Shomit Mukherjee’s Soccer Blog

“A champion is someone who does not settle for that day’s practice, that day’s competition, that day’s performance. They don’t live in the past. You can’t step out onto the field and expect anyone to roll over because of what you did a year before. Champions think about that everyday. You need to stay on the edge of your game. You need to get better every year. You need to leave them in the dust and leave no question of who is the best. That’s what a champion is, that person who perseveres and doesn’t ever get satisfied with what they have done in the past.”
– Brianna Scurry, 1996 Olympic Gold Medalist

“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 want to wish all players of my U-15G Arlington Express the very best of luck in their high school tryouts this week. The way that all of you play the game speaks for itself. Through the ups and downs of tryouts, keep an even keel and do your very best at all times. Please know that you have my support and I personally think that any high school in Arlington would be lucky to have any of you. Good Luck!

I encourage all players who strive to play at high levels to practice yoga techniques when weather makes it difficult to train outdoors. Doing a few of the exercises shown on this link can help a soccer player in a variety of ways, both mentally and physically:

http://www.powerofyoga.com/yoga-postures.htm

The idea with these positions is to hold them while calmly counting to fifteen. It is important to take deep easy breaths while doing this. Players often feel energized after completing these 12 positions on a daily basis. I encourage parents to take a few minutes a day and do this with the players. It should make for some good laughs and some good exercise as well.

Image details: Sampdoria V Inter Milan - Serie A served by picapp.com

One aspect of a youth soccer player’’s development that is often neglected is defensive competency in the individual player. Individual defensive techniques should certainly be incorporated with the overall tactical ideas of the team. When a player consistently has sound defensive technique and is able to incorporate that into the team’’s tactical ideas, the player will become more well rounded as time progresses.

Without expanding too much on team tactics for obvious reasons, the basic principles of solid individual defensive play are: Delay, Deny, Destroy, and Develop.

Delay: When presented in a one-on-one defensive situation, it is important for the player to stay on their toes (not on their heels) and have great balance (not falling over backwards, foward, left or right). Another key in this aspect of defending is a player’’s eye-control. The player must have eyes locked on the ball (not the waist, head, feet, or chest, of the opponent). Proper delaying technique allows time for teammates to make recovery runs and get in the correct positions.

Deny: After delaying the opponent in a one-on-one situation, players should become confident in denying penetration to opposing dribblers. . This requires the individual players to work on their overall foot speed while still maintaining good control of their eyes in seeing the ball. Flexibility in the hips is quite important when having to defend an opponent who is attempting to dribble. Players must learn to adjust quickly and avoid “diving in” or “stabbing” at the ball.

Destroy: After effectively delaying and denying, the next step to is to destroy the other team’’s possession as quickly as possible and regaining possession for your own team. It could be a direct result of denying dribble penetration or it could be because of “covering” defenders intercepting passes. These defenders were able to recover because of the delaying and denying of other teammates, which in turn allowed them to destroy the opponent’’s attack.

Develop: After destroying the opponents” attack, a team must now work on the fundamental principles of possession. With a large number of players who are very sound in one-on-one defensive situations, a youth soccer team’’s chances of group success are greatly increased. I view this as an overall positive quality for individual youth soccer players to acquire as they grow older. It takes some hard work and attention to detail, but teammates should expect each other to be VERY good in one-on-one defensive situations in order to achieve team success.’, ‘Four “D’’s” for good defensive principles in youth soccer: DELAY, DENY, DESTROY, DEVELOP

This past weekend was such a great soccer experience for me that I thought I would share. On Friday February 1st, I was able to make it to the opening night of the VYSA Workshop in Richmond. It was great to see so many great coaches from around the state all in one place. There were a lot of people there whom I have the utmost respect for in Virginia youth soccer. I wanted to stay for Saturday’s events, but I had standing obligations to my two girls’ travel teams.

