (except for 1 kid who is brainwashed by his Dad)

    We expect registration to end about down about 10% in numbers YOY. We've heard from the league that we play in that the U9/U10s #s are way down for most clubs as parents are hesitant and there is a conversation of how do we put teams together. I was hoping for a move of U9/10 to 5v5 from 7v7, U11/12 to 7v7, U13/14 to 9v9 but the initial response to the league from clubs is that they fields are set. Expect to see lot more player passes and I can guarantee you that one club we play will have several 6' tall boys with facial hair on their U11 team. Parents and coaches suck.
     
  11. elessar78

    elessar78 Moderator
    Staff Member

    May 12, 2010
    Club:
    Arsenal FC
    I was shocked to learn today that Florida has 7,000+ covid cases in kids under age 17. Many parts of the world, europe, Asia, Israel, new
    Zealand have all reopened schools with little or no outbreaks. Florida isn't even in school yet.
     
  12. rca2

    rca2 Member+

    Nov 25, 2005
    Children aren't immune. They have lower rates of exposure with schools closed (and sane parents).
     
  13. stphnsn

    stphnsn Member+

    Jan 30, 2009
    I need to vent. Our state association sent a list of "imperatives" yesterday, and upon reading through them, I'm not so sure I even want my club to try to play this fall. Between social distancing and mask rules for players, coaches, referees, and (worst of all) spectators, I don't know that my club has the capacity to take it on. Our in-house rec program hires 3 referees to run the older divisions' games on Sundays and 1 "field marshal" to wander around and make sure there aren't any issues. Those 4 are usually high school kids. Our coaches are all volunteers. Ultimately, it will fall to our board to enforce all these rules on a bunch of volunteer coaches and the players and spectators. I don't want to spend my evenings away from my family being the social distancing police. I'm really discouraged thinking about what the season would look like at this point, and frankly, with the Covid numbers going back up across the country, I think Sean Doolittle was right. "Sports are like the reward of a functioning society." (https://www.golfdigest.com/story/sean-doolittle-said-it-all--sports-are-a-reward-for-a-functionin) We're not a functioning society at this point so why the hell are we even trying to get "extras" like sports back up and going?
     
  14. TCRZero

    TCRZero New Member

    Columbus Crew
    Jan 7, 2019
    We are allowed to practice with contact and scrimmage within the club per Ohio rules, but we are only doing unopposed work for now and are using the older more restrictive guidelines put in place by the State.

    We started back this week, working on conditioning, passing and 11v0 patterns of play. We are enforcing distancing during water breaks, and on the field keeping players separated roughly by zones.

    That said, parents are still car-pooling and players are getting together outside of practice. It was especially self-defeating when a bunch of player siblings started a pickup game next to our practice last night.

    The big question for everyone is competitive play - how/when do we start games?
    I understand that this isn't easy and becomes a question of weighing safety vs. recreation, and not everyone has the same values.

    Ohio is essentially not allowing amateur contact sports competition with this stipulation for tournaments and games for contact sports:
    • Athletes and team staff members must receive a negative COVID-19 test result before traveling to competition; and, a PCR COVID-19 test must be administered to each athlete and team staff member participating in the competition no more than 72 hours prior to the start of the competition and the results must be in hand prior to the state of the competition.
    Typical politicians - Too cowardly to just say no, instead we craft impossible-to-meet regulations.
     
  15. rca2

    rca2 Member+

    Nov 25, 2005
    In some instances the private companies are charging $6000 per Covid 19 test unless you have government insurance (then its $200).

    If testing of healthy people without symptoms is available and covered by insurance, what is the charge to the parents?
     
  16. Malabranca

    Malabranca Member

    Oct 6, 2016
    So as of the 6th, we (New Jersey) were cleared to resume normal soccer activities (our phase 4), with some recommendations regarding social distancing, masks, etc, but very few hard rules. Since then, the governor has added an outdoor mask requirement and put a neighboring state that competes in many of our leagues, Delaware, on a 14 day quarantine list. Many area high schools are seriously considering cancelling their fall sports.

    Our local regional travel league has instituted some safety measures, but is still ramping up for the fall and attempting to hold their first large tournament this weekend. Needless to say, the Delaware teams were disinvited. Looking around it is hard not to wonder whether we should be on the fields right now.
     
