I spend a lot of time on the internet when I’m not coaching or chasing paper to pay bills and of course I really spend that time researching coaching information and methods. I’m always trying to find information on how the youth systems in top pro clubs work or things that they do that I can adopt to my own coaching practices. For example I recently read an article with Pepijn Lijnders, skill coach at PSV Eindhoven in the Netherlands, about some ways in which they coach the U-10s at PSV. I love finding stuff like this as I think we have to recognize that the United States is not the world leader in youth soccer development. I also spend a lot of team reading soccer news and analysis about MLS, the men’s national team, top European clubs, etc. So here are some good websites I’ve been reading lately:

AirFutbol
This site is in spanish but you can navigate it easily with only a very limited understanding of the language. This website is really cool because it’s all about the top young starlets all around the world. Basically anyone under the age of 20 who has garnered significant press at home or is highly regarded in a top pro club’s youth system is featured here. Plus there’s video for most all of the players. So not only can you find out about the stars of tomorrow before anyone else does, you can actually see what level world class looks like at the youngest ages. I think it’s always hard for young players to conceptualize what the best looks like relative to their age, but this will give you a decent idea. Make sure to check out Henri Saivet, the young French striker/winger. I’m a big fan of Football Manager and this guy essentially becomes the best striker in the game (provided you nuture him properly!). So after he banged in some goals for my Spurs team as a 16 year old, it was pretty sick to see some video of him in real life.

Far Post Report
Just found this site the other day and it was the one with the Pepijn Lijnders interview. It says it’s a news site for Northern California Soccer, but it seems to basically be a repository of soccer articles. Some interesting stuff related to soccer coaching. I plan on visiting this site with more regularity to see what all they have on here that I don’t find through my normal channels.

UEFA
The UEFA website has some cool stuff related to coaching. I directed the link to the Training Ground, where there’s a lot of coaching information. A lot of what they have on there is higher level stuff like how certain formations function, or how to deal with tactical problems like a fast striker, but there’s a lot of information on the grassroots movement in Europe. Basically a variety of good information that you might find appealing.

MLS
This is MLS’s website. There’s good video on here and it’s free (unlike the Champions’ League highlights on UEFA’s website, which used to be free several years ago). So you heard Beckham hit a sick 60 yarder to put the game beyond reach? Find it on here. There’s also articles about all of the teams plus matchtrackers when games are playing, league standings, golden boot race, the normal stuff for a league to carry. Pretty nice site.

US Soccer
Pretty well laid out and thorough site covering the national teams and the Academy program. There’s usually pretty good video here of national teams training and the like. Information on national coaching schools is here as well. But of more interest are the various blogs related to national teams. Here is the full national team’s blog. There’s links on the side to others, like the womens’ team and the youth team blog.

US Open Cup
Like watching the English FA Cup where all teams amateur and professional fight for a place at Wembley and a chance to win some prestigious silverware? Then look no further than the US Open Cup, the American equivalent. While this used to be dominated by the semi pro sides that are still in existence (including four time winners, locals Ukrainian Nationals), it’s only been won once by a non-MLS side since 1996 (Rochester Rhinos in ‘99). While typically this doesn’t get near the attention that the FA Cup gets, I think it deserves some respect for being a great competition. With this year including a birth in the CONCACAF Champions’ League for the winner, I think many more MLS teams will take it seriously (as of this post only the New England Revolution and my team, DC United are left. Winner plays in the final against either of two USL-1 sides, Charleston Battery or Seattle Sounders [next year will be MLS]). Keep up with everything that’s happening from amateur qualification to live video (for some games).

Soccer Insider
Steve Goff, of the Washington Post, keeps this blog updated multiple times per day with the latest news on DC United, MLS, and abroad. As a DC fan, this is where I start each day. Goff always has good video of soccer action in addition to his great news scoops.

Soccer By Ives
This is a great news site updated several times per day. Lots of news related to NY Red Bulls, MLS, and European leagues. Ives also writes articles that appear on ESPN’s soccer website with some good insight and commentary. I check this site everyday for the latest news and so should you.

