Perhaps 'cos there's nothing to get?

Aside from a collection of motherhood statements and generalisations.



No shit. :lol:

This is 98% of the current battle.

Clearly my reply was a bit over your head.

Why am I not surprised.

Edited by judy free: 19/10/2012 04:05:57 PM

Judy your replies and "sniping" just make you look a fool. If you can't engage properly you are working against the point you wish to make.

Perhaps 'cos there's nothing to get?

Come on!

I did my Level two in 1985 still have the work book. Its way behind whats on offer inthe AFC C, B and A courses.

You can keep your head in the sand if you want just makes your comments more and more irrelevant.

Aside from a collection of motherhood statements and generalisations.




No shit. :lol:

This is 98% of the current battle.

And yes Judy they (FFA) are trying to fix it, but I think not everyone is getting it (the new methodology as I have been witnessing)

It's not all Black and White

That would be the 10, 15 or 20 years that provided arguably straya's best ever gen of players?

You appear to have little to no idea of player development pre 2005.


Edited by judy free: 18/10/2012 08:29:14 PM

Its an attempt to fix what was happening from the previousi 10-15 years.:roll:

you are right though the sytsem or should i say he personel in the system are not producing #10s the #10s are finding ways around the system.
Do you believe the roar style of play encourages the training of #10's?

But I'm reliably informed that SSGs, SAPs, NCs, TICs, skillaroos, fuckeroos, A, B, C licences, 433, dutch monkeys blah blah were addressing such concerns. Bummer. :lol:

Thus, at the very ages
when we should be expanding the pool of players for development, we are
shrinking it, based upon the faulty premise that we can identify the future stars at
13 years old.

General I hope I have come across in a coherent way. I know I'll get slammed by some about this, but I couldn't care less nowadays.

I look at some of the imports comming to Australia like Flores and now Geronimo at Adelaide and how these No. 10's have taken to and are dominate players here in Australia.

Firstly because we can't produce a number 10 the way we are doing things now and I cannot for the life of me see how we will be producing one in the near future.

Secondly Adelaide can find two from Argentina and they are nowhere near the best that Argentina can produce.

This is our problem and our cream no matter the size is just not upto to that creative level. We are still producing players as the World Cup reports keep saying that are safe, efficient and athletic. But no NO.10's

:lol:

Krones jnr, on the cusp of international stardom.

Robbing your kid of his teenage years. :oops:

Edited by judy free: 18/10/2012 07:03:51 AM

The #10s are out there and starting to make their mark, Just be a little more patient.

General I hope I have come across in a coherent way. I know I'll get slammed by some about this, but I couldn't care less nowadays.

I look at some of the imports comming to Australia like Flores and now Geronimo at Adelaide and how these No. 10's have taken to and are dominate players here in Australia.

Firstly because we can't produce a number 10 the way we are doing things now and I cannot for the life of me see how we will be producing one in the near future.

Secondly Adelaide can find two from Argentina and they are nowhere near the best that Argentina can produce.

This is our problem and our cream no matter the size is just not upto to that creative level. We are still producing players as the World Cup reports keep saying that are safe, efficient and athletic. But no NO.10's

:lol:

General I hope I have come across in a coherent way. I know I'll get slammed by some about this, but I couldn't care less nowadays.

I look at some of the imports comming to Australia like Flores and now Geronimo at Adelaide and how these No. 10's have taken to and are dominate players here in Australia.

Firstly because we can't produce a number 10 the way we are doing things now and I cannot for the life of me see how we will be producing one in the near future.

Secondly Adelaide can find two from Argentina and they are nowhere near the best that Argentina can produce.

This is our problem and our cream no matter the size is just not upto to that creative level. We are still producing players as the World Cup reports keep saying that are safe, efficient and athletic. But no NO.10's

:lol:

I hope that these articles do supply a different way of assesing junior development and appreciate you point of view Dimi.
Where are you from Dimi?

General I hope I have come across in a coherent way. I know I'll get slammed by some about this, but I couldn't care less nowadays.

I look at some of the imports comming to Australia like Flores and now Geronimo at Adelaide and how these No. 10's have taken to and are dominate players here in Australia.

Firstly because we can't produce a number 10 the way we are doing things now and I cannot for the life of me see how we will be producing one in the near future.

Secondly Adelaide can find two from Argentina and they are nowhere near the best that Argentina can produce.

This is our problem and our cream no matter the size is just not upto to that creative level. We are still producing players as the World Cup reports keep saying that are safe, efficient and athletic. But no NO.10's

:lol:

Not going to say anything about this yet Arthur, but there are still plenty of people of this belief that the cream is the same no matter how small the pool...

Interesting concept. In principle the concept is fairly obvious, increasing the player pool and quality of coaches will obviously result in more quality players.

Dimi I think its deeper than that, its not just quantitative but qualitative too. That's what his getting at in regards to Latin American Football. The ones who are succeding internationally, the cream, are comming out of a stronger overall pool. Just look at the best no. 10's in the world and where they are from.


Furthermore, are academies like the AIS actually unsuccessful if they only have a 8% success rate (to quote the value Gary mentions)?If out of 30 players at the AIS, 2 or 3 go on to play for the socceroos is that considered a failure or a success? He suggests its not a success and a waste of resources, but you could argue its a far higher success rate then what occurs outside of the AIS system.

