I apologize for this duplicate of an older thread. But the alternative is sending off an inappropriate email to a fellow coach. After a year of coaching U8 Rec (4v4 format with no keeper), I have a new goal. Penalize the hell out of coaches that teach their team to play a kids consistently in the back in a sweeper position. The team today planted a kid on top of the goal box and never had her move up. We've been working on shape with my team (they know now my favorite shape is a diamond). It is pretty cool to watch them as they have started to understand the idea and play something that resembles soccer. Lots of 1v1 attacking with the occasional pass. These other coaches are all about the win and don't seem to give a crap about development. Our Technical Director has put out guidance that says "don't leave the kid in back" but these coaches don't get it.
Keep fighting the good fight, coach. At every stage there will be opponents who put developmental coaches like you at a disadvantage. Keep doing right by your players and let the chips fall where they may. It'll be the same challenge down the road when coaches park 6 defenders in their box and boot every ball they get a foot on as far as they can. I'd teach your kids to learn how to kick really well and hard and make that sweeper keeper regret standing in front of goal. .
Which is why U-Little matches are usually a waste of time as far as player development is concerned. The recent trend I don't like is clubs that reduce the number of practices but keep matches. No apology necessary.
Thanks for the encouragement. I do have one card in my pocket, I chair our rec soccer program committee and work closely with the technical director. So I will be making sure that all U8 coaches at least hear the right words.
Sorry should have added this above. I've seen these coaches before. I'm actually on my 3rd go round at coaching U-Littles. My older daughter is a high school senior and my younger daughter is a freshman. The U8s are co-coached by my daughter and me. @RCA2-- I agree with you, games are fun places to try the things we've worked on in practice. One of the highlights of my season was breaking the parents of the constant yelling instructions at the kids on the field and turning the parents into cheerleaders instead.
He probably coaches his own kid right? I would also guess he never plays a back. It would be ok to play a back if he gave that back the freedom to attack, and the attacking skills to make his attack dangerous. That is the problem with rec they let anyone who wants to coach coach. On e mails I don't like them used to send out an unapproiate e mails. I rather send those messages to people face to face it is much more fun that way.
I just tell parents what are good instruction to give their kids and what our bad instructions. So when they are home they know what is bad soccer and what is good soccer.
The joystick parents bother me much more than the rec coach trying to win the u8 world cup. My wife started to hand out lollipops to dads who wouldn't shut up. Some of them were not amused but it did work. A video game controller would be even better.
I agree that if the player in back was done as a way to help with shape it would be OK (sort of laughing at the thought of U8s building it from the back), but this kid was rooted to the top of the goal box. There was another team that employed this and the player in back had the entire side of the field open to her and she simply booted the ball back into the swarm rather than dribbling it up. In this case, my sense of sarcasm would have gotten in the way yesterday. To paraphrase my daughter "Go sit down with the parents and shut it." BTW-- love the phrase joystick parents, I will be sharing and using it.
I would never tell a back to clear it or boot it out. I would tell him to always when he gets the ball to dribble out from the back.
Good Luck. My third daughter is now playing U8. When I coached my first daughter at that level, I was naive to say the least, but since getting licensed, watching, reading and learning from good soccer coaches, I realize I got it at least 75% right at that age. Having played and watched soccer for a long time I intuitively knew that playing 4 v 4, the kids should at least have some concept of the diamond shape, and I abhored coaches who used a "keeper" in a no keeper league. We won most of our games because my players were comfortable on the ball getting out of a 1 v 3 situation, and then making a simple pass up field to a target forward which usually left us in a 3 v 1 situation. It was so simple, you would think other coaches would copy it. Now six years later, my youngest is playing U7/8 and she is in a great situation. Her coach "gets it." Luckily he is my assistant on my U10 travel team. He instills a love for the game which IMO is the single most important thing you can do at that age. They lose most of their games BECAUSE they do not camp someone in front of goal. Next season, I am going to suggest that he work a little bit on team shape because just having a defender at the bottom of the diamond (who also participates in the attack) would easily cut the losses in half and would also result in more goals as the defender is taught to pass the ball up the field. Technically, they never win or lose since no score is kept (unless you count all the kids and parents). I do get a kick out of all the parents out there with their first born children who have no clue about the irrelevancy of the wins/losses. We have a team with a losing record (I make very few practices and games due to my other teams), but I can see noticeable improvement and player development which, as a knowledgeable soccer parent, is so much more important than watching the biggest kid stand in front of goal or watching the fastest kid just kick the ball and streak to goal. I've seen those kids fall by the wayside as that technique becomes less and less effective.
We are playing our last U8 game this Saturday and I actually disagree with this assumption. U8 players are capable of a lot more than people give them credit for - it does not have to be black/white when it comes to development. Once your players are comfortable enough on the ball to pick up their heads and see the field, then they are ready to be introduced to team shape, movement and passing. We spend about 1/4 to 1/3 of our practice time on team play - it's not really tactics yet, but as close as it should get for this age. We play the same set-up of 4v4, no keepers. One of our goals last weekend actually involved 5 good passes with an easy goal at the end, built-up from the back. Every team we play against parks a defender at the back. A couple weeks ago it was so bad that the last defender dove down for the ball and stopped it with his hands - the coach agreed to just call it a goal because it doesn't make sense to do a penalty kick, but wow. This approach sucks for the other team, but at least they rotate who the defender is, plus it's a huge advantage for us that we constantly exploit - while the defender focuses on one player, pass to the open one in front of goal. We play a simple diamond formation that obvious for 4v4, 1-2-1. Our last player is not a keeper/sweeper, but the outlet player for changing direction from one side to the other. Many times the defender dribbles into open space up the field, which they are encouraged to do, and the midfielders forget to drop behind for cover, which can lead to a break-away goal for the other team. But that's a good thing because the other team's players need the encouragement from scoring also. Don't bother getting mad at what other coaches do, it's not worth. I really hate to watch coaches still stand on the field yelling at their players, but simply doing my thing seems to calm this type of coaching way down. We don't have refs, so the coaches are expected to make calls. I stay on the sidelines talking to the subs and make the few calls needed from there. My players know whose job it is for restarts based on their position - mid does their side throw-ins and corners, defender does goal kicks, and striker takes kick-off. Anyway, by not yelling and staying off the field, the other coach almost always ends up backing way off and sometimes even shuts up enough to let the kids play. Even if that doesn't happen, stay confident in the knowledge that you are doing the right things for your players which is the only thing you can control. The rest will work itself out fine.