Coaching Kids Soccer - What I Learned

[txtxyeha]

Just finished the season coaching 9 & 10 YO girls in YMCA soccer. Late in August my wife told me that my daughter didn't have a coach for her team, and having played and coached in baseball for much of my life I thought that coaching my daughter's softball team was going to be a treat. When my wife said, "No, it's soccer," my heart dropped to my stomach. Fast forward a couple of months below is a reminder to myself about the lessons I learned as a 1st time head soccer coach:

*Figuring out an equitable, efficient substitution pattern that exposes the players to different positions really was job one.

*Job two seemed to be reminding parents when/where practice/games were and who was responsible for snacks.

*Drilling them on fundamental footwork for the first 20" of each weekly practice did start to pay off towards the end of the season.

*Even if you're not sure what you are doing, keeping them busy in practice and rotating in games makes you look smarter than you are.

*Be fair on offense (pass), be unfair on defense (we really did have an extended conversation one day at practice that it really was ok to try to steal the ball).

*Wish we would have worked on defense more. At the beginning of the season my defenders were successful waiting for the ball to roll to them so they could kick it hard and clear the ball out. At the end of the season the other team learned to easily dribble around my stationary defenders.

*Offsides rule sucks.

 

[nashhorn]

Congrats!
Great experience coaching soccer to the very young ones. Especially when there is not alot of experience. I coached sons in baseball and some soccer and daughters in soccer. Definitely most fun was the early soccer years. It is the only place I know of where you get the joy of seeing someone of limited, oh heck, no ability have one shot almost every game to do something good. There is always that opportunity when the ball comes their way and they can kick it with all their might! Love it.
You did good to give them the 20 min of fundamentals every practice. Most important and so ignored by other coaches. Great sport for the kids at the early ages - well great later too but only a few can keep up with the really good ones! Now I get to watch the grandkids play.

 

[Clarence Iba]

Go easy on the referees at that level. Most are learning too and screaming at them will ensure you won't have any for your next games because they won't come back.

 

[txtxyeha]

Admittedly I didn't learn their names; however, before every game I would say "hello" and "good game today" to both the refs and the opposing coaches. The other coaches always seemed surprised to see me with my hand extended.

 

[Tailgate]

I coach 8U girls softball. It is fun as hell. Luckily we have a strong team and it makes it very fun at times.

The best input I heard was from an old coach when asked for advice he said "find kids without parents." Never knew how true it was until I head coached.

 

[HoustonHorn93]

In reply to:

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[Rayug]

From what I have seen, the youth coaches scrimmage too much. If you could get them to not focus so much on games and more on fundamentals, the other stuff comes later. In many of Europe soccer schools, they rarely even play games at a young age. It's ball skills, ball skills, and then more ball skills.

The other thing is you could be the worst player on the worst team and most of the time you get a trophy at the end of the year and told how great you are!