Allens reference to the 8% success rate, is to 18yo who became professionals and thats in Europe. So that still has nothing to do with International Selection.
It would an intersting excerise to actually see what are the success rates of AIS graduates especially over the last 10 to 15 years.
But if the success rate is about producing a world class No.10 then its a clear fail.
Would more success come from ideas you mentioned if the same amount of resources were spent? im not sure, it probably would but its a very hard question to answer.

Given that academy systems like the AIS are currently a mainstay of the footballing landscape and that is unlikely to change any time soon, the question is what makes some elite academies more successful then others and how can we maximise the results from the academies in Australia. How can Barcelona for example produce numerous first team players with a pool of players that not any larger then most other academies.

Interesting comment Dimi and your right on the button with that assesment, it would like turning a super tanker around.
What Barcelona have as an advantage is they have a world wide pool to select their players from, but that doesn't mean we can't adopt more of their methodology or training regime. I would also include clubs like Valencia and Sevilla in that assesment to. But unfortunately we don't have our State or National Directors of Coaching going over there ro spend time learning and recording those methods and reporting to the coaching fraternity back here.

On his other point regarding playing under age players in higher age group, i dont think there is one development tool that will work for all players. Some players will respond better to playing with old players while others wont develop at all and would be better suited to casual games with no consequence and vice versa.

I ahve seen how playing up does work and that is when you U11's, 12's and 13's training together and U14's,15's and 16's training together under one coach providing one consistent training methodology for all six age groups. Like in Barcelona.

Here in Victoria it is done as though it is an answer in itself and thats the problem.

The Paramount Issue up to U14 is Inclusion – Not Exclusion
By Gary R. Allen

http://www.mnyouthsoccer.org/coaches/articles/inclusion.pdf

US Youth Soccer National StaffI recently attended a meeting held by US Soccer for State Directors of Coaching(DOCs). The meeting focused on a discussion of overhauling our approach for youth players aged 6-12. Effectively, US Soccer has now determined that there are three “zones” for youth players: Zone 1 – ages 6-12; Zone 2 – ages 13-18; and Zone 3 – above age 18.
There has been much thought lately given to increasing the efficiency of developing our youth, especially in light of the continuing difficulty our National Teams have playing at the highest levels. The backdrop for this discussion was the advent of the National Academy program for U16s and U18s and proposals to extend it to U14s.

Understanding Development

We have come far in many respects. To date we have focused mainly on procedural issues, such as numbers of games in a day, training to game ratios, substitution rules. We also have focused on improving our players’ training environments and our coaching techniques. Now, the hard part, i.e., getting to the root of what is still holding us back. Although the procedures are important, they go only so far. The real limitation, in my opinion, it is a lack of understanding and implementation of the substantive issues concerning development for ages nine-15.
The advent of a U14 National Team and the proposition to implement a U14 National Academy program is counterproductive to improving the development of players aged nine through fifteen. The underlying rationale is flawed. It posits, erroneously, that we can spot the future elite players at age 13, contrary to all research worldwide concerning athletes at these ages, as well as everything written by development experts. There has been much ado about creating “purposeful” training environments, and having players play in “meaningful” games. The prevailing rationale also assumes, erroneously, that the best way to develop these “elite” players is to surround them with other “elite” players, and separate them from the riffraff. One of the inherent problems, however, is that the environments we create for these “elite” players really are more limiting than expansive because they encourage the very strengths for which we deem them to be elite, and ignore the areas where they are less mature. At these ages, the key is to improve the "environment" for all players and for all aspects of play, not just those who adults think ultimately will be successful at the highest levels. (I won't even go into the well-recognized fallacy of this type of selection, where the success rate for picking even older players who ultimately play at the highest levels is less than ten percent. This is true worldwide, as well as in the MLS.)

Increase the “General Level” of Play, Not Select out “Elite” Players

Producing players who can play at the highest levels means increasing the "general level” of play with the cream of the crop rising above this level. By doing so there will be many more opportunities for many more players, both the early bloomers and the late bloomers, to play, create, solve problems, and experiment. This is where most of us have had it all backwards for so many years. The focus has always been from the top down, rather than the reverse. Since the 1970s, the main focus has been on finding and developing the "elite" player, rather than improving the general level of play. First, there was the State Select Program for the Olympic Sports Festivals in the late1970s and early ‘80s, which evolved into the Olympic Development Program (ODP). Travel or select leagues expanded to include younger and younger ages, in some areasincluding 7 and 8 year olds. What started in ODP for U19s, expanded downward to U16, then to U14 and finally to U13. We saw the development of the Super Y League, US Club Soccer, the Regional Leagues, the advent of the U17 Residency Program, and, today the Academy Program.
Each new program has attempted to select out the "elite players” for enhancedgame environments and training. Strides in development have been made due, in large part, to the coaching education programs of US Soccer and the NSCAA, but, what is ignored is that much of the improvement has been merely the result of increased numbers of youth players. Our National teams can compete fairly consistently regionally, but we still struggle on the world stage. An apt contrast is Brazil, a country that could field three National teams in the World Cup, with a good chance for all three to reach the second round. If we lose three key players on our National team, we are not only in danger of failing miserably at the World Cup, but of not even qualifying. To be sure, Brazil’s elite players are more skilled, but it is the general level of play for all players in Brazil that creates the depth for developing these elite players.
We have focused on stars like Ronaldinho, Messi and Ronaldo, but have turned a blind eye completely to the youth environment of the vast majority of players in Brazil, Argentina and other Latin countries. The environment is one of street soccer and free play, where the players experiment and compete each day, and the general skill level of play is much greater than here or in Great Britain or many parts of Europe. It is in and from these types of environments that the vast majority of skillful South American players have arisen.
It is not possible here to replicate the informal, pick-up neighborhood street soccer as it is played in Brazil, but that does not obviate the validity of its ultimate influence on the level of play of its ultimate stars. Rather than forming National programs that seek to find and develop the players we deem to be “elite’ at too young an age, we should be seeking to find ways to increase the numbers of players and general level of play. We need to create environments for our nine through 13 year olds, and even older, to have the freedom and encouragement to experiment, and to develop tight skills through playing smaller sides.