ESPN Soccernet
ESPN’s website has all the up to date info about everything going on in the soccer world. Some articles every day about the top players and leagues in addition to articles related to soccer in the US as well as South America. I read this everyday to keep abreast of the world at large.

du Nord
I love this site. Bruce has a great sense of humor which makes du Nord humorous to read. But don’t think that means there’s not a lot of info here. du Nord is a collection of a variety of soccer articles ranging from MLS game reports to world articles related to soccer. Lots of interesting things you won’t find at any of the above websites. Usually updated in the evening. I look forward to finding new cool articles each day.

Big Soccer
This site is one of the best and one of the worst at the same time. It’s just a huge soccer forum where people from all over the world can talk about soccer in any capacity. It’s broken down well so if you’re interested in MLS discussion but not the national team it’s easy to get to the right place. It’s great because some very knowledgable people provide their thoughts on all manner of soccer subjects. From what I understand, former Chicago Fire GM Peter Wilt used to post on there so fans could ask him questions. Stuff like that makes Big Soccer great. Finding up to date news about transfer rumors and intelligent conversation about youth development in the United States is why you come here. Absolutely idiotic posts from uninformed posters, worthless posts asking if Giuseppe Rossi is still eligible to change his mind and play for the US instead of Italy (he’s not, case closed), and wading through pages of crap to get to worthwhile information is why you stay away for weeks at a time. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

There’s other good websites out there. These are just the ones I read with regularity. Hope you enjoy.

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Went through the second practice last night with my U-10 boys’ teams. We’ve changed the way we run practice, so instead of having the ‘A’ and ‘B’ team mixed together, we’re now having them come in at different times. The half hour overlap is a bit troublesome, but not too bad. It was hard last night as all of the other coaches (there’s four others that either coach or assist with these teams) all had work, vacation, or other commitments so I had the teams by myself. I was able to observe a top coach from our area work on Monday night with the U-13 girls I’ll start coaching soon and decided to adapt some of his session into my own focusing on 1v1 attacking. While I know that players this age need work primarily on their technical skills, I was inspired after reading about PSV’s philosophy that the U-10s must learn to “dominate the 1v1.” So with that in mind, here’s my session on 1v1 attacking:

Warmup
All players with a ball in pretty large space, focusing on proper dribbling technique for close control.
After some work alternating feet to work on the weak foot, I brought the boys in and demonstrated a 1v1 move (ex. stepover, Cruijff, etc.) to beat an opponent.
Then had the boys dribble around and practice the move. Would repeat the cycle for a new move. Of course I was giving individual feedback and suggestions and would talk to the group each time I stopped for issues multiple players were encountering. Also stressed keeping the head up to see where they were dribbling. We did this for about 20-30 minutes (mostly because players were coming ten minutes late and the ‘A’ team only had six players total anyway) before giving the boys a water break and moving on to a 1v1 ladder competition.

Plus: Boys were warming up, moving around getting lots of touches on the ball and working both feet. Working on basic 1v1 moves and getting feedback to improve technique.

Minus: Players got bored of the activity and were eager for something different.

Improvement: I had tried to leave an unstructured space so they would have enough room to do the moves. In retrospect I would probably just make a large space so they would still have each other as traffic to avoid while giving space for them to find to perform the moves. I thought they got bored kind of quickly because they’ve seen these moves before, but they don’t execute them very well on the whole. This is a problem I’ve encountered with all ages, from U-10 boys and girls up to college players. How do you convince or show players that they need to work on the fundamentals that they think they’ve mastered (when they clearly haven’t)? Sure the players think they’re not challenged enough, but they aren’t performing the skills at an adequate level and seriously need to improve to be among the best at their respective age. This is a problem I need to solve to become a better coach. I would think putting them in an environment where they can perform the skill under pressure and are unsuccessful would provide the opportunity for them to realize they can improve. Maybe I need to set that up and do more of the coaching at a later stage in the practice where they come to the realization themselves?

1v1 Ladder Competition
Now that I had shown them some moves, I wanted them to go 1v1 against each other for game like practice. The introduction of the ladder realizes a competitive element that should make the boys strive to move up to the top. They still enjoy it either way, but it’s more fun if you’re successful. And if you see yourself constantly losing, then maybe you realize it’s an area you can stand to improve upon. Saw some good things with regards to attacking 1v1 and some players shielding the ball well.

