Young Soccer Players. Let them fail, and fail at full speed.

A kid tries something in a game.  It doesn't work.  He gets yelled at or hears the moans from either touch line ...  and never tries it again.

Thank goodness nobody ever yelled at Thomas Edison.

With the advent of LTPD in Ontario and the decreased importance on standings, I hope that coaches feel less pressure to win and feel more comfortable allowing mistakes to happen and learning to take centre stage.

• Give your players a challenge or task.
• Let them try it.
• Let them try it at game pace, with opposition.
• If they fail, let them try it again.
• If they fail again, let them try it again.
• If there are techniques and movements that can be improved to increase chances of success, develop that technique, then try the sequence again.
• The players will know they're approaching success.

If your attitude is conducive to a safe environment where it's OK to experiment and make mistakes while you're learning, the development of your players and team will go through the roof!  How you react to their failure will be the difference in how they react and proceed.

Some (not all) mild failing moments you can expect as a coach, but must be patient with if your athletes are to become soccer players:

• heading balls into your own net
• poor passes to support behind the ball
• misplayed balls back to goalkeeper
• keepers trying to intercept crosses
• working ball around the back
• working ball out from the back
• slide tackles
• poor 1v1 defending in dangerous places
• goalkeepers taking your goal-kicks and free-kicks for the first time
• playing possession instead of hammering the ball to kingdom-come :)
• trying players in new positions

Now, for the detractors of competitive structure in Ontario ... if a young player learns and retains more through his own discovery, will a coach be more relaxed about a mistake if he has league standings hanging over his head or no league standings?  Will parents make less of a fuss over a mistake if it doesn't cost their child's team a trophy?  Give that some thought.

Years ago Dick Bate, former Technical Director for Canada, came to our club and used a phrase that stuck with all of us "Let them fail fast".  His message; what's the use learning a technique if you are not allowed to learn and fail, and subsequently succeed, at full pace.

Don't confuse letting them fail at a task with learning how to lose.  Two different animals.

So, your new mission, if a mistake happens, be a good coach and create the environment for them to learn from it.