“Elite” U14 Programs Stifle Development

Why can't we get off of this plateau? I believe it is because we ignore the forest for the trees. European and English professional clubs increasingly have signed more and more foreign Latin players, in efforts to create better and better leagues. Then, they state that they must improve the level of play of the English and European youth players. They ignore the natural environment in which players in Brazil and other Latin countries developed, and instead have created an adult-prescribed regimen for a select few young players. Their solution is that same as ours has been -- to find "elite" players at younger and younger ages and get them into the "right" environments. They and we look at the harsh realities of what it takes to be a "pro", what it takes to play at the highest international levels, and then we try to reverse engineer the environment for the few players we think will have a chance to make it.
In our reverse engineering, we have focused on peripheral issues, but omittedmany of the intangible ingredients that go into making world class players. First, we know that it takes 10 or more years for a player to develop, but we have not fully considered what creates player development. We have taken our adult view of the game, and the lessons our senior players have learned in the international arena, and have tried to recreate the pro environment for our younger players. Our attempts to date have been to create quality structured environments for our "elite players,” where they train "purposefully” and play in "meaningful games.” One of the most glaring problems is that we are basing our definitions of “purposeful’ and “meaningful” on the precocious attributes of players who are immature in many other areas of development. Therefore, our training targets those areas where they alreadyexcel.
Because, most often, the only reason they excel at these ages is a maturity issue, the only way for them to compete in more challenging environments is to rely on those areas where they are more mature. We compound the problem because we label the players we select as "serious players,” as opposed to "recreational players.” This has become a case of circular reasoning, and now we seek to find the “serious” players for travel play at younger and younger ages. The result, though unintended, is that we have created an environment where, indeed, results are paramount because our focus is exclusively on how to become more efficient players.
This is why it is counterproductive to have a U14 National Team and U14 Academy programs. By nature, these programs require selecting “elite” players. This means that the focus for local and regional U10 through U13 programs who want to “succeed” will be to identify and prepare "pre-Academy" players. We already see this on the state level with travel programs that begin at U9 and U10 and State Cup at U12. We now have special training programs and U8 and U7 for "pre-travel players.” Mistakenly, we have proceeded as though development should be something different for the “serious player,” than for the “recreational player,” i.e., there is no interest in developing the “general” level of play. We ignore the fact that no one at these ages before puberty is a “player.” Each player is a 10, 11 or 12 year old, in various stages of mental, physical and social development. What we term “serious play” is predominantly the earlier manifestation of a particular stage of development in certain kids, nothing more. 4Moving the National Academy Program down to the U14 age group will end up being just a glorified version of what we have now with "travel leagues” at these ages. The same limited numbers of coaches will vie for the same small numbers of players, and the result will still be that we narrow the pool of potential players at ages when we need to increase the numbers playing. Essentially, it will be like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

Fitting Players into Our Concept of the Adult Game Rather than Letting Them Find the Game for Themselves

What does this have to do with missing the forest for the trees, and the mistakes being made in Europe and England? We are taking only one aspect of what it takes to be a “high level player,” and injecting it into our youth programs. This is the age-old approach of trying to fit players into the game as played and defined by adults. It ignoresthe fundamental facts of how youth develop, but also ignores the scope of the game itself.
The Europeans’, English, and our approach miss some fundamental building blocks -- understanding how young players learn, and applying those concepts to the freeflowing, problem-solving nature of the game. Why is soccer the most popular sport in the world? It is the only team game that truly allows the culture of the players to come through because it requires the players themselves to solve the problems each game situation presents, individually and collectively. The attributes that make a world class player are not just physical and technical, but also include the ability to create and solve problems in ways no one else has seen before. The environments that the young player experiences in those 10 years of development need to present that player not only with many differing types of problems to solve and guidance for solving them, but also with the freedom to solve them. What we have done by selecting players out is not only define all of the problems to solve and the methods of solving them, but we have limited the numbers and types of environments within which players experience the problems.
The variety and freedom are as important as the “purposeful training” we adults devise. This approach has implications for coaches considering how young players develop. First, players need to be exposed to multiple soccer situations, and many different roles within their own team. It also means that they must be allowed to play with and against many different players, with different strengths and weaknesses, so that at times they are the dominant player on the team, and at others they are not, requiring them to solve different problems in many different ways.
By selecting out "elite players” too young, and seeking to make their environments more "meaningful" from an adult perspective, we have dramatically reduced the variety of environments they experience. We also have reduced the number of roles they play, the types of problems they solve, and the freedom they have to solve those problems.

