The Game Within the Child

 I picked up this game from a book decades ago and I play it every season with any age group from U8 on up. Depending on the level of your team you can use it as one way to comprehensively assess the individual abilities of your players.  Anson Dorrance uses the 1 v 1 game it as a component of his "competitive cauldron." Players played a 1 v 1 tournament against all the other players on the team and eventually crowned a champion. His philosophy is rooted in the idea that the best team wins a majority of the 1 v 1 duels in a game.  At our level, players need to gain confidence in dribbling past a defender or winning the ball from an attacker without kicking the ball away. The best way to do that is put them in repeated 1 v 1 situations after practicing some of the skills needed to be successful in attacking (controlling the ball, setting up a move, making a move and then accelerating away) or defending (close down the dribbler, don't dive in, choose when to try and win the...

 When I took my National Youth License back in 1999, one of the big revelations I had was the concept of 100% participation. As a coach, I was comfortable having players wait their turn to participate in an activity. What I learned was that waiting reduces opportunity and breeds misbehavior. Players who are not participating in an activity are losing opportunities to learn and they are far more likely to engage in misbehaviors that distract others or get themselves into trouble. We learned the motto "no lines, no laps, no lectures." While each of these deserves it's own essay, this essay is focused on one area of coaching practice that I have always found particularly disappointing, the dribbling through cones activity.  It is a staple of practices throughout the U.S. and it features rows of beautifully spaced cones and players waiting in line to dribble around the cones and then back. It has so many features that I find disdainful, but I do have to acknowledge that it do...

 Picture a beautiful spring evening, sunny and not too warm. A great game is being played between two evenly matched U12 teams. While this is a game between two recreational teams, many of the players from both teams would be comfortably playing at the academy level. The game is close throughout and late in the second half one team breaks through and scores the only goal. As the director of this program, this is really the best that I can ask for in terms of player development and having an environment where players are challenged to do their best and grow from the experience.  Unfortunately, because of scheduling issues brought on by spring weather and a chronic lack of referees in youth soccer, I am also refereeing this game. In my job description, this falls under "other duties."  Each season, I end up refereeing a few games and usually it is not a problem. My coaches and parents generally understand how they are supposed to behave and even if they don't normally act t...