Posts Tagged ‘coaching youth soccer’

Coaching High School Soccer: 7 Things You Must Know

Thursday, July 22nd, 2010

In Coaching high school soccer, it’s a fact that similar to confidence; self-control too is a choice players need to make. In soccer coaching, it’s the relation between emotions and thoughts that concludes the self control strategies. We all know that our state of mind influences our emotions, which in turn strengthens our performance.

With a view to help the players in learning the skill and discipline of self-control, there is a 12 step strategy which I shall discuss with you. But make sure that your player’s only take these steps when they are sure of its value to them.

Also, players must be ready to take full accountability for their actions. The 12 step strategy is explained in the following paragraphs.

1. Awareness: Assist the players in finding out their weaknesses in coaching youth soccer. Allow them to investigate when, where and how loss of control happened on field in their past.

2. Understanding: Help the players acknowledge the feeling that changed their thinking and caused them to lose their emotional steadiness.

Coaching high school soccer

3. Differences: Let the players recall situations in the past when they did and did not lost control. And then they should determine the difference in their emotions, attitudes, and behavior.

4. Problem: When it comes to coaching high school soccer, try to point out the real problem. For example: A players may be feeling responsible of letting the entire team down because of his actions.

5. Belief: Help the players raise their own expectations including self-control as one of the character. Persuade them that they can change.

6. Reinforcement: A change in behavior is promoted by reinforcement. Therefore, you must not forget your duty as a coach to recognize and honor the improvements of players so that they stick to these.

7. Goals: To improve the skills of the players, you must start with several small goals. Guide the players in understanding the correlation between way of thinking, thought process, and actions.

8. Techniques: Set up multiple performance based methods to boost the confidence level. For example: If a certain situation happens, this is the course that players must follow.

9. Plan: In football coaching, help the players in learning an organized and efficient way to pursue their goals.

10. Progress: Tell them to be patient. Let them know that improvement always comes in a series of ups and downs.

11. Setbacks: Let the players understand that setbacks are there to stay. So, the better is to use these to learn new ways to tackle these.

12. Remembrance: Finally another important point is making the players understand the importance of the reason for they are trying to change. They should always be clear about what are they doing and why. How important the change is for their future?

For a soccer player to achieve a perfect performance state, the player must be trained for relaxed swiftness. In other words, the stress-free efficient performance.

Make no mistake about it. You must include relaxation techniques in coaching high school soccer and train the players on how to control the thought process so that they can keep themselves stress-free.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Andre Botelho is a recognized authority in youth soccer coaching and has already helped thousands of youth coaches to dramatically improve their coaching skills. Learn how to explode your players’ skills and make training fun by downloading your free ebook at: Soccer Coaching

A Guide To Coaching High School Soccer

Saturday, July 3rd, 2010

I don’t know if you know this but communication is the most important element to succeed in Coaching high school soccer. The term coaching signifies the art of communication. It explains what you want of people in such a way that allows them to perform it.

Speaking of soccer coaching, almost all the coaches are the former players who decide to take on as coaches. Then also they have to face a number of issues while coaching young players. The reason why many of these issues show up is the coach’s inability to communicate. You must recognize that there are certain issues related to communication that need special attention if your job is to be made easier.

Let me explain them to you one at a time.

Emotions of the coaches take over their minds while they are watching their kids play on field. Instead of acting as analytical observers, they become more of spectators. As such they are not able to see the key points that could make all the difference in their team’s performance. Here, they miss out on the important part of having a professional conversation aimed at getting a win.

Even though the coaches are well versed with the technicalities of the game, they are not trained specifically on communication. For example; in soccer coaching, many coaches are not aware of the utility of a flip chart or a video. When the coach finds it difficult to communicate his messages clearly, it brings monotony to the game even if he has a complete knowledge of the game.

Soccer Coaching

This occupies greater importance in coaching high school soccer as the players are young but also know the various facets of the game. They have been executing soccer drills for a long time at different levels. One effective method is to continuously vary the format of training in order to avoid the repetition of boring messages.

It’s a fact that sometimes the coaches completely forget that it is people who perform in the practice sessions. Only with a view to execute the training program well, coaches tend to ignore every other aspect of it. An example of ineffective communication by a coach is when he fails to use a player’s name while giving instructions which produces uncertainty.

In football coaching, there are some points that need special attention and they are as follows:

• All messages from the coach are important for players. So ensure that they are understood completely and correctly.

• Your messages should have a positive impact on the players to put their best foot forward. Challenge them to be better rather than punishing them for being poor.

• Spend equal time with all players. Studies indicate that coaches spend relatively more time with star players in team (up to seven times more!).

• Be proactive in communicating the problem the moment you see it coming.

• Add force to the player’s confidence by harmonizing criticism with praise. When it comes to coaching high school soccer, tilt the balance slightly more towards praise.

Believe me. Once you start to apply this in your training programs, the benefits will far exceed your expectations.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Andre Botelho is a recognized expert in youth soccer coaching. He influences well over 35,000 youth coaches each year with his unique coaching philosophy, and makes it really easy to explode your players’ skills and make training more fun in record time. To download your free youth soccer coaching guide, visit: http://www.soccerdrillstips.com

Coaching High School Soccer: Secrets Revealed

Sunday, May 16th, 2010

In Coaching high school soccer, the first and the foremost quality that the players need to have or develop is confidence if they wish to become complete players. You tend to spot the player’s weakness in terms of less confidence to cope with a situation whenever you use the term “pressure” in the game. This is because it is only with confidence that we expect success.

Confidence again is a matter of choice and only a player can make this choice. When coaching youth soccer, illustrate this point by telling them the behaviors of two parrots sitting on either shoulder.

One of them is the positive parrot, always urging the player to face up to the challenge saying “You can do it.” The second one is a negative parrot that is always cautioning the player “You can’t do this.” That’s why it the player who has to make a choice between which parrot to follow.

Once the choice has been made, teach them to take responsibility for their actions. This choice may have to made every single day. Build confidence in the players by emphasizing their involvement in past successes and ready successful players to make a strong team.

Soccer Coaching Drills

In soccer coaching, players should be made to know that blaming someone or something is a signal of insecurity. As a matter of fact, players should be trained on taking every setback as a lesson to become even more confident and not to feel discouraged.

Also, in coaching high school soccer, the players should learn by heart the phrase “I’ll get the next one” to keep them going whenever they lose any opportunity.
This instantly ensures that the distress of the miss has not affected the confidence for the next strike.

Accurate and quick judgments regarding a player’s caliber and talent is a key to manage a successful team. Judging mental readiness is often a bit tougher challenge than judging physical readiness in football coaching.

Understandable and apparent messages are required to make such judgments possible. To check player’s capability to thrive in the game, it is necessary to browse their verbal and non verbal messages.

Success and confidence share a parent- child relationship. When you are completely satisfied with your work that you have done and when you are ready to face a pressure – cooker scenario which is anytime possible, you achieve success in soccer. The phrase “If you are not preparing to win, you are preparing to fail”, is used over and over again to trigger off the players.

Experience is a building block of confidence. The players must be accustomed to their doubts, mistakes, defeats and condemnation so as to establish the experience they need. It is always felt that he or she has the knowledge, has practiced it before and knows what to do next.

Know this. Building of confidence is an everyday task in coaching high school soccer, so players ought to reflect on positive and main steps for their realization.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Andre Botelho is known online as “The Expert Youth Soccer Coach” and his free ebooks and reports have been downloaded more than 100,000 times. Learn how to skyrocket your players’ skills and make training fun in record time. Download your free ebook at: Soccer Practice