Consider How Players Develop -- Physically, Mentally and Socially

By selecting out players before they are in their mid-teens, we narrow the pool of players based upon developmental differences that are non-uniform, but also woefully unpredictable. From a physical standpoint, youth, from the ages of 11-15 are going through the most significant changes in their lives, with great disparity in rates of growth, coordination and maturity. By selecting players out at these ages, we are limiting not only those we omit but also those we choose. The physical side includes the development of skill. Just as players need more opportunities to explore different physical ways of solving problems, they need more opportunities in “smaller free play sides” to hone their techniques and experiment withusing these techniques to solve problems. If we doubt that players can develop skill in this way, all we have to do is go to any park in the evening and watch the multitude of young and old Hispanic players playing freely. While they may not have the tactical sophistication, they certainly exhibit the touch and quickness that even many of our best players lack. And they did not develop such skills in adult-designed "purposeful training.”
Second, youth 11 - 15 are moving into the “formal operational stage” of thinking where they are just beginning to think abstractly. By putting them into a constant barrage of "meaningful environments,” we direct their thinking, but retard their breadth and depth of growth in discovering their own ways to solve increasingly complex abstractproblems.
Finally, socially, these ages are when their psyches are most vulnerable as they strive to find their identities. At ages 11-15, these players are going through tremendous physical, mental and social changes, all at different rates form each other. They are experiencing tremendous challenges to their self-esteem. They are beginning to recognize that ability may begin to play a more important role than effort in determining success. The emphasis on selecting players out at these ages unduly focuses on competition and success at the very time when they need inclusive environments that will not brand them as successful or unsuccessful by adults’ arbitrary scales. Doing so stifles their willingness to explore and find success in many different ways, not just the efficient “meaningful” ways adults prescribe, which is exactly what we lack in our highest level players.

Free Play/Non-Result Oriented Play Are “Meaningful” and “Purposeful” Environments
We all have acknowledged the need for free play, but we most often relegate it to only very young players. We misunderstand what it is about free play that causes development. It is the process that is so important: that of playing with and against many different players in environments that only have ramifications for that particular game. It has nothing to do with a competitive spirit. When we all were younger, we played in 6neighborhood sports games. We competed as hard as we could; we strove to make the sides even so it would be fun and challenging. But no matter what the result was on a particular day, the next day brought a new game, new challenges, without the albatross of a season record determining how we would play the next day.
These were not “purposeless” environments. They were not “meaningless” games. It is exactly the wide variety of environments that develop the creative players. It a subtle way, by seeking to put our young players in more "meaningful" environments, we have subtly made results more important than process. And for development, the process is the result.

Increase the General Level of Play for These Ages

Ultimately, “elite” older players have to shift to more defined roles and structured environments. But, by lowering the age for this focus to U14, we are hurting our younger players. Instead of maintaining and developing the numbers of players at age 13 that we have playing at age eight, we are seeking to narrow the focus to find the cream of a very immature crop. We really must have a paradigm shift. At these ages, we must seek to raise the general level of play for all players, not pare away at the numbers, taking the last player standing. The cream will always rise to the top, but how high it rises depends on the crop itself. If the pond is small, it does not take much for a fish to become the biggest one there.
Back to those Hispanic players in the parks. The vast majority of them never became players at a high level. They represent the “general level” of play from their youth. Yet, they exhibit the tight skills and creativity that many of our best players lack. It is this "general level” of play that produced the highest level players from their countries. This is what we must seek to increase, especially at ages 9 - 15 in this country. This is the “meaningful” environment that will produce players of the highest caliber.
To date, much of our focus above the age of nine has been on important procedural issues. Now, we really have to address providing programs within our states that foster the inclusion of more, rather than fewer, players aged 9 - 15, in the better training and playing environments. We also need to focus on using our resources to hire our better coaches to work with more coaches and players, even across club lines, rather than continue to have clubs compete for the same coaches and players. As a part of this shift of focus, on a National scale the focus needs to shift to supporting these environments and coaching education, and away from reaching down into younger ages for a National program to produce higher caliber National Team players. Continuing on the path we have currently laid out will set us back even further by adding another layer of bureaucracy for us to fight to increase the numbers and develop more conducive environments for producing players who are truly creative and play generally at a much higher level than today. Until we really address these issues, the only thing we will ultimately do is move certain Titanic deck chairs for a few to momentarily get more sun.

