New Player – New Parents

I’m having a problem with one of my new players on my soccer team. This player is new to soccer and obviously new to our club and team.

Honestly, I run a pretty tight ship when it comes to my team. I expect my players to respect their teammates, listen when I speak to give instruction, and to keep their hands to themselves. We have fun at practice, but I do expect everyone to value our time together every week (which is 3 hours).

During a couple of recent practices, three behavior incidents have happened…nothing big, but I’m the type of person that firmly believes in “nipping it in the bud”. All three incidents involved this new player.

I explained the incidents to this player and then his parents. Unfortunately, the parents went off on me. They put the blame on the other kids on the team and they questioned my coaching style.

This really bothers me….especially coming from parents that don’t know me or my team and haven’t made an effort to get to know me or my team.  These parents sit at one end of the field to watch the games…away from other parents, especially our parents. I know our parents have made an effort to welcome them to the team and get them involved, but no luck.

Anyways, I decided to bench 3 of my players, including this new player, for one quarter at our next game. I did this for an incident at the last practice in which all 3 were not respecting each other.

I believe this sent a message to these three players as well as the rest of my team that they need to behave or they face reduced playing time.

I’m not sure what will happen with this new player. His parents did hint at taking him out of soccer completely….which would be a shame. If they are not happy with my club or team, there are always other clubs and teams in our area.

WPS Off To A Bad Start?

First of all, I am a HUGE supporter of Women’s Professional Soccer. I’m excited to watch the games and I’m excited that my young daughter will be able to follow women’s soccer and maybe develop a few “heroes”.

However, I’m very disappointed in one WPS detail…..club uniforms.

After watching the WPS Season Preview on FSC, I saw a segment showing off the uniforms for every club. Suddenly, I noticed a player walking down the runway wearing a skort. For those of you that don’t know what a skort is…it’s part skirt in the front, part shorts in the back.

WHY?

I may be blowing this out of proportion, but why can’t these women play in shorts….like 99.9% of all women soccer players? It just makes me think that some of the clubs feel the need to remind us  these are “women” playing the game and that they are “feminine”. 

I think it’s a bad message to pass along to female youth soccer players. I don’t believe the league needs to make these women more feminine. I find a woman that is healthy, athletic, muscular and competitive to be attractive.

Unfortunately, society tells us that a woman has to be rail thin and use a ton of makeup. I can only hope that my daughter grows up to be healthy and athletic….like the women of the WPS (minus the skort).

The All Important First Touch

The more I watch non-American professional soccer (South America, Europe, etc.), the more I have a hard time watching American professional soccer….like MLS.

I just watched Seattle vs. New York the other day and was so disappointed in the play of these professionals. These players are 1-million times better than I could ever be.

So…what’s my problem? THE FIRST TOUCH!

The MLS players had horrible first touches on the ball. The first touch passes were out of control and hard to handle. The first touch traps went astray. Both made everyone’s job more difficult.

When watching team in Europe, their first touches are perfect…99% of the time. Great control, great passes, great direction.  Very effortless.

The point of this rant is that we must work harder as coaches to teach ball skills to our players…especially the first touch on the ball.

I know I’m going to make a better effort with my players.

Registration Is Up Again

I am so proud that registration for my club’s Spring 2009 season is up 13% from last year. And, this is the largest number of kids playing in our club in the Spring since Spring 2004.

The overall registration trend in our area has been dismal. Thankfully, I think everyone’s numbers are recovering.

Hopefully, the nation’s economy is next in line for an upswing.

To Play Up Or Not To Play Up

There’s a brewing issue in my recreation league about allowing U11 players to play in a U14 bracket.

In our area, the U14 bracket is considered the “middle school” bracket. Due to a low number of kids that sign up at this age (most of them are playing travel soccer), our league has combined the bracket and allows U12, U13 and U14 to play together in the same bracket.

Now, we do have a U12 bracket for U11 and U12 players. However, we have a growing trend of U11 kids that are 6th graders and want the chance to play with their middle school teammates on the same team.

Our league rules states that a player may not play up more than one age bracket (so U10 can not play up to U12). However, an emergency vote is being requested by a local club to allow 5-6 U11 players to play in this “middle school” bracket. The club has said that if these U11 kids are not allowed to play in this bracket, they will have to turn away 9-10 kids because they will not have enough to be able to field a team.

I’m not to thrilled to have any player play outside their own age group. Honestly, there’s no reason to go this direction.

Unfortunately, I think the league’s board of directors will vote to approve these U11 kids to play in the U14 bracket. I think this might open a can of worms as well as an unwanted liability.

Marketing Your Soccer Club

I’m excited that our league, Kanawha Valley Soccer League,  is moving forward with a plan to market soccer to youngsters in our area this Spring.

The difficult part is that we have 10 clubs in our “league” that are individually funded and operated. Some clubs, like mine (Kanawha City Soccer Club), do extensive marketing with yard signs and such…while others do little if any.

However, that is all changing.

