Allow me to put a simple question to you. To coach youth soccer, what 3 things can a coach do? Before you reply to this question, it is vital to understand that youth soccer means that kids should enjoy themselves. The attention should always be making the exercises exciting so that the players have fun all the time.
Hence, to teach youth soccer, bear in mind the following conventions. These will allow you to guide the kids to become advanced players.
Allow the players to enjoy themselves: As mentioned earlier, youth soccer means to enjoy the game thoroughly. As a coach, design each of the sessions ahead of time. To illustrate, engage the kids in warm-up exercises before making a move to the daily drills. After that, get to the advanced exercises such as dribbling, passing, trapping etc.
Also, allow the kids to be creative in their approach. Encourage them to try new things and even of they are doing something wrongly, do not interrupt them. Have a word with them after the session. The support of the parents is also extremely crucial in achieving the fun objective.
To coach youth soccer, it is important since the kids will spend a considerable time with their parents off the field. Seek the parent’s help in keeping a check on kid’s diet, inspiring the kids, and achieving regularity.
Condition yourself to the age level: Teaching soccer to the young players is generally between the age of 7 and 14. At this stage, it is difficult to come up with drills that engage their attention. So, research a lot over what games you would like them to play. And, ensure that you keep the age level of the players in mind while communicating with them and remain very casual in your conversation.
It is always a great trick to divide them into teams and also give them individual names. This pumps in a sense of belongingness. It is advised not to conduct a lot of trials too. The idea of a well-balanced session is to have both tried as well as new activities in it.
Write the exercises: It always pays to write the exercises on paper along with the results that you are expecting from them. It aids in providing a direction to the team effort. A written document is always useful in determining the objectives of the team. When you have to revisit your plan, it is easy to do so when it is in a written form.
And then, it is super-easy to measure your goals. It is perfectly usual for a few things to go wrong and in that case, you can always get back to the original plan.
It can be safely said that youth soccer is an enjoyable and ever changing job. With this information at your disposal, you will without doubt be able to do full justice to your job.
Put this to test right away! These tips on coach youth soccer are guaranteed to bring you marvelous results. If you would like access to a mass of resources on youth soccer, join our youth soccer coaching community.
Andre Botelho is the author of “The Expert Youth Soccer Coaching Guide” and he’s a recognized expert in the subject of youth soccer coaching. Learn how to explode your players’ skills and make coaching sessions fun in less than 29 days! Download your free pdf guide at: Soccer Coaching Drills.