Wrap up of the junior season

The first season of my coaching career came to a close a few weeks ago. The girls' final match clashed with Richmond's relegation battle in the Victorian Premier League. While I was concerned with Richmond's plight (they ended up beating Sunshine 8-0, ensuring their presence in the VPL next year), I was suprised that I never once thought about Richmond while the girls were playing.

Our final match was a good reflection of the whole season. A competitive match of the whole season. A competitive match, we weren't the pushovers that the final scoreline of 3-0 suggested. Just the usual lapses in concentration and an inability to take hold of our opportunities. I know the girls can play as a team, although individually they lacked many of the skills that individuals in opposition teams have.

As the girls could only commit to one training session a week, I don't think I had the time to work with each of them on ball control, passing, dribbling and shooting. Technically there was a lot of work to do, so I took the approach of teaching them how to play the pall to the best of their abilities. From that perspective, I thought that they had a few great moments through the season, particularly towards the end, and they noticed it themselves too.

And if they can notice it themselves, it tells me that they started to understand football a little bit better. As for next year, I don't think I'll be keeping the same team. The U15 coach's daughter will move to the U16 team next year, so I expect that he will take on that team. The girls who will be too old from the U16 next year will probably move onto the U18 team. The team also has a father of one of the players coaching. So I'll just have to wait and see what happens.

From a personal perspective, I think I'm a lot more patient now. I'm very competitive and this clashed somewhat with the girls' lack of competitiveness. Two or three were competitive, but it wasn't sufficient to carry the whole team. So I had to be the one to bend. We'll see how I go next season.

Round 14: trying to get it together.

Another loss - this time 4-0 against Team 3. Before the match started I organised for my goalkeeper to get a run on the field in the 2nd half. It's about time I gave her some playing time. So I spoke to one of the players before the match and told her I was going to put her in goals for the second half. The deal was that she'd play the full 40 min of the first half.

I also told her not to tell the rest of the team. I explained that I was going to ask the team for a volunteer. Essentially, if I had a volunteer then that player would be 'safe.' Otherwise, it would be her. No-one volunteered. Great team spirit (sarcasm.)

Thing is, at half-time we were only 1-0 down. Pretty much thanks to the goalkeeper and the left back - who was going to go into goals in the second half. Easily the two best players on the park for us. But I had made arrangements for the second half... and I stuck to them. The replacement keeper did a good job for someone completely unsure of what they were doing. The normal goalkeeper ran out of puff, so I ended subbing her off. Which was good, as I want her to be aware that if she doesn't play in goals she's unlikely to get a full game.

We have so much wrong in the team, and I don't have enough time to fix it. The players can't tell when is the time to simply clear the ball and when they have time to do something with the ball. If they do want to clear the ball, they want to smash it out of the park. Rather than just make a connection with the ball and letting the ball's momentum do the rest. They ball-watch. A lot. They're extremely one-footed. I only have one player who can kick long balls. I only have one player who can pass the ball - she's also picked up some crazy (in a VERY good way) turns from somewhere since the start of the season. I really ought to follow that up...

All I want is more time... but the girls can only generally commit to the one training session per night. I need quality time with each of them, not 1.5 hours for all of them. I'm hoping for a wet summer and an early pre-season so I can cover basic skills next season.

Oh, and the girl who hurt herself last week is due to miss three weeks. She did her medial ligament in her right knee (exactly the same as what I did), so I'm inclined to give her all the time she needs + more to recover. I'm hoping the fact that she's 16 and that I was 22 when I hurt my knee makes a significant difference.

Last Thursday I conducted an extra training session. Only five girls turned up... Anyway, at one point I set up a 2 (defenders) vs. 3 exercise to try and get the girls used to the concept of first defender and second defender. First defender to pressure the player with the ball, second defender to sit and see what's going on and enter the game once the first defender is out through error or being beaten.

One girl in particular was very half-hearted about pressuring the ball. Instead of giving the player with the ball perhaps half a metre of space, she'd give two. So the player with the ball had all the time in the world. After some frustrating watching of what was going on, I demonstrated what I wanted from the first defender when outnumbered i.e. pressuring the player with the ball but not committing. The next time she did the exercise was a marked improvement and so when I played her as the first line of defence (I tend to play with five defenders in two rows at the moment - the first of two and then a row of three) she had an improved game. So I'm really happy about that - especially since I pushed my knee a bit during the demonstration and ended up very sore on Friday evening when the temperature dropped. At least the pain was worth it.

My first match back

My first match back at coaching on Sunday was an absolute disaster. Morale and energy were low, lots of ball watching, and there was no cohesion in the team. It was awful.to watch and I didn't really know what to do to turn things around.

Perhaps it was because the first match against this team was a close loss (3-4) and the second match was a win (2-1). Perhaps the girls thought Sunday was going to be an easy win? We also had a late afternoon kick-off (3.15pm) and I know some of the girls had a VERY late night. Reminds me of my drunk team days...