KVSL has worked a partnership with Papa John’s Pizza for them to glue 15,000 flyers to their pizza boxes (along with coupons for pizza) at 6 different locations in the Charleston, WV area. Hopefully, this will attract new players to join their area club.

KVSL is also purchasing 25 yard signs for each of the clubs. These signs will point parents to the KVSL website where they can view registration information for each of the club (as well as the respective link to the club’s website).

Of course, these marketing materials are fully funded by the KVSL. However, you should know that each club pays “dues” per player to the KVSL every year to be a part of the league.

I think this is a good start to our marketing efforts and look forward to seeing the results this Spring.

Other Sports Have The Same Soccer Problems

I attended the first Upward basketball game of the season today. My son and daughter play on the same team.

So…how did it go? The kids dribbled wildly. They bunched next to the person with the ball. They paid attention to the game on the other court. And, I think we only had 5 passes the entire game (whoever got the rebound dribbled wildly down the court and either lost in out of bounds or threw up a wild shot that had no chance of going in).

Sound familiar?

It does for me. That’s how my U7 & U8 teams used to play soccer. Everyone was in it for themselves.  Now, my players work as a team. They’ve improved their skills and they enjoy passing to the open teammate.

Do we win all the time? Who cares! (honestly…..we went 6-2 in Fall 2008). For my kids, it’s about having fun, improving and playing with their friends…..as a team. There is plenty of time for winning in high school or travel soccer.

Needless to say, I have offered to help our basketball coach and he openly welcomed the help. Maybe by the end of the season, the kids won’t bunch as much and they will make a pass or two before shooting the ball.

Maybe.  :)

Taking A Break From Soccer? Not A Chance!

It’s 2009. A new year is upon us. And, I’m excited that registration for the Spring season begins in a few weeks.

While I have enjoyed my time off from the sport, can I honestly say I have separated myself from the sport for a well deserved break? Not a chance.

I’m always thinking of soccer in one way or another. I even thought of soccer on Christmas morning….thanks to the Wii Fit my children got their Mom.

We started playing around with it and began doing yoga. After the first few poses, I thought, “Wow….maybe my players could benefit from this.” With that in mind, I’m planning on building yoga into my practices to help build my player’s core strength. I believe this could really help them and improve their performance.

So much for taking a vacation from soccer in the off season.

This Is What Youth Soccer Is All About!

My U7 recreation team had a wonderful season this Fall. The team is really starting to work well together in regard to using the whole field, passing the ball and not bunching. I’m very impressed with their progression at this young of an age. I wish I could take credit for it.

One of the teams we played (I’ll refer to them as SH) this year told me that his team has never been beaten…until they played my team. He was excited by the loss because his team always wins lopsided games and it’s hard to help develop a team that wins by an average of 10 goals a game. He had finally found a team that played at the same level as his team.

With this in mind, he wanted to schedule a friendly with my team. I thought it might be interesting to bring another team into the mix that I know plays at our level (I’ll refer to them as CL). This other team plays in our league, but plays in a different bracket based on geography….plus, I used to with with their coach.

I contacted both coaches to set it up and it was set. We would play a round robin with two 15 minute halves with a 5 minute halftime. The results were as follows:

CL 2 vs. SH 2

CL 3 vs. my team 2 (CL scored their last goal in the last 15 seconds of the game)

SH 2 vs. my team 5

All in all, I would say it was pretty even all the way around. The kids had a great time, the parents had fun and us coaches had a blast. The best moment came when all the teams came together in the middle of the field after all the games for a quick, thankful speech by us coaches and a big unified cheer….”1-2-3-TEAM”.

I love how teams can get together to have some competition without the competition getting to the players, parents and coaches. I didn’t hear a cross word, an angry statement or any negative comment or action by anyone.

Even though my team had one win and one loss, it didn’t matter. The kids played great and had fun. We’re even thinking of making this a bi-annual event for our teams.

I can’t wait until Spring!

I’m So Proud To Be A Coach

Recently, my U7 recreation team played another team from the same area. It was expected to be a good game and very exciting.

Last Spring, my team fell apart against this team. It wasn’t pretty. So, my players were excited to get another opportunity to play this team.

Anyways…we played the game and the outcome was VERY different than last Spring. Although we do not keep score at this level, my players parents did…..the final was 12-2 in our favor.

My kids were excited to even up this series. I was excited that my kids played well. Six of the 9 players on my roster scored on this day. The kids were passing to each other and working well as a team.

My favorite moment came when one of my experienced players made the extra pass to one of my not so experienced players who scored a goal. Then my experienced player went over to my not so experienced player, put his arm around him and gave him a hug. I know it brought a tear to my wife’s eyes.

I am so proud of the kids on this team. They have come so far in such a short time. The experienced players are helping the not so experienced players and those not so experienced players are raising their game to a whole new level.

I’m saddened that the season ends next week with our final game. But, I’m eagerly anitcipating the Spring season….only 5 months away.