Youth Soccer Coach Wanted: Only Those with Patience and Perseverance
Need Apply
By Gary R. Allen
http://www.osysa.com/Assets/pdf/wantedarticlefinal.pdf

Virginia Youth Soccer Association Director of Coaching Education
Following are excerpts from an article in The Scientific American by Phillip E.
Ross, dated July 24, 2006, entitled The Expert Mind. The article focused upon
studies of the mental processes of chess grandmasters and clues to how people
become experts in other fields as well. These excerpts can help us address
some important points concerning the development of young soccer players in
America.
"Simon coined a psychological law of his own, the 10-year rule, which
states that it takes approximately a decade of heavy labor to master any
field."
The 10-year rule, or 10,000 hours rule, can be applied as easily to soccer as to
chess. Each soccer game involves myriad of decisions, technical and physical
challenges in an ever-changing environment, among and against other players of
varying abilities, and in different stages of physical exhaustion. More than any
other team sport, the game takes on the characteristics of those playing it, and
requires development in all of the areas above: mental, physical, technical and
social.
Kids develop at different rates in all of these areas. Both the game and the
players themselves are complex. To help them fully develop their potential as
players, we must allow them to unlock in numerous stages the many aspects of
the game. As philosophers and numerous experts studying human development
throughout many generations have discovered, experiencing, doing, is necessary
for perceptual change to occur (Jean Jacques Rousseau—1712-1778), and
learning and growth and development owe their efficiency to slow and inefficient
experiencing that has gone on before (Dr. John Lawther).

It is the "slow and inefficient experiencing" that is captured by the 10-year rule
concept. When one combines this truth with the complexity (continual decisions
in a constantly changing environment) of a soccer game, it becomes apparent
that we must allow and provide players time and opportunity to experiment over a
long period of time, rather than seeking to accelerate their play by focusing
primarily on the outcome of their games.
"Teachers in sports, music and other fields tend to believe that talent
matters and that they know it when they see it. In fact, they appear to be
confusing ability with precocity."

A key comment by Allen and I have seen it over and over in our game here in Victoria.


Sports history is rife with stories of the experts overlooking players who later, by
sheer dint of their own will, became great athletes. In basketball, Michael Jordan
was dropped from his high school basketball team as a sophomore. In soccer,
Johan Cruyff did not draw attention until after his teen years. In fact, across the
board, those trying to predict who will be the future stars have a dismal record.
For example, studies in England have shown that less than eight percent of the
players picked by the experts to play professional soccer, even at age 18, ever
made the grade as day-to-day professional players. With this kind of record, it is
important that we recognize that we must pour our time, resources and efforts
into a much larger pool of players, and not restrict our focus to those we think
have "talent" at the early ages.

Here in lies one of my core beliefs about junior player development that we must focus on the general playing pool and get away from State teams, NTC, Zone Teams and yes the AIS too.