We ended up losing 2-1, a goal thanks to a penalty we didn't even deserve. I have a couple of girls with an accurate kick that has a bit of power on it. One of the girls hurt herself 2 minutes into the match - won't really know the damage until Friday. The other one took the penalty.

I was very disappointed to see the team in this state. So I had a bit of a talk to them after the match, but only properly discussed the low energy on Tuesday at training. The late night party group did say that perhaps they had abused the late kick-off time, so that was good. Better than them denying what I already knew.

During training I focused on trying to get the team passing to each other again. It essentially took the full 1.5 hours. Perhaps they always played like this and it was only not watching them and seeing the U-20 World Cup instead that highlighted it. But I doubt it. I made them play in two teams against each other. I let them know that if one team makes five passes in a row, the other team does five sit-ups, push-ups, burpees or whatever.

For a good few minutes the record was 2 passes. Eventually 3 were achieved and we only once got to five. This wasn't because the non-possesion team had a superior defensive skills - they team with the ball were never once looking for the pass. Blindly kicking the ball forward was their method of choice. My current pet hate.

We have a second training session each week now. A bit more passing work tonight to try and keep the small bit of cohesion they had at Tuesday's training and some basic defensive work. Knowing the caretaker coach he probably didn't do any of that...

Our first win

We've finally got some points to show how we've improved! 2-1 win today, finished an hour ago, and I'm about to head off to watch some VPL action. But had to make a note of this and tell everyone! Well, the handful or readers that I have.

Changing the defence line

As promised, I trialled a new sweeper last Sunday. It was fairly obvious that I had a lot more faith in her ability than she did, especially once she realized that I was serious. Although I had told her on the Tuesday at training what I was going to do, it didn’t sink in until I wrote her name on my team line-up picture in the middle of defence.

While we lost 4-0, I wasn’t all that fussed with #11’s performance. I think she needs to be more assertive. She also needs to gain awareness of where our players are (particularly the flanks of the defence) while knowing where the ball is. Too often the flanks would be left behind when #11 pushed up the field. Her positioning also needed some work…

I have been playing with a five man* defense – generally positioned as follows:


A and B are more or less attacking defenders, they are the last line in the midfield and the first line of defence. If there’s an attacking midfielder in the opposing team, either A or B will be shadowing for most of the match, leaving a four man defence. It depends on what the other team does. With the back line (C, D & E) more or less the same each week. A left-back, a right-back, and the centre-back who takes on the sweeper role when required. I try to get the centre-back to sit one or two steps behind the two flanking defenders:


The extra couple of steps are so that the ‘sweeper’ can come into the game and have a bit of a head start on any breakaway player that has come from the middle of the park, or for any random long ball where the opposition player who chases that ball comes from the middle of the park.

I limit the space to only a couple of steps so that the central defender can quickly get into line with the other two defenders should the opposition forwards be applying pressure onto the defence line and a long ball looks like it may be played for one of the forwards to run onto. A sort-of offside trap.

So, when there’s no pressure from the opposition:


And when there is:


So, back to my new centre-back… she’s been playing for three or four years now. This may be the first season she’s played in defence, where I put her in to cover right-back when I lost a player through injury (precautionary) during a friendly. She lived there for a few weeks, and now in ‘sweeper’. I have more or less thrown her into the deep end.

My original centre-back (#6) was available again on Sunday. While #6 has the experience of the position, and doesn’t hesitate with her calls, #11 feels completely out of her depth. However, I will persevere with #11 because she connects better with the ball. She simply has superior timing with the ball, and timing is a difficult ability to gain when you don’t have it. Whereas reading and learning the game can be taught.

I initially planned to play #6 as one of the flanking defenders, and to lead and look after the defence from there. But I changed my mind the night before. I am now playing with a four-man defence: the two flanks with both #6 and #11 in the middle. #6 has instructions to look after the defence, and lead it – ensuring players stay in line when required and that #11 doesn’t sit too far back when the time is appropriate. #11 is to always stay free.

By playing alongside #6, #11 can begin to learn how to manage the defence. It’s difficult at training, the “attackers” are simply not competitive enough to gain anything from them. So it’s pretty much on-the-job-training, and I can’t yell out from the sidelines all the time. Hopefully I can revert to my three person defence with 2 attacking defenders before the end of the season. :)

*I also use “man on” and “man up”, build a bridge and get over it.

Shopping for brooms

In my first “proper” team (my second season of playing football, but I’d hardly count the Victorian Churches League as being even remotely competitive) I played in central defence along with another girl, Jess, who I knew from little aths. We would have been 15, and the eldest players in the team who was competing in the U/17s league.

I think Mark was the coach’s name – I’ve got an awful memory when it comes to names, but I would recognise him in an instant. Mark would always play Jess and I at the back, except on the odd occasion when I ventured even deeper and under the crossbar. Being the eldest players, we were easily the most mature, and consequently responsible – we worked well together at the back. Years of getting to know each other at little aths probably helped and we had no problem in directing each other when playing. We weren’t exactly best buddies, but we recognised that there was a job to be done on the park.