The highlight of Friday night was Liverpool Youth Director John Owens presentation about the systems and ideas of the prestigious English club’s youth development system. He mentioned that he took great pride in the belief that every player that comes through their youth system will look back on their time as a player in the Liverpool system as a positive experience. I could tell that he felt very fulfilled by that, which is great to see from a person who is a leader in one of the world’s most famous clubs.

Youth soccer players who are denied vision training during their younger years will have a harder time playing in a competitive environment as they get older. Players of all ages are certainly more comfortable in controlling a soccer ball when they are able to look at it. One of the most difficult challenges in the game of soccer is to be able to control the ball, look up, AND identify/process WHAT you are seeing.

So how do you train this skill with very young soccer players? Simply saying “look up”, which all of us coaches do, is not quite good enough.

Players have to be able to look up and identify what they see while still being able to manipulate/control the ball at their feet. Simple obstacle course dribbling activities in which the players have to look up and identify different objects can do wonders for a youth soccer player. **(Two different colored cones can work for this. Keep one in each hand behind your back, then raise it up and have the player call out the color. If you want to get advanced, have FOUR different colors).

If cones are not available at home, simply have the young player dribble around objects in the yard at home and identify cars crossing in the distance, or colors of birds in the air.

Be creative with it, but emphasize vision…..and make it fun. You need to be able to see the game to play the game. Fun ways to improve field vision for U9 soccer players

I am disappointed to say that I may not be able to attend this year’s workshop in Richmond, but wanted to pass along to you the link to the workshop and also a link to the VYSA touchline, the youth soccer newsletter for the state. I hope all of you can read about some of it.

http://www.vysa.com/home/207632.html

VYSA

Youth soccer players need to make a conscious effort to understand their surroundings on a soccer field as they continue playing. Coaches should reinforce the concept of time and space on the practice field on an almost daily basis at all ages of youth soccer. There are several characteristics to look for in individual players who have a difficult time identifying how much time and space is available to them. It is up to the soccer coach to identify the mistake to the player and the player has to take part of the job by trying to correct the mistake the next time he/she is presented with a similar situation. All young players reading this should try to avoid the following mistakes that are often made when incorrectly identifying how much time and space you actually have:

1. The “hot potato” play: A team has just combined one, two, and three passes and the fourth pass comes to an open player…..the player has a lot of time and space but is unaware of it and plays the ball “one touch” and it becomes a turnover.

What’s the better play? Since the player had time and space, there was likely no need to play the ball one-touch. He/she should have probably taken a touch, looked up, and evaluated what else there was to do with the time and space that was available (another pass, shot, etc). If for some reason the player feels that they SHOULD HAVE played the ball one-touch with all of the time and space that they had, you can emphasize that their technique in striking the ball was rushed and may have caused the turnover. Situations are rare when a player should play a ball with one touch if they have plenty of time and space.

2. Playing out of pressure in TIGHT spaces requires LESS touches: Coaches and players alike get frustrated by it sometimes but it is important to keep an even keel when it happens. A player has a few turnovers where it seems as though they are dribbling too much. The idea to take players on with the dribble is great and should be encouraged. However, it is important to know WHEN AND WHERE to do it. If a player is surrounded by multiple defenders, it is often wise to pass the ball out of the pressure quickly (i.e, with less touches) to find an area of the field that is not occupied by multiple defenders.

The moral of the story is: Be aware of your surroundings on the soccer field. What’s the fastest and easiest way to get better at that? Use your eyes to help identify ALL of the spaces around you ALL of the time. Do you have space in front of you? behind? to the left? to the right?

The spaces around you are changing every second. Can you see how it is changing?

For U9 players, space may still be a bit of an abstract concept but it is great to plant the ideas of “time and space“ when having conversations with the young soccer players. For older players, it is important to not only identify the time and space that surrounds you, but to also take advantage of it and use it the best way that you can on a regular basis. Players will watch their overall game improve tremendously as they continue to get better at seeing the time and space that is available to them.

The U-15G Arlington Express and the U-14G Arlington Eagles are a combined 11-0-1 after twelve total games in the 2008 FairfaxSportsplex Indoor Session II.