The various stages of technical, mental, physical and social development do not
necessarily coincide within one individual, let alone in a team of individuals.
Thus, while certain physically precocious 12 or 13 year olds might be able to
outrun others and win games because of their speed, it would be a mistake to
attempt to predict future success in the sport based upon this one aspect and
stage of development. Worse, it would be foolish to try to define what successful
soccer players look like, or try to select "elite" players, based upon their ability to
win games because of their precocious development in one or a few areas.
Yet, this is precisely what we do in the United States. Instead of allowing more
players to play in environments that require more varied ways than just speed or
size to solve game-like problems, we tend to select out those players we deem to
be "elite" at too young an age, and then reinforce the use of the precocious
attributes they may possess, by putting them on teams with other players who
also may have one or a few precocious attributes.
What the 10-year rule should teach us is that more, rather than selected fewer,
young players should be exposed to training and playing together. They should
be encouraged through smaller field sizes and smaller numbers per side to
develop more varied ways to solve the problems the game presents, as well as
to develop better technical ability by touching the ball more in game-like
situations.
"Ericsson argues that what matters is not experience per se but "effortful
study," which entails continually tackling challenges that lie just beyond
one's competence. It is interesting to note that time spent playing chess,
even in tournaments, appears to contribute less than such study to a
player's progress; the main training value of such games is to point up
weaknesses for future study."
This confirms the point that it is primarily through training that players learn, not
in match or tournament play. Yet, how many youth coaches, as a "training tool"
across the country, load up their schedules with pre-season and mid-season
tournaments and multiple scrimmages.
Players must be given plenty of opportunities to experiment and fail; to creatively
solve problems in ways that are uniquely suited to their temperaments and
abilities. They can only do this to a very limited extent in games. The
consequences of a failed experiment in a game cause most players to do only
what they think will succeed. If they do experiment and fail, there is a great
likelihood that they will be sitting on the bench and not playing. As coaches and
parents, we must allow time and opportunity for this experimentation to take
place. We cannot be guided by wins and losses that really only provide a
snapshot at a particular moment, and do not constitute purposeful training.
[size=6]Games, thus, are not the ends in themselves for younger players, they mainly
show the weaknesses at that moment, and provide a guide as to what is needed
in training.[/size] It is the training environment that should constitute most of exposure
players have to the game: training and free play, without the specter of winning
or losing affecting a season-long record. Consequently, a much larger
percentage of our time should be spent in the training environment, rather than
loading up the season with extra tournaments and scrimmages.
In today's youth soccer, there is virtually no nonadult organized free play. Kids
don't play pick-up soccer the way many of us played various pickup sports in the
neighborhood growing up. We may not realize it, but these types of games
provide an integral ingredient to the development of top-class athletes. One of
the things most of us forget about the neighborhood games we played growing
up is that they were, indeed, competitive. Competing to win each day was
extremely important, but once today was over, tomorrow was another day, with a
new chance to compete, but without the accumulation of a record and standings
in a division. This is predominantly what the 10-year environment must be.
Opportunities to experiment, to succeed, to fail, to play and to compete.
Another key aspect to the freedom to experiment present in the neighborhood
pickup games that we lack in organized youth soccer today is the challenge of
playing with and against many different levels and types of players. As kids,
when we picked up teams we did not just take the best five and play against the
worst five. It wouldn't have been any fun. Instead, we always tried to create
even teams, and if one team was winning handily, we would have mid-game 4
drafts to create more even teams. This gave each of us the opportunity to play
with and against different players all the time, and we had to adjust, both
individually and collectively, as to how we solved the problems of the game
depending on who was on our team and against whom we were playing.
This ability to adjust and change the rhythm of play is something we lack in
soccer played in the US. This development is all but lost in youth soccer today
because the adults controlling youth soccer currently do exactly the opposite
from kids playing pickup games. We try to put all the "best" players on one team
so that we can win the division, etc. It is the result, not the development, that is
paramount.
One of the key aspects to effective training is to continually provide players with
different types of challenges that are just beyond their grasp. Because of the
varied and free-flowing nature of the game of soccer, doing so in an efficient way
requires constant innovation, but also a huge amount of time on the ball in gamelike situations for the players. It is mainly through inefficient experimentation that
players learn intrinsically and efficiently, and develop the instincts for the game
that are activated once they are engaged in full play.
"They had to work things out for themselves, as did Bach, Mozart and
Beethoven, and if they fall below today's masters in technique, they tower
above them in creative power. The same comparison can be made between
Newton and the typical newly minted Ph.D. in physics."
Of major interest for all soccer fans, and really fans of any sport, is to watch an
incredibly talented player solve problems in ways no one else has tried before.
Highlight reels are loaded with heretofore-unseen feats.
It is interesting to note that some of the greatest players of all time: Pele,
Maradona, Cruyff, Platini, Bobby Charlton, etc. were not especially tall players,
but each of them was electrifying to watch. Yet, because we tend to focus on the
results of games, and selecting future stars out so early, our attention most often
turns not to the player with a spark of something unique, but to the physical
attributes of the precocious "early bloomers." While this may seem to reinforce
collective efficiency at a given time, because of the nature of development, it
ends up placing a premium on being bigger, faster and stronger, and eschewing
the creative methods that less physically precocious athletes use to solve the
problems of the game. In addition to bypassing many future potential stars, this
focus also causes the "selected" players, in these very crucial years of their
development, to learn to be successful by using a very rudimentary, direct style
of play.
Soccer is a game played on a relatively large field. Arguments for years have
centered on trying to make the field and the numbers per side smaller.
Unfortunately, even though strides have been made in these areas, fields 5
generally tend to be too large for younger players. This often results in footraces
to balls driven into spaces that are mostly won by the bigger, stronger and faster
players. Thus, in the formative years when they could be put in smaller
environments that require them to solve problems by developing many different
tools, these players are rewarded for relying almost exclusively on their
precocious attributes. Thus, they learn to be efficient, direct players, but don't
develop the creativity to work out different problems of the game for themselves.
"Motivation appears to be a more important factor than innate ability in the
development of expertise."
This statement is immensely important, because it affects both the type of
players we develop, as well as whom we develop. First, as to the type of players
we develop, by placing such importance on the physically precocious player, we
motivate those players to perpetuate the physical and direct style and method of
play. The premium placed on winning games and having successful seasons
actually diminishes any motivation for players to experiment, or try to solve a
problem through guile or indirect and crafty play, because of the penalty for
failure.
Two crucial aspects of the game at the higher levels are patience and
concentration. Because success based upon physical prowess often results in
promoting direct play, players up through the mid-teen years often have never
developed the patience or the concentration to hold possession of the ball
beyond three or four passes, and certainly do not have the foresight to use the
ball to draw opponents into certain parts of the field so that they can exploit the
spaces they create. This sort of patience, concentration, guile, and using the ball
as the ultimate decoy are not even considerations for most teenaged players.
Most of it is due directly to what has been the reason they have been "selected"
and the continual motivation throughout their earlier years: success through
physical, direct and efficient play
The second issue of motivation is "who" is motivated to continue to play. It is
well-known that in youth sports generally, approximately 70% of all athletes at
age 12 stop playing sports altogether by age 13. Why? Most of it comes back to
intrinsic motivation. Players entering their teen years are like all teenagers, they
are beginning to search for their identities, and they also start to realize that they
do have choices about how to spend their time. Why is there such a rise in
"extreme" sports in this country? Could it be that these sports provide teens with
a way to express themselves and solve problems in unique ways, without the
constant prodding from adults to do things in certain, prescribed ways?
Another fact, of which many are unaware is that almost 75% of physically
precocious athletes only develop into mediocre athletes. By focusing all of our
"special" attention at ages 9-14 primarily on these players, we are missing many
players, who, though they are not precocious, could ultimately be the great 6
athletes when they mature. Yet, currently, we provide them with very little
motivation to continue, focusing most off our attention on those we deem to be
"serious" players.
A 13 year old searching for affirmation as he or she begins to go through
tremendous changes physically, mentally and emotionally, is generally not going
to be motivated to continue in an area where he or she may not be successful
because he or she has not grown enough yet, or may have grown too much too
quickly and is temporarily awkward. Yet, instead of focusing on providing
intrinsic motivation for more and more young teens to play, we adults do just the
opposite, seek to select out those we perceive to be "elite" for success.
"A 1999 study of professional soccer players from several countries
showed that they were much more likely than the general population to
have been born at a time of year that would have dictated their enrollment
in youth soccer leagues at ages older than the average. In their early years,
these children would have enjoyed a substantial advantage in size and
strength when playing soccer with their teammates."
The study referenced above showed that the vast majority of successful players
were born in the first half of the year. Since we place such a premium on
physical prowess between the ages of 9 and 14, this makes sense. It is at these
ages that there is the greatest diversity in development. For a 14 year old, six
months can make a huge difference in physical development. Every parent can
relate to the fact that at these ages they have to constantly buy larger clothes
and shoes. Most kids born in the second half of the calendar year, therefore, are
at a distinct disadvantage having to compete with players born in the first half of
the year.
Our current push to select Olympic Development Program players at younger
ages exacerbates this problem. While we are legitimately searching for ways to
increase our ultimate level of play, our efforts in this instance, hurt us more than
helps us. We have decided that the solution lies in finding and identifying players
at younger and younger ages. There is a Under-14 National Team, for which
players must be chosen from Under-12 Regional teams. Thus, at the very ages
when we should be expanding the pool of players for development, we are
shrinking it, based upon the faulty premise that we can identify the future stars at
13 years old.
The issues for youth soccer development in this country are huge, but not
insurmountable. To be sure, the solutions will require nothing less than a
paradigm shift. All of the modern organization and viewpoints notwithstanding,
the nature of how kids learn has not changed. If we truly want to develop players
who can play on a world level, and a society that enjoys the game as much as
the rest of the world, we have to recognize, embrace and utilize these truths.
Otherwise, we will perpetually be pushing the rock up the same hill, only to have
it roll back down again.

