U13 - First friendly game

Tonight we played our first friendly.  Our friends from Niagara Falls u13 were our guest and a very nice team to share a field with.  They came to the game with the right attitude, and that was to work on things.

We played on the turf field in St Catharines and the rain was coming down.  The weather radar let us down as it said the clouds should have passed by 4:50.

Back to the game.  The bottom line is we lost 5-0 but I don't care.  The kids had some good ideas and were working hard to establish their shape.  That made me happy.  Niagara Falls already had 5 full field games and they were sharper than us.  Three of there goals were off giveaways from poor restarts and that's something we can fix.  Restarts are a definite topic of the next 2 sessions.

We haven't really organize ourselves past our overall shape and moving the ball around the back and into the midfield.  This is our next practice's topic.

A few individual things we need to fix are:

• 1v1 defending and intensity doing so
• Getting to the ball first
• Not letting the ball bounce, playing it out of the air

I was very happy with our wide defenders and wingers tonight.  One bone of contention for me in the past was keeping our width and today we did that.  Our holding midfielders also kept their shape and that was a problem last year.  They would always creep up between the attacking mids, killing that triangle.

Coach Paul and I agreed that the boys looked more organized than when we started last year.  Our next friendly is coming up followed by a tournament and I hope to have more of the movement organized by then. We have 2 sessions to before the tournament.

Next session we will work on getting to the ball first, then organizing the movement within the midfield and forward from there via phase-of-play.  That will be one session.

The following session will be 1v1 defending at first, restarts, then phase-of-play moving the ball into space behind the defenders (penetrating passes) from the midfield.

After that we would do a session on penetrating the defensive line via the flank players.  That's a science in itself.

One step at a time the team's delivery will be put together.  Coach Paul and I look forward to helping that happen.

U17 - Trash the plan and adjust - denying shots

We had a U17 session tonight.  We were expecting more players but only had 9, including our GK.

My theme for the night was working on the pressure and support aspects of team defending.  It was a great plan.  :-)  But we only had 9 players and the mood was that of frustration so I trashed the plan. 

I changed gears.  We started with a dribbling warm-up followed by a competitive 1v1 and 2v2 drill.

During the 1v1, 2v2 we stressed deceiving a defender into committing one way, changing direction then shooting.  It wasn't a 1v1 attack exercise, but that was a nice byproduct.  Simple, the winner stayed on and we tried to keep the pace fast.

When a player scored, another player from behind that net came in to be the next opponent.  We were encouraging that player to try and shoot if the shot was there after their first touch.  This was to force the defender to move quickly and deny/block the shot if possible.

The competitive juices were flowing and they were ready for the last game.

We set them up with the GK in goal, and a grid approx 30x20.  4v4, all players shooting on the same net.  The game was simple.  1 point for a shot on goal, 3 for a goal.  So denying shots was crucial to prevent points against.  So we had the defending team looking to block shots and the attacking team feeding off the previous coaching points of trying to get the defender to commit and changing direction.

In coaching the attacking team, we were trying to set the stage for the defending team to work hard and improve their shot blocking.

Coaching points for attacking team, to set the stage:

• Keep the ball moving
• Decide if you have a shot or not.  Yes: shoot, now.  No: pass to somebody who can shoot, now.
• Proper shape to get open and challenge defenders mobility

Defending team:

• Goal side, deny shots
• Do not turn back when blocking shot
• Keep balance in case you move one way and attacker changes direction

The intensity was good and the boys were very competitive.  That's never a problem with this group.

I was happy with their work rate and I would say there was improvement.  We flew without a plan but it worked out better than OK.  It's a session I have run quite a few times before.

When sessions are done with these boys I have trouble picking things a apart.  They always work hard, compete and are good boys.  Some of them fight me in terms of working through bad habits, but that's our job to keep persisting.  Credibility is a challenge when dealing with teenage players but I feel they trust us in giving them the right information.

The number of players was disappointing.  I am hoping once we get outside and start having games, things will start to pep up.  Right now they are playing a lot of soccer at school so we know they are staying active.  Everybody is also itching to get outside.  School soccer is outdoors right now but the boards have not released permits for the public to use the fields.

Last week the boys complained that the balls were soft after being in the trunk during a cold night.  Today they take the balls out, I hear somebody say "Why are the balls so hard ... ".

Personally, I should have realized that we need to arrive with 2 plans in case numbers are low.

U13 - Full field shadow play

Today we had a full field session on the turf in St Catharines.  So both U13 boys teams can prepare, we shared the field.

We both took 45 minutes on the field.  We moved the one goal way back into the football end-zone so the team that was off the field can work on other things.  It worked out OK and two teams got to have a fairly useful training session after a frustrating week of rain.

For the first 45 minutes we worked 1v1, changing direction to create space to shoot.   The organization was:

• Goal off the field and at the back of the end-zone to not interfere with team on field
• Three lanes set up, all three heading into the goal on different angles
• The attacker served the ball into the defender who served it back to start the game

Coaching points were:

• Look to fake a shot to get defender to commit, chop the ball into open space and shoot
• Try shooting with either foot
• Ball must move after the chop and attacker must get on it and shoot quickly 
• Faking a shot properly requires a full body approach- arms, hips, head, foot all used to "sell" the shot.
• Balance during the turn so you can move to the ball faster than your opponent 

We have a problem with a few players shooting when the player is in front of them or make the move and don't get on the ball quickly enough to shoot.  If you don't get on it quickly the defender has time to re-organize.  There was visible team-wide improvement and it's something we will address again.  I am confident we can get every player on track.