While Mark never asked us to play in front of each other, in the end this was how Jess and I played. Mark would organise the rest of the team, perhaps giving each player instructions – but he essentially left Jess and I to our own devices.

Prior to kick-off Jess and I would sort out who would play in front of the other, with the other effectively playing as a sweeper. Although true sweepers are rarely seen in the modern professional game (much to do with offside tactics), it works well where the defence is generally inexperienced. With Jess, whoever was playing deeper would generally organise the defence, keeping tabs on the less experienced players who played left and right back, and ensuring that if one of us was about to make an important tackle that the other was there as a back-up.

In the case of the U/16s that I am now coaching, I am faced with a similar problem – I really only have a handful of experienced players in a team that has a high proportion of first-timers. For the first two matches I’ve been using the girl (#6) who apparently played in central defence/sweeper last season in the same position. She can more or less read the game, and has the maturity to accept responsibility for her errors – before I point out that certain events occurred due to an error of hers (unlike my goalkeeper who will only accept that she made an error when I explain the entire chain of events that occurred from her, say, calling the ball when she was too far away). Back to #6 – she’s alright as a player, but seems to have some issues connecting to the ball. She’s not available this Sunday, so I have a chance to experiment.

I’ve been using one of last year’s wingers (#11) as my right back. I randomly put her in there in the friendly against the U/15s from our club as we were short on players and girl who was playing right back at the moment hurt herself. #11 was on the wing, so I pushed her down and spread the midfield out. She impressed me a bit in defence, and she’s more or less lived there since.

She’s told me she enjoys defending – it’s novel for her having always played in the midfield- and although she tends to get a little lost in the play when she’s on the ball I’ve decided to play her as sweeper. She doesn’t seem to be able to judge how far she can go with the ball until it’s too far from where she should be, and doesn’t organise any cover for herself, I had a bit of a chat to her about her tendency to carry the ball too far on Sunday after I took her off the park, and on Tuesday I told her she would be playing sweeper. Hopefully with a bit of discipline she’ll hold the defence well. I’m not sure about her ability to read the game, or if she can control the defence like #6 kind-of-can, but I won’t know until I give her a try.

Edit 01/06/07: I suppose this post is a more elaborate answer to Watt's earlier comment/question.

Our second match

It's been a while between matches, and you can blame the FFV for giving us two byes in a row for the first three rounds of the season.

After our disappointing performance in Round 1, I was hoping that the girls would lift their game for Round 4. One girl (#14) had been telling me that they’re not a bad team, they just play slightly worse than the opposition regardless of how good the opposition was.

She may be right. Round 1 team was awful. We were worse. Round 4 team had more skilled players, I wouldn’t really call them a team though. Their coach was constantly yelling at them, giving them instructions. In the end, can his girls play football? They may have the individual skills that my girls lack, but my girls are more of a team, and I know that with some discipline we can be a difficult side to beat.

I take more pride in knowing we caused the other team problems than scoring more goals than them. I was really happy with the girls on Sunday - much better performance than our last outing, players were more careful with the ball, looked for the pass occasionally, tried to support their team-mates and consequently played to each other a lot more.

Apparently for the past three years, the girls have always played in the same positions. While a couple are suited to their roles (#14’s natural game is to play as an attacking midfielder, and tends to play the ball with her back to goal, and #6 has the responsibility to play sweeper), I’ve messed about with the rest. #14 tells me I’m the first to do this, and that they like having the opportunity to play elsewhere.

Ideally, I’d like them to play anywhere I put them, but for the moment I aim to create some stability in the team – so many are playing in similar positions to training.

One of the most striking things about my team is the difference in playing ability and difference in attitude. About half of the team has played for a number of seasons, and have general skills such as passing and controlling the ball – albeit inconsistently. Some have only played a short while and it shows.

Attitude is something you can’t teach – players either have the right attitude or they don’t. There are 4 new girls in the team – I believe 3 are complete beginners. 2 of these I want to keep for ever and ever – simply because when we have a drink break in training, they’re the first ones back in our training area. And instead of standing and chatting, they’ll start to kick the ball about. It shows they want to play. If I ask the team to do something, most will complain about how they’re not left-footed, or that they can’t do headers. But these two will give it a go, and when they can’t, they absorb the correction like a sponge. Perhaps they’re easier to teach because I don’t have to break bad habits.

The other thing that shows is their attitude. On Sunday, one player in particular stood out for me - not because she completed the most passes, won every ball, scored a goal or saved our defence. She may be slow (in pace) and mis-kick the ball a bit, but I know that any ball (or player and ball) that comes near her will not be given up easily. While she may eventually be beaten, and while she lacks the pace to chase down the player who beat her, she was my star player for the simple reason that she put the most effort on the park.

