Development or winning?

Ideally, it should be development, but that aim does not always align with what's best for the club and/or some parents also care more about winning so the answer is going to depend on the person.

/thread

Or argue about it for 40 posts. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

 

I think getting rid of problem parents is the top priority. After I get rid of them, I will start rotating players into different positions based on their individual strengths and weaknesses

 

I’m messing with you. I also think my kid can play midfield better than our midfielders. But I am not pushing the idea to the coach or demand that he plays him there. I understand the coach has a difficult job balance winning and development. I’m not going to rock the boat and make his job more difficult. I genuinely believe things will take care of themselves and there is no need to be pushy.

 

Teams should try to win. Players should play where they get developed. That is the parent issue. Do you take him off a winning team so he can play a more integral role on a lesser team? For example, let's say you have a kid who always plays forward for the best and biggest club in a big city. He may be developed at said club. But a move to a lesser team that may need him to be the engine of the team at midfield might be a better development path. However, said player would be moving out of an MLS Next club which may make it more difficult to re enter said club when it becomes important around u14 or u15. But if said player developed a more well rounded game it might make it easier to get back. That would be a quandary.

My son was lucky in that he started at a 3rd tier club. We (parents) discussed moving to a tier 1 type club around 7th or 8th grade but opted against it because he was getting quality minutes at his 3rd tier club. I wouldn't have had a clue what to do if he began at a 1st tier club.

 

I forget who said it first but I love this quote, "In my next coaching life, I want to coach team of orphans."

 

As a coach I focus on development and then the winning comes from that. I work mostly with younger teams and I tell my parents to ignore the results will come. Its all about teaching the players to play the good soccer and having them develop good soccer brains. I had a team that was largely winless at the youngest ages but by year 3 they lost one game all season.

The trick is you have to get the parents to buy into the plan which requires lots of conversation. I have one advantage in that I've been coaching for years and have some flashy credentials (national award and hall of fame in my club).

 

Some random thoughts on this as I think about it a fair bit. I am assuming we're talking about pre-teen soccer here.

First and foremost - there needs to be a balance. No player plays this beautiful game or any other sport, just to develop. They compete to win.

Second - lets be real here, development is great, but if it comes at a cost of winning very little then:
- kids stop having fun, get discouraged, and may not try as hard, quit, move to other clubs
- not every parents is educated or disciplined to buy into "we'll win later".

Third - btw, when is this nebulous we'll win after we develop the team? Remember that even kids have a finite soccer "career" duration. I have seen poor coaching excused by "we're still developing". Never have I heard (and it could be just me) a specific timeline - we'll develop for the next 5 months, and then start beating most teams after. This includes a number of coaches my kids have been with, forum discussions, etc. To paraphrase a famous expression, if you don't know what time you need to be at a place, you'll always be late.

Fourth - development needs to show results. Otherwise it's not development, is it? Results should be pointed out to less educated / discouraged - look at that beautiful pass into the box, see how they played it back to the GK, see how they used the triangle technique.

I hope this does not come across just as a sour parent talking. I do believe in the need of learning and not just kick and run type of futbol. I taught my kids to look beyond winning at any cost and understand that big, strong, kick and run won't work long term. However, development needs to show results, there must be wins. IMHO, if a team does not get better than some of it's " league peers" within a year, then the "development" is likely not as good as at the other teams. After all, these are the same kids, same fields, same coaches...

 

I look at development as an evolving process (refining touches, technique, tactics, etc) and the games as a) fun and b) confirmation of development.

The development progress tends to show up on the field on game day. If the skill gap between the best players and the worst players is quite large... that should be somewhat concerning from a development stand point.

If a team is winning every game, they probably need to move up a competitive tier. If they are losing every game, I would look inward to see what changes need to be made on the development front (coaches, managers, structure, commitment etc).

The same goes for individual players. If you are the best on the team by a wide margin, you should look for a more competitive club and vice versa if you are lagging considerably behind.