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  17. elessar78

    elessar78 Moderator
    Staff Member

    May 12, 2010
    Club:
    Arsenal FC
    Our summer program just ended. We were in the GREEN phase here in PA, but I just told the club I'm done for now.

    All the research I'm reading still indicates that children are unlikely vectors of transmission. And if coupled with being outdoors, distancing—it should be pretty low risk. stphnsn's post above is spot on about "the extras".

    I'm seeing this as an opportunity to diversify the players' athletic movement repertoire.

    Some promising vaccines are on the horizon, we've learned a lot in 4-6 months about the disease and therapies and it's nefarious effects. I'm all for buying ourselves a bit more time.
     
  18. stphnsn

    stphnsn Member+

    Jan 30, 2009
    We just cancelled our fall rec program last night. We were going to allow our 12U travel team to play, but we didn't end up with enough players.

    Looks like golf season just got extended by 3 months. The good news is my new clubs arrived last Friday so I'll have plenty of time to get used to them through the fall.
     
    elessar78 repped this.
  19. Buckingham Badger

    May 28, 2003
    Interesting that you guys cancelled the fall. We are in phase II in our state from a US Soccer standpoint but our county has instituted stricter measures recently which effectively means we are at phase I. Our league structure is up in the air as 70% of the leagues members are in this county. My feeling is that our league will be cancelled.
    I assume our season will be like softball/baseball around here where the local leagues are cancelled in an attempt to minimize travel/community interaction so the teams can continue to practice and play games against teams in their club. We have also revamped our littles program (u6-u8) this summer and are hopeful we can test it as we hope it will be more player friendly. If the league gets cancelled we will play scrimmages up and down with some sort of mixing kids and teams in a SSG format.

    Part of me would really like to ditch the league especially at the u9/10 level and just run a full SSG for a while. Maybe I will get a chance.

    What we have seen on the baseball/softball side is that while people observe the league cancellation - 25% of the teams will then just shift their schedule to find tournaments or others things to play in where they can ignoring the reason for the cancellation.
     
  20. stphnsn

    stphnsn Member+

    Jan 30, 2009
    We're unique in that we're a very small club who are all volunteers from directors down to coaches. We know our players and families will not abide by social distancing and masking requirements set out by the state association. One of our directors said he wouldn't participate if masks are required. So we decided that we cannot do it safely so we just won't do it. If other clubs or sports in our area aren't going to enforce the rules that we've been given and our players play somewhere else, so be it.

    Frankly, I think by the time schools are ready to restart, we'll be in a second lockdown so it will be a moot point.
     
  21. Joe Martelo

    Joe Martelo Red Card

    CDC Montalegre
    Portugal
    Sep 30, 2019
    I was doing one on one video training sessions via zoom a while back but we have now returned to training with the youth that I coach. Can’t live in fear forever.
     
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  22. NewDadaCoach

    NewDadaCoach Member

    Tottenham Hotspur
    United States
    Sep 28, 2019
    Let kids, coaches, parents decide. If they don't want to play, great, don't. If they feel the reward is greater than the risk and want to play then let them. LIBERATE SPORTS
     
  23. rca2

    rca2 Member+

    Nov 25, 2005
    I don't understand why people make a partisan political issue out of wearing a mask--a public health issue. Do they protest against being required to drive on the right side of the road? It is something we all do for the good of all. Traffic flows better and safer using "the rules of the road" in the uniform traffic laws.

    Wearing a mask is exactly like driving on the right side of the road.
     
  24. stphnsn

    stphnsn Member+

    Jan 30, 2009
    Weak leadership. Trump missed his chance to use this pandemic to unify the country and solidify his reelection campaign. Imagine how different public opinion would be if he'd listened to the scientists and public health officials in January and February and had taken decisive action. We'd have contained the pandemic, and he'd be able to say (rightly for the first time) "look at the great job I did". Instead, he obfuscated and actively hindered efforts to control the thing. It's mind boggling how people continue to refuse to acknowledge how bad he and many other leaders botched this.
     
  25. NewDadaCoach

    NewDadaCoach Member

    Tottenham Hotspur
    United States
    Sep 28, 2019
    I have played soccer every week since Jan. And every day the last 2 months. And have never been healthier, probably because I am outside getting exercise.
    The best thing we can do for kids is let them play outside.
    Show me a study that says playing outside spreads disease.
    80% of deaths are old people in nursing homes.
    But hey let's add $6 trillion in new debt that our grandkids will have to payoff.
     
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