I’m looking forward to this Sunday. Round 4 showed massive improvement, and we had a great training session this evening - in my humble non-biased opinion as coach ;). Hopefully they’ll apply what we covered in training in the match – that’s my priority anyway. Make sure what I try to teach stays in their heads. It’s funny, how the more I cover, the more that still needs to be explained! Never-ending, really… :)

Shake and Stir

It’s been a while since I sat down and wrote a post with some substance. Most of my assessment has been completed, so I can spend a little more time thinking about football.

Later in the year I’ll be heading overseas to visit family. This means that my team will not have their coach for 4 matches (and 3 training sessions). Consequently, a cover needed to be found for that period. While I was meeting the U/15 and U/18 coaches of the girls at the same club, I mentioned that I would be away, and depending on fixtures I asked if there was the possibility of looking after the girls at some points There was also a particular parent who put her hand up to help me out, being my first time and all, should I require it. I informed her that I may be needing a cover for when I’m away.

Now, I’ll be frank and admit that I’ve effectively been sitting on my arse with regards to this issue. But I had more pressing matters to deal with (assessment tasks), which I think is a decent recent for not actively finding a replacement up to this point.

Before I delve into the actual situation that’s seriously begun to bother me now that I’ve thought about it, perhaps I need to explain a little about my playing background, and the set-up of the Junior club (JunC) that I am currently affiliated with.

One my earliest posts gives a good account of a particular senior club (SenC) I played at on and off for 3 years. During my off years, my brother was still at the club, so I’ve known the club and its people for some time. Needless to say, it’s a SenC that I’m not particularly happy with. I started there in the junior team they used to have, and my experience with that team wasn’t pleasant.

The JunC that I’ve started coaching at currently uses the same facilities as the SenC. My team trains on one of the nights that the SenC has training. So when the president (Pres) of the SenC spotted me, he came over to have a chat. Fair enough, I thought, he’s just saying hello. Then he came over the next week, suggesting that my U/16s join the SenC to make up the numbers in their lowest team (i.e. team that played in the lowest Division that the club had a team registered in). Naturally I declined. Especially since there’s an U/18 team he can poach from – difference is that Pres doesn’t know who their coach is. Again the next week he came by again. I’ve moved my training sessions all about the place to wherever I can find a spot – making it harder for Pres to figure out where I am.

At training, my team manager (TM) asked if I had sorted out a replacement yet. I admitted that I hadn’t, but that I’d mentioned it to the coaches above and a particular parent. TM said that the other coaches couldn’t (fair enough I said, especially since the fixtures had now changed and we no longer had byes during the period I was away). TM then said that Pres of SenC had put his hand up to help out. I was a bit stunned to be honest, and then said I didn’t want him associated with my team. TM said there was no-one else. I said that I had a parent who I mentioned my situation to, but hadn’t had a chance to seriously talk to them about it. Somehow, somewhere, TM & I finished out conversation with the conclusion that our options were limited. At the end of training, I confirmed everything with the parent I had in mind, and sent TM an email when I got home.

TM,

I had a word to Parent this evening after training, and she's more than happy to take the girls while I'm away.

-Cecilia

TM’s response:

Cecilia,

I spoke with Pres before training finished and said we were happy to accept his offer to take training and game day.

...

Regards,

TM

Let’s say that I wasn’t very happy at this point, but was far more concerned with particular piece of assessment.

Assessment’s now more or less over (well, there’s exams...), so I’ve had a little time to think about this. I’m really annoyed that this was essentially organised behind my back.

First - Why on earth did the Pres put his hand up? I can only think that the JunC approached the Pres, or mentioned that I was going away. Regardless, the JunC coaching situation should not have been something that the SenC gets itself involved in, particularly considering how often Pres had approached me and my team to join the SenC!

Secondly – why was I not given the time (or option) to really discuss the cover with the parent I had in mind? I have heard (from the U/15 coach) that Parent has been a handful and annoyance to the club in the past, but I am yet to have an issue with her. She seems to be the kind of person who would shoot me while I was watching her. I do mean that in a positive way – she has absolutely no problem telling me what she thinks to my face.

In contrast to TM, who was meant to organise friendlies for me, but didn’t. Perhaps because she knew her daughter wouldn’t be involved with one, and that the other fell on Mother’s Day? The least she could do is tell me why. Then I would’ve made it my responsibility from day 1. Instead of day 20 – which made it harder to get the friendly organised. Yes, I failed in the end, but only because the other team pulled out two days (three, perhaps) before kick-off. Now instead of telling me that she was going to accept Pres’ “offer” after our chat, she’s left me thinking that I can talk to Parent about it. I now know that she didn’t.

Tomorrow we have our second match of the season at home. I intend to find out:
1. Why Pres had a chance to get involved with my team,
2. Why TM did not give me chance to talk to Parent, and
3. Why TM made the executive decision on the coaching future of the team.