Plus: Players willing and eager to go 1v1. Seemed to be having fun. I was able to stop and give some instruction with regards to keep the ball safe while dribbling past an opponent but otherwise didn’t give too much coach intervention. Some players shield the ball well and others would have scored more goals (stopping the ball on the line) if they were able to shield the ball a little better.

Minus: Maybe not enough use of moves. Players prefer to use change of pace to beat an opponent, which is fine, but one dimensional. 1v1 defending was not very good.

Improvement: I think this went pretty well. I have a tendency to over-coach because I see so much that I can positively influence in all of the players. But I stepped back and let them play more, which is what they need. They’re improving by doing the activity, which is the ideal scenario. I did well to adjust the field size based upon the success/failure players were encountering. Also made use of player input when coaching (ex. asked them when dribbling past an opponent, which foot should the ball be on? And then helped them work through why it should be on the foot farthest away from the defender) Maybe I would call all of the players together at the end to see a final 1v1 between the top two players. This would add more importance to being the best and would maybe stimulate the competitive spirit of the others so that they will be the best next time. Then again this might not work as well due to their age.

With the ‘B’ team I used a 1v1 activity I found in a book I recently purchased. It ended up being a bit too confusing for the players as they have a teammate who basically does nothing half of the time. I’m not a fan of how that works, maybe I would do something more along the lines of having a continuous 1v1 with three goals (like this activity used) where the players switched after each goal and let the scored-upon team start by dribbling the ball in from the endline. So even though the same two players would be going against each other, they would alternate turns to start attacking and defending. After a period of time it would make sense to change teams around in some fashion (when using two fields you could just switch the pinny teams from the two fields). Unfortunately due to the fact that I was the only coach around and the ‘A’ team was arriving and needed to warmup, I didn’t get to spend as much time with this group as I would have liked. I let them finish with ten minutes of 3v3, although I would’ve liked for this time to be longer. I realize that it takes longer to get through each activity and still get what I want than I originally plan. I probably should run the practices a little tighter with regards to time spent per activity and move on to something different after the set time while still being cognizant of how they are progressing with the skill being focused on.

With the ‘A’ team I let them finish with a half hour of 3v3. They had cooperated well and they get the most joy out of scrimmaging. Plus I didn’t like how the one activity had gone with the ‘B’ team, so I scrapped it. I tried to give some instruction to the group while they were playing (’coaching in the flow’ in USSF parlance), but mostly in terms of asking them to think of how they could create more space for themselves or get open for a teammate to make an easy pass. I stopped it once when one player was trying to play a kick-in and his two teammates were hiding behind defenders and went about it by asking the passer if he could easily get the ball to his teammates and where he’d like them to move. I thought this was a good way of letting the players find the answer without telling them. Maybe (although their limited attention span makes this somewhat difficult) I would have the teammates switch spots with the passer to see what he sees and realize how they were in poor positions (stole this idea from Laureano Ruiz’s Spanish Soccer Coaching Bible). I was pleased that I was able to use more guiding technique this practice instead of always telling players the answer. It will hopefully make them better players and problem solvers in the future.

I still need to find more activities that stimulate them and that they enjoy playing. When I ask them for feedback they tell me they like scrimmaging the best. I’ll have to try more small-sided games and see how they like those. I still need more work as a coach and to do a better job with these guys. The age specific characteristics are harder to handle than I originally imagined. It’s all good experience for me and will make me better in the long run. I find that reviewing each practice like I am on this blog and thinking through things that go well and things that need work is really helping me to eliminate repeat mistakes. I recommend all coaches do so if they don’t already.

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I ran my first practice for a while tonight. While I am an assistant college soccer coach, I don’t plan and run those practices. I don’t own those practices the way I do when coaching a team of my own. Even when I did a training session recently for a U-10 girls’ team, it was somewhat awkward as in the back of my mind I was thinking ‘this isn’t my team, I wonder how they’re comparing me to their coach, how much should I push them when I’m not getting the results I want, etc.’ on top of the normal concerns like ‘is this space big enough, is the game offering too little resistance for the best players, etc.’ So needless to say I prefer being the head coach in charge as opposed to an assistant or a trainer (running practices for a team where you’re not the usual head coach). Both being an assistant or trainer have their merits, but I prefer being able to plan everything out to the nth degree whenever possible.

