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Message: [QUOTE="memcorsu, post: 588813, member: 452"] I played in HS and college. I have coached AYSOl, girls and boys HS, and middle school this year at my school. At that age and at this early part of the season, I would focus on fundamentals, fundamentals, fundamentals, training, training, training. The first thing I would focus on is teaching the basics trapping, passing, rules. I would also have lots of conditioning. If a player is out of shape their ability to sustain the basics, trapping/passing, will be reduced greatly through the game (think of players shooting FT's after playing for 10 minutes if they are out of shape it greatly reduces the percent that they will make a FT). Start the season with a lot of passing, trapping, and carrying the ball. First start with no defensive player and then increase the size of the drill and the amount of defensive players in the drill. You will notice what abilities each players have and can begin to hash out who should play what position. After a week or so, you should start focusing on small games and start teaching positioning. It is soooooooo important for the player to pass ON THE GROUND and make traps in front of them without a bounce up. The most important thing in soccer, once players can pass, trap, carry the ball with confidence, is to teach them to move to space, talk, and play triangles. Start watching how the European teams play. The biggest flaw in US soccer is that we teach our players to "run and gun" kick the ball and chase it. It was a big issue I had in playing here. My father played in Germany and I was taught to play to space and "build" your advance towards the goal. You knock around and let your players move from the defense side of the ball to the offense side of the ball. Americans instead like to try and kick and run thus lack the extra players to have mismatches. Also, if the players learn to move and pass triangles, you run the other team to death with your team playing at a slower smoother pace. Instead of sprinting the whole time, you save that for runs through. If you notice an American soccer field it is worn out pretty much right down the middle and all the kids end up playing on one side. In contrast, European fields are worn out in an H pattern. Pull the ball to the wings play, through the middle and either back out the side or switching fields. It is important to use the WHOLE field and teach the kids it is okay to pass/carry sideways back, forward as long as it is into space. The most important thing is to have the players take as many touches as possible. Like anything, soccer is muscle memory. The more you play the better you get. I used to spend hours just kicking a ball against a wall. First I learned how to give a crisp pass and then have a crisp trap. Next, I learned how to give one touch passes (pass that is given when a ball is received and then played back without a trap). Finally, I learned how to volley, control balls coming to me with pace in the air. Soccer is a game of angles. Teach them to see those angles and have a team that is well conditioned and you will go a long way. At this age it is important to really drill the fundamentals. It might not be evident at first, but, by the end of the season, it will pay back in bucket fulls. Hope this helps. If you need more, PM me. MEM PS I crossed trained playing all sports. My football coaches loved me because of the footwork I had gained from playing soccer. I learned how to control my body which also helped in bball and Lax and the training made me one of the top 400 m sprinters in TN my senior year. Although, as a kid, I was always training on my own. If you want to raise to greatness you have to have the heart, plus some God given tallent, and the desire to put in the blood sweet and tears. Very few of us are born with "it" but many of us have the potential to raise to a high level. [/QUOTE]

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