Stifling The Development Of The American Soccer Player
by Gary R. Allen

Virginia Youth Soccer Association
Director of Coaching Education

Sam Snow, the Director of Coaching Education at US Youth Soccer, recently sent an article to the National Youth License Instructional Staff. It chronicled the journey of Cherno Samba, a 19-year-old player in who was considered a “phenom” at age 14, and the saga of his lack of success in the past five years playing with professional clubs. The article, although interesting, misses an important point. While it addresses significant issues concerning adult intervention (or perhaps "interference") in development and the psychological and societal ramifications, it fails to grasp an underlying issue that goes to the heart of the development of soccer players generally.

An obvious comparison can be made to a young "phenom" player in our own country, Freddy Adu. Both Freddy and Samba have attributes that enable them to stand out from their peers, and perhaps from players a few years older. It is easy, however, to overlook the fact that Freddy Adu’s situation is unique. He developed his great skill and promise as a youngster in the streets of , where he played pick up games and had free rein to play. Now, however, when he appears to have grown beyond players his age, he has become the paradigm in the United States for the notion that the way to develop promising young talent is to identify players as early as possible and place them in increasingly tougher and more competitive situations. All of us hope that Freddy will develop into a great player, and, if he does, it will be predominantly because he is unique, with special gifts, and in large part because during his formative years in the game he was allowed to create and experiment, and was not guided merely to achieve results for a team.

Our current method in the to develop better players mistakenly focuses almost exclusively on the extraordinary physical maturity and technical ability of players like Samba and Adu. This thinking ignores perhaps the most crucial element in the total development of a soccer player: the ability to read the game, the flow, and how to anticipate and adjust to individual opponents and teams. These are the intangible traits that make great players rise above others, and that players only develop over a long period of time with experience and experimentation.

We look at the European club models with their apprentice programs and reserve teams as the key to developing players, but we ignore the abysmal rate of the number of players emerging from these programs to be star players. There are some, but it is like gambling -- winning happens very sporadically, yet after an isolated win, people keep coming back again and again hoping for another win, losing and wasting much more than they gain.

The solution is not just to put "promising" young players in environments to play faster, as the mantra nationwide has been for a while. There is much more to the game than just playing faster against older, more mature players. It may even do more harm than good because the adjustments that these young players are required to make are strictly based upon having to compete in certain roles against bigger, stronger, faster and more accomplished players. [size=6]These players are given roles that do not have so much to do with their development as how to use the one or two extraordinary abilities they have while masking their less-developed attributes. What is often overlooked is the fact that the adjustments these players are required to make, and their reading of the game, are heavily influenced by their particular physical, mental and social developmental stages at the time. While it sounds good to have a 14-year-old prodigy playing against pros, the reality is that such a player’s problem-solving abilities remain those of a 14-year old. [/size]

Therefore, the experiences and experimentation such a player uses may end up being just a form of survival and not true opportunities to grow and develop in an environment where failure fosters growth without dire consequences.

In these “high-level” “high-pressure” situations, the player is always competing, and therefore, relying primarily on his or her strengths, just to earn the right to play. The player is not necessarily exposed to the well-rounded variety of situations that he or she might face playing against players with differing strengths and weaknesses. Instead of being able to experiment and really stretch him or herself, there is always present the consequence of failure, which promotes practicality, not flair, in his or her play. Thus, these environments, in many cases, are not really related to the player’s ultimate long-term growth.

