Tag Archives for " Youth Soccer "

Teaching Turning

Teaching players to turn with the ball is an area that I don't see covered very often by coaches working with players from eight to 12. I'm not sure if it is because the coaches think the topic is difficult to teach young players or because they don't want to take time away from areas

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Rhythm and Soccer

This post comes from our official Soccer Conditioning experts at SoccerFIT Academy. I found it interesting and thought you might too. Rhythm and Soccer: a theoretical coaching approach to effective movement February 17, 2011 By Scott Today’s post is written by John Lytton, a sports performance coach and former pro-soccer player with a facility in

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Brazilian Transition Games

Brazilians learn the game by playing the game.  In many countries training sessions are focused around drills and exercises that isolate techniques and tactics.  Brazilian coaches spend most of their time creating playing environments with small-sided games that put an emphasis on the specific areas of the game but also train the player ‘globally’. One

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2 v 1 Exercises

We all want our players to be able to recognize certain situations and then choose the correct option to take advantage of it. One very effective way of showing players these situations is to set the attacking team up with an advantage and condition the defenders to play in a certain way. This allows the

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Ball or No Ball-THAT is the Question

This thought provoking post about whether or not you always need to have a ball included in every aspect of training is from our friends at Soccer Fit. The folks at Soccer Fit are on the cutting edge of the latest soccer conditioning science so their perspective is worth listening to. Today’s post is by

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Five Goal Game

This is a game that I've used as a warm-up and in the main part of the session. I like it because of how many different things you can coach depending on your focus. As with most small-sided games, the kids really enjoy playing it so they get a lot out of it. Here is

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Can faliure be a good thing

We came across an article recently that points out that we often do our children a disservice by protecting them from distress or difficulties. Allowing our children to fail, and learn from that experience can be the best thing for them. Why allowing failure can raise successful children By Gregory Ramey, Ph.D. 2:29 PM Friday,

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Adding Movement and Awareness to Basic Passing

Basic passing exercises like the one below are great for focusing on the technical aspects of passing the ball but it's easy to get stuck in a rut of doing the same progressions over and over. I was playing with different ways to add movement as well as force the players to think about where

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Circle Drills

There are a number of high level coaches that use a lot of circle drills in their sessions including Barry Gorman (long time coach at Penn State) and David Williams (Manchester United Academy). I've had the opportunity to watch both of them run sessions at our International Coaching Seminar so I've used some of their

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The Day Before a Game

There are times that I'll have a practice on a Thursday when the team has a Friday game. This is a session that comes from our Brazilian Academy Journal that I have used. It provides a relaxed environment where the players can have some fun and express themselves. The small-sided games give the players a

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Options for Soccer in the Winter

The approach of winter in the midwest means that teams are making plans for what they will do once the colder weather arrives. Traditionally the options have been limited; teams played indoor (arena style) soccer and held their practices at the indoor facilities or in school gymnasiums. In the last 5-10 years more options have

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Multi-Theme Practice

During this time of year I like to run a few sessions that incorporate competitive games that test the player’s dribbling, passing and shooting. Making the exercises into competitive games increases the motivation of the players and challenges them to perform the skills under pressure. You can use almost any drill or exercises in this

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'Dots' Warm-Up

I think it’s important to start practices with an activity that will engage the players and get their attention. When players arrive at the practice field they have usually come from a busy day of school. They may have spent some time playing with friends around the neighborhood. Depending on their practice time, they may

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RESEARCH: SOCCER TRAINING DRILLS FOR ENDURANCE TRAINING

This is a post from Scott Moody of the Soccer Fit Academy. I thought you would find it interesting because it follows on from the discussion that was generated by the post where I discussed the preseason running program I used with one of my teams. I was recently forwarded a soccer conditioning research article

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Developing Vision and Awareness

We received an excellent DVD recently and I’ve found the information very useful with my team so I thought others might as well. In my opinion, one of the most under-coached aspects of youth soccer is awareness. We do a good job teaching the techniques of the game as well as the basic tactics of

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Rotating Positions

Do you continue to rotate player through the different positions as they get older? What is 'older'? I have always made sure to give my players experiences in a number of different positions during the season. Sometimes in positions that they weren't well suited to but I wanted them to have a chance to play

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