Being head coach for a select/travel soccer team can be challenging. They say the first season is often the most difficult as a youth soccer coach so I’d like to share a few pieces of advice that may help you out during the course of a season.
- Honesty is the Best Policy: I’m an upfront person. I prefer everything to be kept on the level. When I get asked a question, I give an honest answer. At the start of the season I was asked about expectations for the season ahead. I told the parents that I expected it to be a tough season for a variety of reasons. It turned out that we struggled in the first tournament and in games that we played at the beginning of the season. We did turn things around with hard work and effort as the season went on. Keeping parent expectation levels low kept the pressure off the boys and ensured that no-one got carried away.
- Emphasize Teamwork: No individual is more important than the team. This is true whether you’re playing in the Barclays Premier League, La Liga, or in the local park on a Sunday afternoon. I tell my group of soccer players that we win as a team, and we lose as a team. This season we played in a pretty tough game and we were given a penalty. I called for one of my better players to go and take the kick. He missed it and we went on to lose the game. At the end of the match he was in tears because he thought that his mistake was all that mattered. I took him to one side and reassured him that he had played his part in the game, just like all the other players and as a team we had lost, not because of that missed penalty kick. That following week in training his attitude was impeccable. He seemed to play with a lot more freedom, and in the following weekend’s games, he played one of his best of the season.
- Train Hard / Play Hard: Select / Travel soccer is quite a step up from rec soccer. Several of my players had a tendency to slack off during training. They didn’t see it as important because it wasn’t a real game. They thought they could coast through training and just turn up. I told them that the best soccer players give 100% effort and commitment in training and during the games, and that those players who didn’t do the same would be starting the weekend’s games on the bench. Once a few of them got the idea that there was no guarantee of a starting place on the weekend, the training performances were stepped up several notches.
- Player Development Should be Key: If your son or daughter is playing competitive sport and they have a coach who’s priority is the winning of games, perhaps you should assess the situation. A coach’s primary aim and first priority is the development of their players. The American culture is one of win, win, win. In youth soccer today, we need to remove the pressure of winning on our young soccer players. Instead we should be providing an environment where they can continue their soccer education. Sometimes we can learn just as much from losing as we can from winning. Michael Jordan put it best when he said “I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed”
- Make it Fun: Sometimes keeping the kids on their toes and mixing the training sessions up a little does them the world of good. Hearing the coach talk about ‘taking a positive first touch’ and ‘keeping our shape’ gets a little boring. Every few weeks I threw in a few training sessions which included soccer games that were fun and less instructional. The boys loved it and it kept them motivated and interested in coming to training.
- Persevere: Lets face it, none of us are perfect. Even though we strive to do our best out on the training field sometimes things go wrong. There are training sessions where everything seems to click and the kids have a good grasp of the content the session was set up for, however, I left a few of my training sessions during the season wondering if the kids had learnt anything at all. Instead of reacting to those in a negative way I reassessed what I thought went wrong, dusted myself off and got right back to it.
- Educate Yourself: Many coaches take up the role of coach without any prior experience of having played soccer. Fear not! Asking some of the more experienced coaches at your club for information is a great thing. Many coaches don’t want to ask questions of other coaches because they have a certain sense of pride. Let me tell you something, every soccer coach I’ve ever spoken to has their own different way of doing things. It may not be your approach, but a different insight can make the world of difference. If you’re not sure about asking another coach go talk to your DoC. Don’t be afraid of asking questions. Another thing you should do is to take coaching license courses. Both the USSF and the NSCAA put these courses on during the off season. I thoroughly recommend attending these because the amount of information you come away with from the instructors and other coaches is invaluable.
If you have any insight or helpful suggestions that you feel would benefit other soccer coaches, please leave a comment and share your coaching knowledge.
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