Tag Archives for " Over-Coaching "

0 Developing Soccer Intelligence

Soccer is a 'Player Centered' game. The players make the decisions as the game is played. Unlike our traditional American sports of football, baseball and basketball. In those sports the players rely heavily on the coaches for direction and decision making. The coaches call the play, give the sign for a certain pitch or run an in-bounds play that the team has worked on at practice.

By contrast, soccer is a free flowing, constantly changing game where the players have to decide what to do based on where they are, where their team mates are and where the opponents are at any given moment. There are no time outs and few stoppages that allow the coach to directly effect the play. The players must have the ability to

1 "Silent" Coaching Weekend

A recent email from a local club renewed an ongoing discussion in our community about over-coaching. The email discussed the upcoming, "Silent" Coaching Weekend. Here' the email that the Director of Coaching sent to coaches and parents in the club:

"Silent" Coaching Weekend this spring is May 11 and 12. This is our second weekend after a successful effort in the Fall.

 The goals we had for the Fall were to empower the players to make decisions for themselves without being micro-managed by the coaches (and parents) for every decision throughout the game. We want to continue that theme and provide another weekend to give the game to players.

Our expectations for coaches are that they will