Evolution of US Soccer Coaching Focus

You're fixing some, but not all, of the problems you identified with the volunteer coach model above. You still have high volunteer turnover and you still have inexperienced coaches. Yes, the inexperienced coaches are being told what to do, but you can do that with volunteer coaches in a non-academy settting as well. You still need to monitor them to make sure they are doing it right. Sure, you have them all in the same place, but as you spread yourself thinner and thinner with more and more volunteers to oversee, you further and further dilute the effectiveness of the coaching. Plus, you're creating some new problems:

1. You now need a pretty huge centralized training area in order to train huge groups of players at once, especially if you want the benefit you described above of grouping players by ability rather than age, which now requires you to train multiple age-groups simultaneously. Not all towns have large areas like this that are available for soccer training.

2. You're going to lose even more of your top athletes to sports that allow them to compete in a more traditional way. I can tell you for sure that many of my top players over the years have had uber-competitive parents who wanted little Johnny to be known as a stud in our town. They would not have settled for him playing in a communistic system, and would have taken him over to baseball or lacrosse in a heartbeat, where he could be the superstar that everyone loved. These parents aren't evil, they're just type-A.

3. You're not generating coaches like you and me anymore. If you and I had fallen into a program like this where we just do what we're told and don't develop as coaches, then you don't have prolific coaches churning out top players. I developed all five of the current top 5 ten year olds, not just in my city of 250,000, but in the combined surrounding area of over 1,000,000 people. That's not a coincidence. And it wouldn't have happened otherwise. Of those five, three of them were kids I specifically recruited to play soccer. They wouldn't have played at all otherwise. That story is not unique, but it wouldn't happen anymore under an academy-style system. Who would bother to recruit them?

There are more problems, but that's a start.

 

I'm not meaning to suggest that an academy system can't work. It certainly can. We have a very good one in a neighboring city. It happens to be small, as are all the other ones I've seen that work well. By small, I mean about 20 kids per age group. And the ones that seem to work best are designed to cater more to kids who are super interested in soccer, not just casually interested. In other words, they function less as a replacement for a rec league and more as a supplement. I don't think academy programs are nearly as scalable as other people do. I think that as you reduce your ratio of good coaches to players, you suffer degredation in quality.

As for me, I don't think I'll ever stop coaching. I'm going to coach my youngest son for as long as I think I can do it better than anyone else can, and then I'll drop down and coach U5-U8 until I'm too old to keep doing it, which I would peg at around 75 years old. So I've got a while left in me! Hell, I may even start my own academy program one day!

 

Not sure who you checked with, but manipulating and propelling a ball with hands or feet is a fundamental athletic skill. While parents and others (including me) may call what young kids do "playing soccer" it is not playing soccer. Soccer is an adult game played 11v11 on a large field with a specific size and weight ball for a long period of time with limited substitutions. We modify the game for kids because they cannot play the adult game.

My understanding of the classifications of movements is that there is no bright line. More like a continuum. And the classifications are for the coaches use. With U-Littles the initial focus is on fundamentals. That means the coach really shouldn't care what size ball the player is manipulating because it is the basic manipulation skill that is being developed, years before the player will actually play with a size 5 ball which is really too heavy for a little kid. When the kid is older, we will focus on how well the player performs with a size 5 ball. I hope that helps.

If one were to focus on say a U10 youth soccer match as the sport being taught, then the coaches goal would be to develop a U10 soccer player rather than an adult soccer player. This actually happens quite often and is a problem.

 

Not particularly helpful, no. If dribbling a ball with your feet is not soccer specific, please let me know which other sports it occurs in. Can't think of any. No idea why you're talking about size 5 balls and whatnot.

 

Originally I thought of "soccer-specific" like you do. Then I started doing some serious reading on athletic development and found the concept to be more complicated than that. You have to keep context in mind--the concepts are intended to be tools for coaches to better do their jobs.

 

Too pedantic for my taste. If dribbling isn't a soccer specific skill, nothing is.

 

I'm glad you've decided that for us all, supercoach.

 

What are you on about? I clearly stated that his definition was too pedantic for MY taste. How is that deciding anything for "all of us"? Sorry if that spoils your big joke. Anything of substance to add, funny guy?

