U13 - FIRST win of the season

We finally won our first season game tonight.  It was a good moment for the boys.  And a relief for me.

We had a few games that we could/should have won but let things slip away.  We've won games in tournaments, but season games are the true tests.

I could pick the game apart and mention that I was still not happy with our reluctance to challenge, but I will not.  I could mention that our restarts took a little step backwards.  But I will refrain.

We did a lot of good things with the ball and had 4 aggressive goals from four different players.  Our GK was sharp and he did have action.  We've scored 6 goals in our last 2 games and that's big for us.  Our wide defenders were very involve din the attack tonight.  Activity on the flanks encourages the boys to keep their shape.

We have been doing some fun things with the ball in training and they actually used some of it tonight, with confidence.  All involved playing the ball in the air to each other (wall passes, penetrating passes, etc). 

At U13, winning is not important in terms of standings etc.  But it is VERY helpful in terms of keeping the guys in tune with your message and trusting you as a coach.

We also told the boys that the more you lose, the more difficult the first win is.  Every game becomes increasingly tense and everybody worries about making mistakes. 

We had a few players who took serious leaps in the confidence tonight through their play. 

We'll see what the next game brings in terms of confidence and expectations.

We play again Saturday then train Monday.  We will continue the message of 1v1 defending through different activities, work on restarts and more finishing.

U17 - Commitment to smarter soccer

The U17 boys have demonstrated a commitment to being smarter players and a smarter team.

 This team has been a good experience so far.

Every game the boys are meshing into a more cohesive unit.  Every player has shown their own creativity, individually and in small groups and that is something you never want to program out of them.

Our shape is always getting better and everybody has a better understanding of how they fit into the situation regardless of where the ball is.  My personal little indicators of improving shape are:

• Wide defenders being used as options on the attack
• Wide defenders always being immediate options for the keeper
• Wide midfielders available, wide, at all times
• Strikers supporting each other when pressuring high
• Central midfielders always supporting, on angles, to each other
• Players sliding into positions to cover players who make attacking runs
• Player with ball always having a forward, lateral and backward option.
• Our shape opening holes in the defending team's shape

On the defensive side of the ball, they are showing a lot of patience in the right parts of the field.  This was a problem earlier in the season.  We now concede very few crosses from poor 1v1 defending out wide.  Our opponents rarely get a successful, first time direct pass out of their end because our strikers are goal side of the ball, one supporting the other.

More importantly, defensively, I hear the boys talking themselves into their shape.  When our strikers are flat and beside each other or a player is being challenged in different parts of the field teammates are giving the right information to help make things work.

Our intention was never to make the kids robots. Here's the thing ... if the players are systematically organized and understand what they are doing, they put themselves in a better position when it comes time to take that gamble and be creative.

We have some creative players who have great ideas and those ideas break games open.  We just want to make sure we are ready to defend or relaunch if those ideas don't work. 

If the boys continue to buy into the message, we will continue adding on to what we've built to this point.

There is something special about grassroots soccer

Every coach should make periodic visits back to grassroots soccer.  This week I lived it.  Working with those kids makes me a better coach, of this I have no doubt.

For the last 24 years, a majority of my coaching has been at the district, travel and college level.  But, for me, getting back to grassroots is always re-energizing and meaningful.

This past week I worked our club's annual camp with Coaches Rob and Gerry.  Youth Assistant Coach Cara from our u14 girls team was also on hand.  We had 42 players from ages 5-8, boys and girls and the camp ran from Monday to Friday, 9am-noon.

Working with grassroots players at the youngest age groups re-aligns your coaching methods and gets you right back to basics.  You cannot make assumptions on what the players already know and your tone of voice, coaching style and choice of words have to be bang on and suitable for the age group.

Physical literacy and familiarity with the ball was the order of the week with the camp.  One player.  One ball.  Show them something.  Everyday we ran 30 minutes of different movements with their bodies with and without the ball, then broke off into stations that offered more movements and situations to put their new skills to work.

The kids give you a harsh reminder of what they want and what keeps them coming back.  A nickname.  A free ball and shirt. Fun. Juice breaks.  They didn't even realize they were playing a LOT of soccer.

The length of the get together was not in line with LTPD, but the content was and matched the age group.  It was a camp and I am not sure where LTPD and camps find common ground.

