Shomit’s Youth Soccer Training Tips

Image details: Linesman waving a flag for offside served by picapp.com

Players who are often targeted, with penetrating passes in the attacking third of the soccer field from their teammates, must keep a watchful eye on the offside flag being raised. As an attacking player, it is always wise to be sure that the opposition’s last defender is between yourself and the goal, while also maintaining sight of the soccer ball.

Players who are more advanced are also able to see the potential for surrounding support based on the positioning of their teammates. Attacking players should certainly never let an offside call affect them in terms of their attacking mentality.

The offside may (or may not) be called, depending on a variety of factors. Some of those factors would include the timing of the run in relation to when the ball was released from the passing teammate.

Certainly, good teams will have crisply timed runs with balls played into dangerous spaces so the awareness of the flag must be there.

Don’t let an offside call (or non-call) get you down during the course of a game. Continue to attack and the goals will come.

“We have to do what is best for the players.” The phrase that all youth soccer coaches should live by.

Soccer is a team sport. This is often lost when talks arise in regards to individual player development. I have even heard youth club leaders mention a “player development centric” model as opposed to a “team development centric” model. My feeling is that player development and team development are woven together in ALL team sports. If a group of soccer players are actually developing, I believe that it will show when their team plays in games against other teams. Of course, the opposite is also true. If players are not developing, I think that will show when the team is playing against other teams as well.

What soccer actually is often gets lost in all of the “player development” jargon. In reality, soccer is a game in which there are 11 players on the field who are trying to score more goals than their 11 opponents that are standing across from them…..even at the highest levels.
Coaches should certainly focus on ball mastery at the young ages, but there are several other aspects of player development as players mature: Communication, Defending, Off-the-ball supporting angles, Vision, etc, etc..

What good is it for a player’s development if he/she can juggle the soccer ball twenty times, but cannot stop an opponent from dribbling around them? Or cannot communicate correct information to a teammate quickly in a game situation? Is that part of player development? Yes.

Soccer is a team sport that requires great attention to detail. If players are developing together, it will show when their team plays.

I wanted to share with all of you two inspiring stories of team committment that I have had the priviledge to witness. I have been coaching for almost ten years now at the youth level, and I am constantly trying to analyze what separates championship teams from teams that tend to underachieve in terms of wins and losses. Obviously, players’ physical abilities and a coach’s competence come into play in terms of winning and losing, but there is something else that is tremendously more important in my opinion.

I have found that on all the GOOD teams that I have had the priviledge to play on or coach, players’ attendance at team activities during the regular season is top-notch. On the contrary, I have also coached or played for a few BAD teams and a common thread there was poor attendance at team activities, especially games. Certainly players and families have obligations/family emergencies that may cause them to miss practice on occassion, or a winter season game/scrimmage……..that is not the focus of this post.

What about the soccer games during the regular spring or fall season?

On average, a youth soccer team plays about eight or nine league games during a spring or fall season. If a player misses two out of eight games because they take two trips to the beach…….is it worth keeping that player on the team if she misses 25% of the season? Or would it better for the group as a whole to replace that player with someone with similar abilities that would attend 100% of the games as opposed to 75% of the games?

This leads me to the incredible stories of team commitment that have helped shaped my views. My travel team, the Under-16 Manassas Lightning had advanced to the final sixteen teams in the VYSA State Cup and we had to travel to Richmond to play the Midlothian Blast, a tough opponent. My then teammate and current assistant coach for the U-15G Arlington Express, Mike Walsh, was faced with quite a dilemma. Mike, the youngest of five children, had to choose between attending his oldest sister’s wedding or playing in his team’s State Cup game. To make a long story short, Mike attended the State Cup game (with his family’s blessing of course) and proceeded to score the game-winning goal with only seconds left in the game that sent the team into a wild celebration as we had advanced to the VYSA State Cup quarterfinals. The final score of the game was 1-0…and his sister still got married.

In a similar situation this past fall, a player on my U-15G Arlington Express, Alejandra Espinoza, faced a similar decision. Alejandra’s cousin had a wedding scheduled the same day as a WAGS league game. Just the day prior, the Express had suffered a loss in State Cup that the players on the team certainly did not feel good about. It was going to be tough to bounce back as a group in less than 24 hours. Alejandra felt that she needed to attend the game for her teammates. The game started of in a sluggish manner, but with about 15 minutes left in the game, Alejandra scored two quick goals to lead the Express to victory. It was only after the game that she remarked to assistant coach Mike Walsh, “Hey, I skipped my cousin’s wedding for this sort of like you did for your sister….” Mike and I immediately burst into laughter as we recalled our own experience as players more than ten years prior.

You only have 8 or 9 games to try to achieve a common, TEAM goal. Can your team count on YOU to be in attendance during those 8 or 9 dates barring an actual emergency? Or do you think you should skip the game and go lay on the beach?

What does committment to team mean to YOU?

Balance and body control in soccer is something that is often taken for granted by both players and coaches alike. We often see players rush shots or hit bad passes out of bounds, however, the first things soccer coaches tend to correct (and I have been guilty of this as well), is the technique that was used to actually strike the ball.

What about the remainder of your body before you strike the ball. Is your non-kicking foot in the correct place? how about your head? knee? hands? arms?

There are many activities to work on these types of things, but there are people who specialize in these types of trainings that I highly recommend. Check out this website for fantastic balance and agility training available in Northern Virginia for young soccer players who want to really improve in these areas: http://www.bodydynamicsinc.com/index.html.

