Here’s my proud coach moment of the winter from my 2011/2012 girls. Defense passes to the keeper to the middle to another player to an overlap...and I’m pretty sure most of it was totally on purpose [emoji23] Great sequence by the #EWSurfSC 2011 girls at Futsal this weekend! pic.twitter.com/s7Hp2oOBrM— WE Surf SC (@WESurfSC) February 16, 2020
In my experience locally (in Ohio South), we've got a new batch of refs calling games much tighter in this age range, and not putting up with the hacking and shoving. These are higher level officials being pulled in to cover a shortage (I think). However, we still have a couple of older men who wouldn't notice a homicide on the field. In the local rec league, they've started pairing kid refs up with a mentor at beginning of season. Mentor generally observes, and advises them at half. Good for parental control, and has improved quality. What do you do when you start feeling a game is getting out of control, and think that someone is going to get hurt? Do you say anything to ref or other team's coach? Do you instruct your players to do anything different?
It's a tough gig, and I couldn't do it. I was happy my club had experienced adults from russia/eastern europe/germany and they trained a couple cohorts of good adults/teens while I was involved.
I have to admit, I've not seen the hacking that is being talked about here. I've seen holding, hard tackles, players getting knocked over in a competitive nature. Are we really taking about U10-U12?
It may be different in different parts of the country. There's a blue collar ethos that runs through this area.
For our U12 girls - against one area team, I've had to carry a player off the field every single time we've played them - studs into ankles and knees. In other cases, it isn't as bad mostly just blatant arms out shoving and the occasional trip or hack. Some of it is down to poor coaching of defensive technique, or just not teaching it at all. We also tend to hold a lot of possession, so they get frustrated and lash out.
Studs? A strike at a joint with even a bare foot can cause serious injury, but it has been decades since I have seen youth wearing anything but moldeds and turf shoes. There was even a period when moldeds were not allowed on the synthetic fields. I know some of the turf shoes have fairly aggressive patterns, but I always wore cupa mondials, which were really safe.
In my experience when you deal with very low level players playing bunch ball, there is a lot of ankle kicking, especially in front of the goal.
The mentoring model is the one i learned with and it was great. It was intensive over several games not like the one and done here.
Using studs generically - everyone here is in molded cleats. In this area, all league games are on grass fields.
I'm still 3 weeks from the start of the spring season. Highlights of my 1st week will be running our new coach orientation and, helping a former NWSL player run a session for a a group of 3rd grade girls. This week, I'm sending a proposal to club staff to convert my unofficial coach education role to something slightly more official.
I spent 3+ hours out at the fields on Saturday doing setup and walked 6 miles doing it. Holy crap. Training starts tomorrow for my 19Us. 59 and rain is the forecast. Happy spring!
Our park district decided just before the weekend to close all the "practice areas" because they were "too wet". I get the sinking feeling they will try to keep it closed until April. It is about as dry as it gets here. Wish we had the resources for our own fields. Working with parks & rec is suboptimal.
When you know most of the coaches in your area personally or by reputation—how do you hand off your kid to be coached by someone else? Is it just like school? You put them on a bus and deal with it good or bad? Not a perfect example, because we have little choice in public school but hopefully you get the idea. I don't presume to know it all or be the best coach out there, but I'm not impressed by many of the coaches here. (That sounds disingenuous, but really it's not or maybe I can't skip past my own bias). Not necessarily from a technical/tactical standpoint—but simply from a human standpoint. I count 12 coaches in my area who I respect. But a mixture of geography, gender, and age group may not make them available. This season, I put my daughter in a boys league and she's doing well. The coaches running the team are the stereotypical dad-volunteer coach that joysticks the whole game. But she's thriving despite of that.
My first week of training is in the books. My 19Us aren't as skilled this year as they have been in the past, but I'm excited to help them get better individually and coalesce into a team over the next few weeks. It should be a fun season, assuming we get to keep playing. Have any of your clubs started cancelling things due to the virus?
We've always used the rule - if you didn't go to school, don't come to practice. I think that applies here as well - when the local schools suspend in-person classes, we'll suspend operations. We've got a tournament next weekend - I'll be shocked if it isn't cancelled.
ISA cancelled all travel games through April 2 and recommended all clubs stop activities until then as well. Looks like I'm going to have more time to lose golf balls...
And sure enough school's cancelled, tournament postponed, league postponed - I'm really hoping the decision makers don't try to cram 8 games and 2 tournaments all into the month of May.
P2P clubs have cancelled here but the state assoc has not. I am leaning toward taking a hiatus. Soccer is awesome, but we need to minimize contacts right now.
Up in Washington here. All league games cancelled through 1 April. Our team is still scheduled to go to a tournament in Phoenix at the end of March. They seem to think they are still going to hold it...