"Working with grassroots players at the youngest age groups re-aligns your coaching methods and gets you right back to basics."

On Saturday, I went to run my friend's session in Niagara Falls and was surrounded by the buzz of younger age house league soccer at Niagara United SC.  This afternoon I took my son to officiate the Welland Soccer Club's annual house league festival and found myself walking around watching the U5-U6 kids from our camp playing.

The look on their faces when they are playing in priceless.  Excitement and nervousness all bundled up in a little kit.  The games were exciting and the parents and coaches were positive with all of the players.

My wife tells everybody that I love Saturday mornings.   How can you not?  The BS and intensity of competitive level sports disappears and it boils down to the players and the ball.  There is an electricity in the air at Saturday morning house league.  Every player comes with parents and siblings, umbrella, chairs and cooler.  You can't find a parking spot and the traffic on the street is jammed.

I make the occasional visit to grassroots soccer, as a coach, but this week I was immersed in it and came out a better coach.

U13 - Looking for the "turn around" game

Tonight, I was hoping we would have our game where the ship turned into less turbulent water.

We travelled to West Hamilton after having 2 solid sessions this week.

We lost 5-2 and spent a lot of time in their end.  They missed a lot of shots and we missed 2 penalty kicks, so it would not be fair to say "it would have been 5-4".

On a positive side, more players demonstrated a willingness and ability to be creative with the ball.  I was happy with that and so was Coach Paul.

And we were very competitive once in the opponent's penalty area. That is something we directly addressed at training this week.

On a negative side, our inability/reluctance to get physical is causing us more problems.

In terms of denying shots and forward progress, we are still being impatient and over-committing while defending, as a team and individually.  We are giving up a lot of open shots and unforced passes because of poor 1v1 defending, front to back.

In terms of possession, our boys are panicking when they know they will have to fight to maintain possession, causing some rushed/errant passing.

As for me, I stayed seated for most of the game, for once.  I enjoyed the game more and saw a lot more than usual.  I told Coach Paul last week I was sitting tonight.  This is the first team where I've spent a lot of time standing and yakking during games.  Not sure why, but I need to end that game-time strategy.


Coach Paul and I will continue to work to be positive and encouraging and help the boys find more game time comfort.  When I say "work", that's an admission that it is easy to become frustrated at times.  The boys give each other what they have.  Our job is to help them discover they have more to give, they just need to find it.

U13 - Two productive sessions preparing for Thursday

Our last two sessions were probably our most productive back-to-back get-togethers since we started the season.

Our Monday and Tuesday sessions served to get our boys as many positive touches on the ball as possible and a lot of competition.  We've yet to win in our league and I wanted them going into Thursday with as much confidence as possible.

Without getting technical, we ran fitness, passing, 1v1 defending and attacking and one-ball-per-player dribbling sequences.  All geared for success, confidence and improvement.

To help drive home the message of patient and intelligent 1v1 defending we actually put them through a drill on 1v2 defending.  Coaching points were:

• All key factors of 1v1 defending
• Do not over-commit to the player on the ball unless you force him into a pure 1v1
• Deny the pass to the teammate
• If player you are pressuring passes, drop and move to pressure new player with ball

The message was patience and timing were the keys to success here.  If you held them up long enough in a game, help would/should be arriving after a few seconds to even the numbers.

We ended both sessions with 3v3, 5v5, 6v6 in the box on the same net.  We were looking for:

• Boys to have fin and enjoy the training environment
• Players to shoot on half-chances
• Players to recognize they are being blocked and create space using 1v1 moves
• Players recognize if they have a shot or not and to shoot or pass - QUICKLY
• Smart defending to look to win the ball back
• Tough/physical play to deny shots and chances and win the ball back

I have to say driving home from both sessions I had that good feeling I was looking for.  Teaching new ideas was part of the plan, but the focus was to simply build some confidence, create a good feeling among the boys and work WITH them to approach Thursday's game with the same enthusiasm and confidence they show at training.

Was it a logically sequenced training session all dealing with the same topic?  No.  But for what Coach Paul and I wanted to see, we got what we wanted.  The boys kept working, there was no need to any disciplinary barking and they seemed to enjoy what we were doing and how it ended both times.