Who said Australia players can’t have individual skill.
Check this out.

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=RlAuHuA1qDo

Bit of a stretch mate. He your son or something? Ive seen better touch with kids half his age. I doubt hes the next fernando torres but at least it looks like hes having fun. :lol: You could probably find a better representative of a young kid with skill. Then again you wouldnt be showcasing your son would you?

Edited by mk0825: 11/11/2008 08:42:45 AM

I quite like the way you included the errors as well.

Nice - but notice that none of the world's great freestyle footballers are professional players... Almost all of them bombed out at youth level once it became apparent that although they could control the ball beautifully, they suffered badly when it came to picking out team-mates in match conditions, running for 90 minutes and reading the opposition's game... Just make sure he doesn't spend too much time working on those showboating skills, and spends plenty of time playing games with a high quality of team-mate/opposition.

Edited by Benjamin: 12/11/2008 12:10:02 AM

Quite true Ben.
I's still scarred by my experience at a 12 year old. I could already boot a goal kick over half way, I was taking all dead ball kicks for my club team and I stood a full head taller than other kids my age, but I was dropped from our local rep team because I couldn't juggle the ball 50 times.
I'm not saying I would have been a Socceroo, but it still makes me mad!

LOL. Sounds like me. But I could do the 50 juggles. :lol: I prefer trials where players are selected after playing practice matches.

Can he pick out a pass or does he take on everyone? How does he read the play on the field? Does he cope with bigger players? Bit of juggling and a double step-over doesn't make you a superstar, just ask Leandro Love.

That kind of thing makes me mad. Juggling is an excellent indicator of a player's ball control and touch - but it should never be the be-all-end-all of any team selection.

Check out youtube for "Jeremy Lynch" - one of the best freestyle footballers in the world... But released from Arsenal's academy for exactly the reasons mentioned previously (poor engine, lack of 'vision', etc).

That guy is a fucking gun. Freestyling is a different sport.

is he the guy from x factor

X-Factor, Britains Got Talent, or some similar trash, yep.
There's some fantastic stuff of him on youtube - really outrageous skills...

But none as outrageous as REMI GAILLARD. Check him out on youtube. If you haven't seen it before, and if you have any sense of mischief, you'll wet yourself laughing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdAOZg12tOE

Thanks for your thoughts but please watch this and tell me your thoughts on wenger’s opinion on youth development.
Then tell me how you would develop a player from 9 to 14.
Please don’t confuse a team with a player.
I am only interested in developing players 9 to 14 not set pieces or teams or set plays.
Only individual innovative technically superior players who can control play and take on all opposition.
My hope is at age 14 to hand over technically superior players to tactically superior coaches.

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=hauzLRm3NaI

Make sure the players have a ball attached to their foot 24/7. Juggle, freestyle, shoot, pass against walls, whatever just get as many touches per day as humanly possible. They can do this themself. If they need to be taught how to love the game THIS much they wont have ambitions to be the footballing machine you are aiming to make.

Training a player individually and then introducing them to a team set up after the age of 14 is the stupid. Get them in a team ASAP. As long as theyre playing "football" and not "hackball" it will be a success.

I like the idea of futsal only, or SSG, indoor and outdoor up until the age of about 12. They have to be involved in a team environment and 5-a-side is better than 11-a-side IMO. A young kid could be daunted by being on the field with 21 other kids. How are they supposed to track the movements of 21 other players whilst focussing on their own game? In a 5-a-side game they still have to learn where to position themselves and the movements of their team-mates and opposition players but its on a much smaller scale. Easier for them to get their heads round. Plus they get more touches and more time on the ball. They will also learn to value possession and that keeping the ball on the floor works best.

A player cannot learn where to position themselves and the positioning of other players through individual training. The 10yo kid who recognises there's a player up his arse, two more fast approaching, and his only option is a first time ball back to defensive mid, will get further than the 10yo kid who can catch the ball on the back of his neck and juggling 500 times.

You should be aiming to hand over technically AND tactically superior players to tactically superior coaches. A technically gifted player alone is only half cooked. If that!

At Manchester United, up to the age of about 14 all they teach is how to control a ball and beat a man. That's pretty much it. The belief being that if you can receive a ball and evade trouble, you are half way to being a good player.

Small sided games on small pitches. Lots of five-a-side. Lots of futsal. Emphasis on skills coaching.

The most hated element of training is usually that pre-session warm up lap(s) of the pitch. This can be made far more useful through the distribution of balls and the addition of a few simple skills during the run.

At Ajax and Bayern Munich, they have a policy that the trainees should always have a ball with them.

As a curious aside, Middlesbrough had a policy a few years ago of giving each trainee a ball with his name on it. If said trainee couldn't locate that ball at any time, within 20 seconds of it being requested, he had to down 20 push-ups. The idea being that if he's in control of the ball, it should never be lost. Even if they are doing 30 yard passing drills - he should always know where HIS ball is.