Ignoring the training session I ran for the girls’ team several weeks back, I hadn’t really planned and run a training session since last spring when I was coaching high school JV girls. Even then I was really more of a trainer since I didn’t go to all practices or games, so going further back to fall of ‘06 was the last time I had control of the whole process from start to finish. There’s definitely a different pressure I put on myself to make sure everything goes off without a hitch. With the college team I know what to expect and have a good idea of how I can contribute at each practice (although i’m learning more and improving in this regard all the time). To top it off, I haven’t worked with this age group before (U-10 boys). So I was a bit unsure what to expect.

Everything turned out pretty well. It was definitely hectic controlling the whole group of eighteen players, which was further compounded by the fact that half of them were the ‘B’ team of this age group (I’m the head coach for the ‘A’ team and the trainer for the ‘B’). I felt fairly unprepared for this group a couple of weeks ago so I bought a book called Coaching Under 10s which is written by a guy involved with the KNVB, the Dutch equivalent of the USSF. The book proposes a ‘circuit model’ which basically entails setting up two activities to run simultaneously and then having the players rotate after twenty minutes. In this way it’s easier to set up and explain everything to the group and gets everyone on task much faster. The only clean up involved is removing some cones and you already have a field assembled for the next activity. I’ve already been doing the last part on my own, but it’s good advice. The downside is that the coach and players are generally more familiar with a system where the coach runs a single activity for the whole group and has a bit more control over making coaching points. I think the circuit model is supposed to aid in players learning from each other and playing with somewhat less structure/involvement from the coach so as not to suppress their natural curiosity/instincts.

I have to admit that I liked the circuit model after using it tonight. While I still had to go around and re-explain rules of each game (which this model is supposed to eliminate), the players were able to get on with it by themselves pretty well. The guys assisting me really helped out and everyone seemed to get into the flow pretty naturally. I definitely liked having things set up and planned out as too much time off task is really bad for this age. It was really easy to step in and out of the small groups (each activity consisted of no more than eight players) and provide instruction without really interrupting anything too much, which can be difficult with the more traditional method of coaching. That being said, I think this would work almost exclusively for individually focused skill and tactic work. For team or even group tactics, I’d like to be more involved and see everything as the coach instead of seeing bits and pieces from each group. I also found that the players didn’t seem to like the one activity which provided little opportunity for rest (mental or physical). But they loved the one where they were basically in line (although getting a high number of repetitions as the line was only about four players deep) and got the chance to execute a skill, receive feedback and go at it again thirty seconds later. The other activity ended up with players stopping or going half speed maybe because they couldn’t focus for that long. I’ll have to keep that in mind for next time. I plan on using this style of coaching again, but will gradually use different exercises and probably do some practices where the whole group stays together so I can have some more control over them. Maybe I’ll only do that rarely if I think I’m getting good results. And if you’re lucky to have multiple assistants (I have two who are knowledgeable, quite good for U10s), it’s the best way to utilize their talents as well. They don’t feel awkward stopping the activity or a player and giving feedback, which can feel strange when one person is running the whole show.

The DVD portion of the book is decent, basically provides video of Dutch players doing the activities and being coached by Erwin Koeman. They seem really under control and focused for him! I guess I just need to become a professional coach…or let the players know that if they don’t work hard everyday then they’re gone at the end of the year, haha. On an unrelated note I just bought two other books, Zone Play by Angelo Pereni and Michele Di Cesare and Developing Game Intelligence by Horst Wein. The first book looks like an extremely thorough discussion of modern tactics and how zonal play throughout the whole field dominates those tactics. It’s written in 1998, so it might be a bit outdated, but I imagine 90% of the principles are applicable. The modern game has really only increased in speed somewhat and degree of defensive mindedness in those years I believe. Already learned some things about defending, I think it’s a book that will take a while to digest but will offer a ton of info. Wein’s book is supposed to be pretty awesome, judging from what I’ve read about it (which is limited). All about activities and coaching to help players understand the game. Maybe through reading it I can have a small part in ensuring that the next generation of American players aren’t ‘tactically naive’ compared to their Euro or South American counterparts. Hopefully I’ll be able to read them and provide reviews in the not too distant future.

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