 

Actually this statement is pretty close to my understanding of what I have read. Of all the sports, soccer is the most general in that the sport requires the broadest range of athletic abilities in its players.

But remember this is talking about the field of athletic development which we soccer coaches normally think of as the technical and physical aspects of play. (Tactical and mental aspects are more about decision making and attitudes rather than body movements).

 

Maybe this example will illustrate. Throw-ins. The Laws require a specific type of throw to be made. So you might assume that a "soccer throw" was a sport specific skill, except that I have seen examples of general core training exercises (not sport specific) include "soccer throw" as part of the overhead work with medicine balls. It might be a movement required by soccer rules, but it is apparently also a general athletic movement, i.e., not unique to soccer.

 

I understand what you are saying, but if you define "soccer specific skill" to include virtually nothing, then it's not a particularly helpful definition to even have. I would say that "soccer specific" are things that occur within soccer and don't apply generally to other sports, and I wouldn't even be that limiting. For example, striking a ball with your laces occurs in American football (for placekickers) and in the game of kickball, but I'd still call it a soccer-specific skill. Non-soccer specific skills that occur within a game of soccer include running, jumping, balancing, etc.

Going back to the original context within which this sub-subject game up, I think I now understand your point as being that you think U5 coaches should teach general athletic movements more so than any particular soccer skill. We've had this conversation before, and I understand your position, but I disagree with you.

At U5, the iron is hot for teaching the skill of close control dribbling. I get about 7.5 hours per season of practice time with my U5s, total. I use virtually all of that time teaching them how to dribble the ball with close control, and about a third of that is scrimmage time where I simply give them reminders to dribble with close control rather than kicking aimlessly or kicking and running. If I accomplish that, I've done my job and I have laid the foundation for them to continue learning the game of soccer.

If I encounter a kid who has terrible balance or terrible running technique, I will work with them on that in the course of my drills that are designed to teach close-control dribbling (for example, pointing out to kids that they shouldn't hold their arm in that funny way that lots of kids do with their elbow and hand bent up at their chest, or teaching balance concepts during toe touches), but I don't make those things stand-alone areas of focus. I just consider the time I have better spent on teaching close-control dribbling.

By the end of the U6 year, if they are excellent at dribbling with close control, I've given a huge gift to their U7 coach (who happens to be me!). I don't begrudge others for using different methods.

 

What's the matter? No sense of humor?

Do you realize that even when you're agreeing with someone on this board, you're still arguing with them and trying to prove your experiences are more valuable?

I'm not sure whether to take you serious or laugh.

 

You haven't said anything funny.

That's some pretty deep psychoanalysis you're engaging in. Did you stop to think that maybe you're doing precisely what you're accusing me of, like right now? Hypocritical much?

Look, you're reading what you want to read and taking it personally that I don't subscribe to the same school of thought that you subscribe to. There are plenty of posters on this forum who I generally agree with including, most notably, @Monkey Boy. I happen to have a pretty stark philosphical disagreement with the school of thought that preaches that the U5-U6 age group shouldn't really be taught how to play soccer so much as they should be educated on how to move athletically. You clearly fall into the general movement education school of thought, so our views are diametrically opposed. That seems to hurt your feelings for some reason.

As for trying to prove that my experiences are more valuable than others, I'm not sure where you're getting that from. I'm sharing my own experiences, which is all I know. Others are sharing theirs. I'm not here to quibble, but to help myself crystalize my own thoughts about a subject I care deeply about (i.e., coaching youth soccer, principally ages U5-U8). Sometimes I pick things up from others, sometimes I validate or invalidate my own thoughts just by thinking them through long enough to write them out. I don't think that makes me any different from anyone else in this forum. I don't expect you or @rca2 to change your views on the value of soccer specific coaching versus genernal movement activities any more than you should expect me to change mine. And I don't care whether you do or not. I'm not here for that.

That's nice. How about this? You put me on your ignore list and I'll leave you on mine (and this time, I won't hit the "show ignored content" button)? Is that a deal, or would you prefer to just keep sniping at me from the rooftops? I'll even give you the last word, though I won't be reading it. Life is too short to allow guys like you under my skin.

 

Oh, the irony. I'd be surprised if your ego allowed you to actually follow through with that promise.