I have taken my Under-9 Boys Arlington Attack Blue to Body Dynamics and found the exercises extremely challenging and FUN for the little guys. I also plan on taking my Under-14 Arlington Eagles and Under-15 Arlington Express through these types of trainings prior to the start of the spring soccer season.

I think that part of the reason for my early baldness has been from watching young soccer players that I coach miss what appear to be easy chances to score goals. As a former player, obviously I have missed easy chances to score as well so I can certainly relate to the frustration that a player feels at that time. We have all seen it.

- A player dribbles through three defenders and has an open path to goal, but shoots the ball from twenty yards away directly at the goalkeeper rather than continue to dribble at the goal and calmly passing the ball into the back of the net.

- A player has time to trap and shoot directly in front of the goal, about eight yards away, but instead rushes a shot with one touch and it either goes wide or over the goal.

You get the picture. For U-14 and older players, this is something that they need to pay close attention to on their own but can be assisted with a little guided discovery in practice sessions……..were you really trying to finish by doing what you just did, or did you just take a shot to take a shot? If there was something else that you could have done, show me what it was. Was there something else you could have done to put either yourself or another teammate in a better situation to finish? Explain to me what you think that may have been.

For younger soccer players, the focus on finishing must deal with the technical side of the game. For example, some good questions would be:

1. When you are 1 v. 1 against the goalkeeper, what are some different parts of the foot you can FINISH with. Ok, show me.

2. Which part of the foot do YOU think is easiest to finish with in this situation? Why?

This will get younger players’ thought processes going and hopefully lead to more success in scoring goals in game situations.

Soccer is an emotional sport. We see it all over the Washington D.C area during the youth outdoor seasons and we see it on television at the professional levels. Players get pumped when they have done well and may also be seen laying on the ground in tears after a difficult loss. Obviously, this is never going to change in the game of soccer. However, it is important to keep your emotions in check while playing in a game and/or through the course of a long season in order to play your absolute best.

The idea of keeping an even keel is something that I feel is not stressed enough to youth soccer players. Some people have never even thought about paying attention to it, but it is great to watch soccer teams that are able to maintain it. Soccer is such a free-flowing game, that if you worry about what happened two minutes ago or even ten seconds ago, you are going to be missing what is going on RIGHT NOW. If you pay attention to what is occurring at the moment at all times, your overall game will improve tremendously.

If you score a goal (celebrate of course)…….but then it’s over so move on and keep playing right away. If you have a silly touch out of bounds and feel like crawling into a hole…..don’t worry about it…..it’s over….keep playing right away and try to correct it the next time.

Emotions run high during a soccer season or a soccer game. Keep an even keel on the soccer field, and while playing in the heat of a game, always pay attention to the present……. not the past. When going through the season, always look forward to your next opponent, not backwards at your last one. Your teammates will thank you for it.

We often hear soccer coaches yell from the sideline (myself included), “Keep Possession!” Two teams are playing against one another, so naturally, as a soccer coach or soccer player, you want your team to have the ball right? Of course…..but then what? If we play the soccer ball back to our goalkeeper 90% of the time and he/she is able to connect thirty straight passes between him/herself and the four defenders, is that good possession? Certainly not, and here is why:

Possession is only one (though a quite important one) aspect of defeating an opponent in a soccer game. What if your team kept the soccer ball for almost the entire game and never got a shot on goal? What if your team kept the soccer ball almost the entire game but played horrible team defense and gave up three goals? Was the possession that your team was able to keep good enough to achieve the common team goal? No it was not.

Often times, when players are fed the “we don”t keep possession well enough” speech from soccer coaches, they automatically think that they have to play “keep away” for twenty passes in a row. This could not be further from the truth. Always remember these few basic principles of soccer when thinking about possession:

1. My team is trying to get to the other team’’s goal as fast as possible so that we can score. (trying to penetrate the opponents” defense).

2. If we face any obstacles when we are trying to score (or move the ball forward), we should always be able to bring the ball back, be patient, then keep possession……..and get on the attack again as quickly as possible.

THAT is possession with a purpose. Being able to understand and apply this concept is a key component in soccer teams that are consistently able to defeat their opponents.

All youth players that want to excel and play soccer at a high level should pay close attention to the consistency of their first touch. The first touch is also referred to as a “preparation touch.” The first touch on the ball for a player should comfortably set up the desired second touch, whether it be a shot, pass, dribble, cross, etc.

Several simple exercises that can be done at home and are not so physically demanding can do wonders for a player’s first touch, no matter the age or gender. Simply going outside and tossing a ball five feet above the head and bringing the ball down with different surfaces (shoelaces, thigh, chest, head, etc.) can do wonders for a player’s confidence if they take the time to do it. The progression for this type of activity is to have the player consciously throw the ball higher and higher as they go. This, of course, increases the degree of difficulty.

Once players feel comfortable in bringing the ball straight down out of the air with multiple surfaces of the body, they should try to expand to bringing the ball down AND moving in a direction simultaneously. For example, throw the ball up in the air and then use the outside of your right foot to attack the space to your right. Timing is key, and the foot should make contact with the ball almost at the same time that the ball makes contact with the ground. Having focused eyes that watch the ball throughout its flight in the air is such an important detail that many young players do not pay attention to. This is an abstract concept to some people, but I feel it is of the utmost importance in being a good soccer player. You control your eyes…..let them help you become the master of your first touch.