We then went to 3v3 and looking for the players to use those fakes and chops to create space to shoot, pass or dribble.  We demonstrated a few situations where it can happen.  It was going "not too bad" then I realized the shape of the attackers was all wrong.  After fixing that it was better.  

The organization for that was:

• All the balls at the net
• 3 attackers 20 yds out
• 3 defenders serve ball from net and move to pressure
• Game is live when attacking team makes one pass.  This was done to avoid the receiver just pounding the ball on goal
• Defending team moves to attacking start position when their game is done

When we went to full field, the players seemed to be in a learning mood.  All we did was start at the kickoff position, 11 players in grey, 3 in blue just jogging within the play.  We ran it as a shadow play type of setup.  All of the balls were at the touch line at half.  As the ball moved around we were just massaging the shape into place.  We then switched to a sequence where the ball had to move in and out of the midfield and moved around the field so the team was forced to move.  It worked OK and it was our first time.

We play an attacking 4-3-3

There are things we need to fix:

• Wingers coming back to support wide defenders
• Defenders moving up with the ball, closing down large gaps between them and midfielders
• Midfield triangle not going flat
• Players going to a place to help, but not so close that they kill space
• Speed of our passes
• Longer balls played sooner and driven with the laces

Coach Paul's job was to prevent having both central defenders or attacking midfielders on the same side of the field.  That worked out OK.

Today we had a few parents helping bring the balls back into a good starting position helping keep the flow of practice going.

I felt a bit rushed during the shadow play but that's mainly because I wanted to keep going.  It was my first time doing it with this group and I had a little chat with them about trying to stay attentive because coaching over such a large area is difficult.  Not their fault, but I had to at least put that bug in their ear.  I hate to do it, but next time I will use a whistle to stop the play.

Practice was early today (8am) but the boys were energetic and the 1v1 3v3 exercises early on had some spirit. 

The next time I need to make better use of the three players who were wearing pinnies and not part of the 11.  I didn't want them defending just yet, but next time they will play a more opposing role.

You forget how difficult it is coaching full field after being indoor for 4 months.

Did the players understand what we wanted?  I think so.

Was the organization suitable?  Today the organization did not hurt our progress.

Did they show improvement?  I would say "some".

Did we put them in a position to get more out of the next session?  No doubt.

Did they enjoy the session?  They continued to work till the end.  I think they enjoyed the 1v1 3v3 portion more.  But they knew we have to work on this and splitting the field meant we had the full field second today.

Assistant's feedback: not happy with shooting after the 1v1 move in first exercise, happy with progress during shadow play but wants to see stronger passes.

Next session?  Full field with some defending, faster pace, practice driving ball with laces.

U13 - Parent meeting

We had our annual parent meeting last night.  It started off with a bit of confusion because the establishment where we said we would meet was crazy busy and we made a last minute switch.  Everybody got there OK but it did start off a bit unorganized.

We circulated a document with our mission, vision, some expectations and budget numbers.  Somebody can argue that the meeting isn't necessary since we all know each other and some of the boys have been on the team with me coaching for 3 years.  I disagree.  The purpose of the parent meeting is to lay out the program and open the floor to any questions, concerns, comments, etc

Even though it's "only" soccer , it's still an environment where parents are leaving their sons in the care of another adult 3-4 times/week.  I think it would be a sad day in my coaching if I were to not call the meeting and make Coach Paul and me available for questions.

There is never any friction at these events and it's a nice bunch of families we have on our team, but the process has to be respected and carried out.  My voice may sound like noise after three years and most know the drill, but it has to be done.

We did say we wanted parents to have a little more involvement this year around the perimeter of the actual soccer.  It's good for the team, it's good for the boys and it's good for the parents to be together.

Next year I will not be caught off guard like that with respect to the meeting place.  I will also develop a new format for this so it's not a fourth year of the same old stuff.  Maybe get the boys involved.  The same type of parent meeting for the fourth year will serve nobody positively, in terms of team development.

I am looking forward to a good year.

U13 and St Mike's , not a good soccer day!

Today we cancelled an 11v11 session with the U13 boys and a phase-of-play session with the St Mike's boys.

There was a SNOW STORM on April 23.  What the heck??  it was -5'C with snow and rain.

Bad news for both.  For the Welland U13 boys, we just came off 2 good sessions and may not be able to get in another team-only session before our friendly on Monday.  Today was our chance to set the tone for Monday.

For the St Mike's boys, they have a tournament Tuesday.  After the tournament this past Friday, this was a chance to fix a few issues before they play again tomorrow.

I am not a big fan of playing 2 games in a row without a training session to make some adjustments.  You also have players who may have had a bad game and a training session is a good time to get some good positive touches on the ball to rebuild confidence.

Our out-of-season snow storm!