Interestingly enough, Pres has not yet approached me about conducting some kind of introductory session (something I had planned with Parent, also because of the massive difference in ability that I have between players in the team). My reaction to such a request from the Pres is not likely to be viewed favourably by SenC, but they should expect that from me anyway. I am not sure how the JunC will take it.

I am new to the JunC, so I am not sure what their history holds. I am not sure if TM did not give me chance to talk to Parent because they’ve had an issue in the past, or if Parent and JunC committee have had an issue in the past. As TM is a member of the committee, perhaps she acted in the interests of the committee. Either way, I need to know, and I intend to find out ASAP. Ideally I want to find out by talking to people in person. I’ll resort to the phone if I can’t track them down tomorrow before/after our match. And I refuse to use email to initially attack the issue – I’ll be happy to correspond electronically once it’s been raised, but until then I’ll be old-fashioned and, in my opinion, proper – no hiding behind a computer screen.

So, who's Mark Viduka?

Sorry, still completely nuts at uni. Tonight's training session, however, had a couple of magic moments I simply can't resist blogging about!

I accidentally put my shorts on backwards this evening. A player noticed and thought it was hilarious. Honestly, I couldn't give a s#!t. Anyway, I started to mention Paolo Di Canio - I was going to go on to talk about how he did that once by accident, realised before the match started, decided to keep them that way, had an awesome match, scored a couple, etc....
"Who?"
"Paolo Di Canio...," I repeated. More blank faces. Hmm... perhaps they were too young? I gave them the benefit of the doubt and dropped it.

Later in the session, we were playing a mini-game. I was half-playing with the coloureds as they were one short. I collected a loose ball at one stage, didn't have any options, shielded the ball, needed some space as I stuck my arse out. I could hear whack between me and the player (Steph), followed by laughter from that Steph's mum. Anyway, passed off the ball successfully.

Claire calls out that what I did wasn't allowed. I yelled back that it was - and that was how Viduka makes his living.
"Who?"
"Errrr... Mark Viduka," I respond.
"Who?"
"Oh gee, he's only the current captain of our national team, the Socceroos," I responded is a sarcastic tone.
Blank faces. Again.
Sam quips up, "Oh him. He annoys me." Well, at least one of them MAY have heard of Viduka, or rather, MAY have heard of the Socceroos...

I think we have a football culture problem...

Our first match

We had our first match on Sunday, in short we lost 2-1, played poorly, but then the other team played poorly too - so I thought we could have done better. Short post, terribly busy at uni at the moment as the semester draws to a close and exams approach.

And now for something completely different!

I was going to make you all do a "How well do you know me quiz", but this isn't MySpace, is it?

Anyway, we had a bit of a friendly today - my U/16s vs. the U/15s. There were 9 of us and 12 of them. Take a guess at who won. Then consider we played most of the second half with 8. Guess the score.

Well, we finished 4-0, not that they were spectacularly bad, we were outnumbered most of the time (but still managed to be competitive) and the main killer was a lack of subs - so the girls finished off knackered. There is a LOT that we need to fix up, and the most annoying thing is that my goalkeeper needs a lot of work, but I can't correct everything she does as I have to look after the whole team. It's quite frustrating.

Funniest moment of the day came when I overheard a couple of the U/15 parents... "I think we're going to do really well this year." I felt like retorting, "Yeah, if all the teams you play against have 8 players." Naturally I didn't, if I was a neutral I would've, but I don't want to be seen as a sore loser, especially since I didn't actually care about the result. How the girls played (or didn't play) was far more important.

There's so much to work on, I don't know where to start! Well, I actually do, because I'm naturally a defensive player - or like to build the game up from the back. But who's right at the back? The goalkeeper. Who I don't have time to fix. It's not just her physical performance that was frustrating to watch (she can't dive properly, take goal-kicks properly, lacks explosiveness and agility) but her decision making was awful! It's not something that can be easily corrected by training over and over and over again! And her talking. Ahhhh!!!!

A few moons ago I played at a club where I could not stand the coach. Loved the goalkeeping coach there, but the team coach drove me insane. One night at training he was trying to get the girls to push up immediately after that ball was cleared from defence. Not once the ball was safely at the feet of our midfield, but cleared from defence. Now, in my opinion, there were a few problems with this:

1. the girls lacked the discipline to push out together as a unit, not forgetting to leave anyone behind,
2. by pushing up you're risking not being able to quickly cover a ball if it's popped over, which could happen since...
   
3. you don't know what's going to happen to the ball.

So you could have the girls running up the park to push up, and the other team could control the cleared ball and pop it over the defence who at that point are running the opposite way. A bit silly. Who in the end has to fix up the bloody mess in such an event? Me, and the odds would be against me. Anyway, that night he and I argued over it until he used some foul language at me telling me that I wasn't the coach of the team and so I should just shut up. I stopped arguing with him but I was still fuming. A few minutes later I had goalkeeping training, which was a God-send that night.