 

I have a fundamental belief that soccer is not realistic at U5/6.

It might be soccer-like, but it's not anywhere near the same structure and dynamics of the senior game.

https://www.bigsoccer.com/community/threads/at-what-age-does-it-resemble-actual-soccer.1996591/

 

I saw that thread, and my response is, "Define what you mean by 'actual soccer'". You can IMO answer that question with any age you want depending on how you define that term.

If you define it as "controlling a ball with your feet, getting it away from opponents, and kicking it into a goal", then U5 games can certainly be "soccer-like". It is greatly simplified and 4yo don't take advantage of every tactic they could, but it still qualifies as "soccer" in my book. The more you add on top of that definition, the older you have to go. Heck, you could come up with a very high-level definition of "soccer-like" that even my U15 State Cup champion team might not satisfy, compared to how, say, Bayern or Barcelona play the game.

Personally, I side more with dcole than Twenty26Six. Recall that, historically, there was no passing in the game. 150 years ago Association Football was mostly a dribbling game.

 

Amusing comments, but remember when we discuss these topics, we are talking in a context of coaching soccer. Otherwise it is just an uninteresting discussion of semantics. As I said earlier, I call U10 games soccer, but it is not soccer in terms of my view of developing soccer players. As soccer coaches we need to define soccer as the senior game, the ultimate sport that we are preparing players to play. So how someone played in the past is not relevant. With U-Littles we are looking forward 10 or more years into the future. If you are coaching a senior team, then you are preparing them to play the adult game in the present. You don't have to see how your training fits into a longer scheme. And this is the advantage that you professionals have over the rest of us--it is easier for you to see the big development picture because you coach players at various points in the development process.

So this goes back to my earlier point about whether coaches are preparing U10 players to play U10 matches or to play adult matches in the future. The best approach for player development is to take the long term view.

As to taking "sides" I may be the only one that thinks there is no sides to take. I am just trying to make a point about player development and coaching theory. dcole may be the best U5 coach in the country. I don't know. Coaching is like cooking, the proof of your ability is in your products. dcole doesn't have to agree with me to be a good coach. My guess is that what he is doing is developing the kids' eye-foot coordination, which is extremely helpful to their development. He can call it teaching a soccer specific skill (close control dribbling) and I can call it a general skill (eye-foot coordination), but it doesn't diminish what the kids can do either way.

 

Pattern play is just a type of drill. I think it is very useful for introducing team tactics. It uses the reality of players on the field instead of abstract x's and o's on a diagram to teach. You essentially do the same type of approach in functional training when there is no pressure.

It is what they suggest you use it for that I disagree with. Their primary thrust is that you can compensate for the lack of skill by the tactics you direct the players to use. This enables you to play winning possession-style soccer with players of minimal technical ability. They are correct in that is how to gain a better chance of winning matches in the short term. They are selling a product to youth coaches who prefer winning matches over developing player technical skills. If you are coaching a high school team, this approach is fine. But it is not a good approach for pre-teens who are supposed to be learning skills. It is what I call developing a team instead of players. Or trading match success in the short term for a reduction in long term player development success. Parents understand and see short term success. They tend to not believe in long term success, because it sounds like an excuse for failing to win matches. And they think that if their children are on a winning youth soccer team, that will somehow give them a future advantage.

If 3four3 were only marketing to coaches of older age levels trying to put together a competitive team with lesser skilled players, I wouldn't be upset. But they are advertising success with U9 teams.

The reality is that this type of travel coach will eventually replace his current players with players who have spent their time developing skills. And at tryouts, coaches are looking for the best players; last year's record won't help.

 

Thanks RCA2, you are confirming my worries about my kids' travel team. The coach, who I like and is very well meaning and puts a lot of effort into his coaching, is training them in this type of possession play at u9 and it is nice to watch, but I think my son's close control skills have actually degraded because the coach does not want the kids taking people on (except for one or two stars). OTOH, the general field awareness has improved a whole lot, because the players aren't just robots, they have to digest the movements on and off the ball and get their heads up quickly. So there is some development going on.

 

seems like it would it be completely contradictory to practice 1v1 games in practice and disallow it in games?
does he implement this "play it safe" in practices too? or just matches?