Many former run-of-the-mill pros profess that exposing these players to older professional players is good because it toughens the young players up. But these pros don’t realize that they are often projecting their own past experiences upon the situation. Because they were strictly run-of-the-mill players themselves, in many cases, the main attribute that allowed them to survive at the pro level was a "tough" exterior. The true development of a player at the highest levels entails so much more than "toughness," and many players who have shown some promise early on have been "hardened" into unexciting, uninspirational, run-of-the-mill pros often suffering severe injuries early on in their careers.

"Street soccer" and "neighborhood games" are commonly extolled as breeding grounds for superior players. But do we really understand why these environments help create such crafty players? Soccer is a game that constantly changes, the ball is always moving and there are many contests, individual, group and team, all over the field. These myriad situations in each game require players to make adjustments. The real key to understanding what makes a player great is realizing that it lies in the unique adjustments and decisions he or she makes to solve the problems presented in a game.

This is one of the "truths" captured by the National Youth License (NYL). The focus shifts from coaching methodology to consideration of the mental, physical and social capabilities of different aged players and how this affects problem-solving. The whole course concerns providing appropriate sessions to allow players to solve problems for themselves. These “truths” about the mental, physical and social capabilities of players do not magically cease being truths when players reach age 13. They continue to play an integral role in players’ development throughout their playing careers.

Every former player I have spoken with who has taken the NYL raves that it is the best coaching course they have ever taken, mainly because of this focus on “problem-solving.” The NYL touches a vital chord for all former players because each of them knows that the way they learned the game involved much more than just focusing on proper technique or training sessions. The effectiveness of the NYL approach is that it encompasses the very essence of the game of soccer -- a game whose look, feel and style is totally determined by the players playing it. It is all about players learning to solve problems for themselves.

This is why for teenaged players the concept of "guided discovery" is so important. Unlike other sports, we, as coaches, cannot be effective by merely teaching isolated techniques, particular team patterns to advance the ball, or giving each player a specific role to play or specific instructions to follow. We must focus on the long-term and intrinsic development of players, guiding them, but more importantly, allowing them, to think for themselves, to make their own decisions. This will enable them to have the tools to adjust and exploit a vast array of situations, in many cases, all in the same game. This is neither an easy nor a short-term learning process. The fact that we are dealing with pre-teens and teenagers further complicates the matter.

Forming "all-star" teams when players are too young or developing a whole system of "select" or "travel" teams before the teenage years is detrimental to the long-term development of players. In "select team" environments, where we place our kids beginning often at age 8, the players are chosen because of certain "perceived" strengths. If they want to play, then they are required to use the strengths for which they were selected, so that their team can win. Conversely, in the "pickup" game, players are constantly experimenting with different ways to solve problems with and against different players, and though a failed experiment might cost a goal on a particular day, tomorrow is a whole new game. There is no season record (or disappointed adults) hanging over them.

Furthermore, when we use more "competitive" teams as our primary development tool, we never allow players to experience the joy and passion of the game, because all of our efforts are towards winning, promotion, State Cup and ODP. Is it any wonder that we lose so many players as they enter their teen years and begin to realize that they can pursue a number of creative activities and sports of their own choosing, and don’t have to play soccer because mom or dad want them to do so?

Players need time and opportunity to experiment, to enjoy the growth when they finally succeed at something they have been trying to do. We coaches often only see ahead a season or a year, and we are impatient for such growth to occur. We forget how we, as former players, were constantly learning and refining our games, and how often our greatest strides were made, not in structured learning environments, but in situations where we were allowed to experiment.

I remember when I was a freshman in college, playing varsity at a very successful Division 1 school. I was one of two Americans on the team. The rest were Brazilian, El Salvadoran, Israeli, and English. Some of the greatest learning experiences for me as a player that year did not occur in college training sessions. Instead, they occurred on Saturdays when many of us played small-sided pick-up games in a local park with Portuguese fishermen who were in port at the time. It is in this type of environment that players have the opportunity to truly learn how to play and adjust to many types of situations and players. Thinking and the ability to adjust take a long time to develop, with a lot of experimentation, and, yes, failure. But our culture won’t allow the failure required to learn at any age or stage. We must always have immediate success.

After all, we need U12 National Champions, otherwise how will we be able to identify the players of the future -- winning is everything. Yet, in the 30-plus years that we have had organized youth soccer on a mass scale, we have not yet produced even one truly world class player! In the long-term development of a soccer player, winning in any particular season means almost nothing. It is the playing and experimentation that are almost everything.


I have spoken with many world-renowned soccer players and coaches over the 32 years I have been coaching. Basically, they all say we need the same things for to become great at soccer. We need creative players who can play in unique ways, more quickly, and who can score. We recognize the need, and yet beginning at age 8, we force our young players into more rigid and competitive teams where they are recruited to play certain roles so that the "team" can win. We wonder why when we evaluate players at ODP tryouts out of 100 players we see five who have the beginnings of flair, but the 95 other players seem to be cookie-cutter players. When do we allow them to be creative? When do we allow them to try to solve problems in unique ways? When do we allow them to experiment and enjoy the game? When do we allow them the opportunity to search for and learn new solutions, and to do so again and again, thousands of times in thousands of situations? The answer is: we don’t