My goalkeeper does the same in terms of her timing of the "push up" call. It's really like she can't read the game and doesn't know anything else. So the defense is preoccupied with the ball being in their area, and instead of trying to help them out by calling out who's unmarked or ways to remove the ball from defence but keep possession she tells them to push up. I got a bit tired of this and ended up yelling at the defence to stay where they were and to the goalkeeper that there was no point pushing up if the ball was still in the immediate area. I'm finding this sidelines thing annoying, and am worried at the idea of being confined to a technical area.

So my current problem is how do I transfer all my understanding of the game to the girls? There's so much to learn, and it's hard to praise for one thing when they don't do the next bit right, and you end up praising but they don't really understand the next part unless I stop the game and actually go through it. Something that I can't do during actual game time.

Anyway, I need to make a long list of all that didn't work today, and a short list of what did.

Aahhh parents...

...enough said.

Meanwhile, I'm seriously considering striking Danny Vukovic from my swoon list. I cannot think of what on earth he was thinking... at all... can't think of any excuse for him! And nice to see Mr Yellow Card doing his thing for the national team - while he was captain. Leijer's a great player IMO, but his tendency to collect yellows and make rash tackles is letting him down. It's not something he needs in his game.

Short post, I know...

Maybe something did go in...

Sorry, I meant to write sooner, but uni needed some attention from me.

Last week’s training seems so long ago… so you might all be lucky and end up with a short post! Who would’ve thought?

Anyway, my plan for last week’s training was on solid passing and good control of the ball. Unfortunately my session was bit of a shambles as the head coach and the secretary of the club each wanted to have a few words with me. Add the parent who decided to hang around during the start my session and it was all a bit annoying really.

First I’ll start with how training works. Starting at 7pm, my group is one of the last to start training. So all the younger groups are there before us and tend to finish at around 7.30pm. Leaves lots of space for us. :) The group closest to us at the start of training is perhaps at U/13 or U/14 boys team. They have a young coach too, and I find him amusing. To laugh at, not with. I’m such a football snob at times, but I respect those who know something and deserve respect. If anything, I feel sorry for his team – actually I don’t. I dunno.

Anyway, during his session, a ball rolled away from his little area and closer to us, where I was starting to warm the girls up. Ah-ha, now some devious ball acquisition can occur! As our warm up continued, I noticed a second ball had made its way into the area. Two extra balls! I was getting quite cheery. Mind you, I had not touched the balls at all. Going through stretches with the girls, the parent who was hanging around approached our balls (and the extra ones). Shoo, shoo, go away I was thinking.

I wasn’t going to steal them, as the club knows exactly how many each team is meant to have. Plus, they’re all marked. But I wanted this coach to learn a lesson. He clearly did not respect the footballs, and consequently did not deserve to have them there when training started next week – I would return them next week and play dumb, “Oops, looks like they ended up with me! Maybe you should look after them better.”

Alas, such thoughts were just dreams as the parent who was hanging about noticed that two of the balls weren’t labelled for the U/16 girls. Parent came over while I was going through stretches and asked me about them. I confirmed that ours were marked as U/16 Girls, and perhaps those extra ones belonged to the other coach. I made up some excuse that I saw them roll over to our area but expected him to have noticed and collected them. I was too busy warming up the girls to notice… I think parent accepted my excuse. But I was still annoyed.

Before the ball incident I had the secretary approach me to confirm numbers. I then continued my warm-up. She interrupted again, and discussed some paperwork/registration stuff about the girls. Once sorted, I went back to training. Then the head coach came by. “Look, I don’t want to tell you how to coach,” he began… oh great I thought… “but I wanted to check how many girls you had.” Huh?!?!?! First, what did the first part of the chat mean if you just wanted to discuss numbers? Second, go talk to the secretary! And third, I rock up to training 15 minutes before I expect to start. Talk to me THEN, not now when I’m trying to correct the girls’ passing ‘technique.’

Grrr grrr stomp stomp.

I just lost so much time with the interruptions, I couldn’t really do much. Then the U/18s came over and challenged us to a match. They had six, we had six (four from last week plus two from that first Sunday). Alright we said, and off we went.

It was an interesting match, mainly because of the contrast in styles. There was also a bit of a difference between the four girls who came last week and the other two. The four would support each other a bit more, or at least understand when I told them to do so. Of the other two, one seems to drop back and help out a bit more – whether it’s a natural part of her game or she caught onto what the others were doing, I don’t know. Perhaps it was a bit of both – she saw what was going on and was able to adapt. It’s really difficult to try and help players when they’re in the middle of a match. I much prefer the mini-games where I can stop the play have a chat and continue. But it was good to play a slightly competitive game.

We won, which was nice – settled the girls a bit to know that they could at least play against the U/18s. At the end of the game I got them to warm down a bit and had a chat while they were stretching – I wanted to see if they understood why they had more or less dominated the game.