Totally agree with man u’s approach.
The children I coach are part of a team. They do a lot of one on one and they love it. When they play we have five forwards two are dedicated wingers so that they develop as wingers. We play with three defenders; two of them would make great midfield players but needed to learn to hold the ball under pressure. We tried to play out from the back with the keeper only throwing out the ball but a lack of individual skill made it impossible. The only instruction I gave where have fun keep control and stay calm. The thing they hated the most was juggling I would bribe them with chocolate but the best we could achieve was 16. The problem is the culture of football here is still kick and rush. Players with individual skill are not encouraged in fact the opposite occurs.
Hence my reason for posting the video. If children, coaches and selectors here could see that by the responses people from outside this area believed that these skills where important and necessary the culture might begin to change. The sad part is for many children who if encouraged may have developed individual skill are too old to start now. The biggest crime however is that some of those that did have left the game or will leave the game altogether.

First line - Mickey Gray, a mate of mine from back home... The lad couldn't do more than a 20 keepy-ups despite having had 4 years at Man Utd's academy and 2 years as a youth trainee at Sunderland (he was dropped by Man Utd 'cos they had this kid called Giggs coming through in his position)... Yet over the space of 3 or 4 years in his early 20s he developed some excellent juggling ability. He's played close to 200 EPL games, another 200 CCC games, he's played ECL, and he's played for England. It's never too late to learn.

Second line - that's criminal. No one should ever leave the game!

I trained with the coach of the national indoor soccer squad once and the skills sessions there were awesome I find I have awesome technique in a backyard game and such but I never translate it to a real game because I am a defender but if I play in the backyard I play up front. Anyway we did some great training focusing on passing which i think is my best skill that and general kicking accuracy and he made us kick the ball along the halfway line for about half an hour ecah time the ball was more than hgalf off the line we ran a half length and did push ups then come back. Probably the best training we did was where we had to pass the ball through some cones to him run onto the next marker, recieve a pass back and then lob it to him, run on jump a hurdle and as soon as we landed he had lobbed the ball back we had to controll it on our chest and were allowed to take two steps only before we shot. Even though i play as our teams sole defender I am also the one who sets up alot of our attacks with passing and crossing and the like and a few of my mates were with me at the training session and it helped them do what i do which allows me to focus on staying back alot more now.
I played a backyard game in a family friends new shearing shed a few days ago and I had been out of the game for a while it was so much fun and I ran my self into a heart attack playing as my teams sole player while my dad kept against a couple of my mates. Our league closed down so we were the last winner of the under 16 league ever, and we have been searching everywhere for a new comp that we like but have not yet found it

Who did he play fo thats awesome

Academy at Man Utd, then 10 years at Sunderland, Glasgow Celtic on loan, free transfer to Blackburn, loan to Leeds, free transfer to Wolves.

He's 3 or 4 years younger than me, he was 'that kid' who always played football with the older kids - we all tried to kick seven bells out of him - but he was always too fast and too tricky.

cool found this on him
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Gray

Says on wikipedia that he had arun in with rooney at a restaurant

Yes, allegedly asked if he could 'have a go' on Rooney's girlfriend/wife. Sounds like the kind of thing Mickey would do after a few drinks.

Rooney apparently put him on the floor with one punch. Also sounds like the kind of thing Mickey would do - he's not the hardest lad in the world.

Lovely lad, but does tend to act up a bit after a few drinks.

lol sounds like a good bloke. Do you still keep in touch with him? Rooney doesn't look much but I wouldn't want to fight him apparently he is a good boxer

Nah, haven't seen him for years. I moved over here in '99 - and he left Sunderland in 2003.

Don't think I mentioned it earlier, nicest thing about him (not overly common in these money-obsessed times), when Sunderland were in huge financial trouble in 2002/03, he was due a testimonial season. When they were trying to get the big earners off the books - several of the top players insisted on contracts being paid out in full, etc., Mickey on the other hand, volunteered to cancel his testimonial and leave early with no pay out. Probably cost him about $1.5m, but then again he was earning $25k/week at the time!! Top lad (when he's sober).

Edited by Benjamin: 20/11/2008 02:07:26 PM

This guy is incredible. Absolutely amazing.

There is a bloke Billy someone who is pretty good he does the nike ones and has a vid with Ronaldonho, C.Ronaldo and Zlatan

Check out Touzani aswell.

I know that there is two guys from newcastle who go around Australia showcasing their skills, they also showcased them at the half intervals at jets home games. I dont think that they've got a video on youtube however.

I'll have a look at Touzani and the Nike bloke then.

Billy Wingrove this is the one with him Roanldo, Zlatan and Ronaldinho. Ronaldinho is easiily the better of the three his skills are amazing in it
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=4ZVn1Iuo8Hc