The conversation went something like this…

So, what did you think?
- I think we can keep on playing.
- I don’t feel tired at all.
- The others were getting really puffed.
- Yeah, we’re so much fitter than them.

Why do you say that we’re fitter?
- Because they were getting really puffed.

It doesn’t mean that we’re fitter.
[silence]

Well, why do think they were getting puffed and not you?
[more silence]

What made them get puffed?
-They were doing a lot of running…?

Yeah, but why?
- Because they relied on those two girls up front to do everything.
- Yeah, they just kicked the ball up to them all the time.

But it didn't work, did it? What else happened?
[silence again]

Well, why aren’t you tired?
- Uhh… [gingerly] coz we did that uhhh... supporting thing
(Sigh of relief in my head – maybe something did go in from last week)
- Yeah, we passed the ball more than they did
- Yeah!
[general cheeriness at this revelation]

Yep! (So I joined in the chorus of yeahs and yays... I can see you rolling your eyes at me!) So what happened when we passed the ball around?
[silence again]
(Hmmm… I thought. Well, they got to the point, I’ll just talk about the rest, and proceeded to contrast our defence to their defence….)

Anyway, so the U/18s played what I call a kick-and-chase style of football. Heck, it’s not really a style. But whenever the ball ended up in their defence, their last player would boot it up the park. It was a short make-shift pitch (lots of width, not much length – almost square really) so the girl who I put in central defence would usually collect the ball. Sometimes she’d be under pressure from the opposition, but she’d almost always have a couple of options to relieve herself of the ball. Almost because the girl I put on the left tended to wander. The girl on the right was always available. So we’d play it out and pass it to each other, rather than blast the ball to wherever and chase it down.

When I set the formation up, I put the goalkeeper in central defence as I wanted her to start to get used to talking to her players and distributing the ball with her feet. I think when the time comes I might play the girl who I put on the right as the centre of my defence. She understands what I want, as does the ‘keeper, so I’m hoping she can hold the defence together. I haven’t yet decided what to do with the rest – I see things here and there which suggest to me that they would be great in certain spots. But I want them to be able to play anywhere on the park.

I’ll be working on passing and controlling again this week, might include throw-ins too. And I’m trying to introduce the concept of stepping on the ball to the girls. It’s funny how things that I like to do (I love moving sideways with the ball, shielding it with the side of my body and rolling it over with whichever leg is further from the opposition player) are completely foreign to the girls. Anyway, here’s hoping for no interruptions.

P.S. Watt, I was distraught with the signing of Kemp. I’m over it now, and I hope Merrick can teach him a thing or two. About Spase, as I said, I don't particularly care where he plays as long as he gets decent game time so I can swoon at his through-balls. Sure it’d be nice for him to come back to Melbourne, but whatever – if he plays and removes the recklessness from his game, I’ll be a happy girl.

P.P.S. There's more to this whole passing/supporting/not-so-much-running thing, but I should get to sleep. Perhaps this will come up at some point in the future.

The first 'proper' training session.

I'm regarding Tuesday as having been my first 'proper' training session because that very first Sunday was more of a kickabout/meet-and-greet than anything else.

So I had a plan for defensive work. I more or less stuck to the plan, although I didn't have enough players to step a 2 vs. 3 scenario while trying to keep everyone moving (I had eight on the night). What I wanted the girls to understand by the end of the night was the importance of providing the right kind of support and when the best time top tackle a player was.

Say you're the last defender. Generally I would expect the defender to hold off the attacker until:

1. a back-up arrives in the form of a team-mate,
2. the attacker makes an error so that the defender has a chance to win the ball, or
   
3. the attacker makes a move where the defender has no choice but to be a bit more reckless in defence.
   

I want my players to hold-off an attack until back-up arrives. This implies that team-mates recognise the situation, support the first defender and talk to that defender so that s/he knows when the time to commit and make a tackle is. This support doesn't only occur in the situation of an attacker with the ball, but one scenario at a time. I'm also trying to get the girls used to talking to each other.

I think they understood the action of supporting, especially as they took it upon themselves to continue the drill after the first defender made their move. i.e. the first defender went to back up the second if the ball was not won. :)

An interesting part of the night came up when my players (strange to think of them as “my players” but I suppose they are. Also, I think “my girls” sounds weirder) noticed another group of women training at the other end of the fields. They asked me who they were and I informed them that the other group was the local senior team (one which I had played for on previous occasions and knew the club fairly as well). Had a bit of a chit chat and when it came to why I stopped playing with them, well, I couldn't find any nice way of explaining all the politics involved so I told them that the only way I would go back to that club is if things changed. And I told them that was all I was going to tell them.

Not to be mysterious, but they simply don't need to know. Later the ex-president (possibly the current president again?) came to say hello to me (I'd bumped into him numerous times after Victory matches on the train home) and suggested that if I didn't have enough players that maybe we could join up with some of the women's division 4 team. I'm not in any position to really say anything, so I told him that we'll see what happens. I'm not particularly keen on the idea because of the jump between open and U16 (alright, and because I don't like the senior club at the moment). When current/ex-president left our group we chit-chatted about it and I said I wasn't keen on them playing open because it's a far competitive and less fun environment. One of the girls had been training with a senior team and agreed with me, which put the rest of the girls at ease with my evaluation.

I think the most important aspect of coaching kids is knowing how far to push them. I don't know my players all that well yet, but based on the chatted from Sunday they're still quite carefree. I don't think they'd enjoy football if winning was the main priority. Sure, I'm competitive, but I'd be more satisified to lose knowing we played well that take a poorly deserved win.

Anyway, I finished the session with a mini-game, which I plan to do every training night. I do stop them quite a bit to explain what I want from them. I don't particularly want to play in these mini-games as I found it very frustrating when I was a player for the coach to do this. Often they'd end up doing everything, so how was I supposed to learn? Anyway, I found with these girls that after a few stoppages and some direction they understood why I want them to play with a support player behind the player with the ball. They may not have used it, but by understanding the reasoning behind it I could say the first step is accomplished. Whether they remember for next week is another matter...

About coaches playing during training, it was amusing that the email I got the next day from Fine Soccer was about this. I completely agree with the article and will link it once it appears in their archives. In the meantime I recommend that you sign up, even if all it does is refresh your memory about a certain aspect of the game or reminds you of a drill you haven't done in a while.

To answer some of my (two) readers' questions...

Firstly, this is my first time coaching. Luckily I have my dad watching most of my sessions so he points out things I could have done better and he sees things in players that I sometimes miss. Although I was defending a player after Tuesday because I think her head works in terms of football, but she's just missing the connection with her feet – the only reason I know is from discussing why she did something and the idea was good even if the execution, or rather, talking to team-mates wasn't. (She has a preference for passing the ball in front of a player, expecting them to run on to the ball. It's a style I prefer to play when compared to. a game that's always played to feet, and so I won't discourage her from playing that way. I know there's a place for both kinds of balls – but I like a fluid form of football, which can't really be achieved by passing to feet.) Anyway, in regards to my dad being there, it's good to get the kind of feedback that I won't get off players – I think I might be a little spoilt as a result, but I'm not complaining!

Anyway, Hamish - the only way I can think of trying to figure out your, “unlike you we have had very little experience” comment is that perhaps I haven't been as inactive as you as a player. That being said I more or less was assistant coach when my dad was coach of my team a few years ago – simply because I knew what my dad was on about and would try and ensure it happened during matches. I think it'll be interesting to see how we (incl. John) all go in our coaching mis-adventures.

Now to Watt with his more technical questions! I plan to structure my team on a spine-like basis. I want my central midfielder, central defender and goal-keeper to be my best players and hold the team together. Whether I'll have this luxury or not is another matter. In regards to losing the ball if passed backwards and the risk of the girls being discouraged – I've already found during training that the girls don't quite connect and they lose the ball quite cheaply. There are a few reasons – lack of talk, lack of touch (in controlling the ball) and poor passing. I find that they respond well when I applaud or congratulate a good idea and discuss why it didn't work and why it was a good idea.

While I like the idea of playing with a sweeper, I suspect playing with an outright sweeper would end up putting the other team onside most of the time. So I'm thinking of playing with a pseudo-sweeper, where I'll let my central defender know that I want them to sit back about half a metre to hold the whole defence together and still be enough of a jump on a long ball over the defence or through-ball. It will depend on how much speed the defender I have in mind is. I don't like doing running drills in training, I think ball time is far more precious but I'll need to figure out their speeds sooner or later.

Parents may be an issue. So far they've let me do my thing but I suspect match day may be something different. I will not tolerate parents giving instructions to players. Support your kid by all means, but telling them to go “all the way” is downright selfish and ignoring that football is a team game.

"One thing there is no doubt, if they do what you tell them they will play beautiful football." I hope they do. I feel a bit sorry for the girls at the moment because I think I overload them with information. I know I overload them, but I'd rather they started to learn how I want them to play now, rather than let them get away with things that I then have to change later. I've spoken to them about how perhaps I give them too much information, so they know that I don't expect them to remember every single thing I say and that I would not be surprised (or annoyed) if it takes a while for things to sink into their heads. Hopefully if certain situations recur in game situations they can start to identify what needs to be done themselves. Like so many things, it's going to take time.

Long post, I know, but a few things happened between the girls, my playing history and that the local senior women's team train at the same time is amusing. I'm not going to deny that I'm looking forward to the day that their coach decides to pay me a visit and I can tell him to bugger. off. Perhaps not in those terms exactly, but I know that I have some of the senior club on my side. ;)

Culture Shock

While Fozzie writes about how we need to change the way in which Australians generally play football, he overlooks that football is not part of our culture here. Sure, these days more kids are taking up football on weekends, but I'm not sure if they watch entire matches – rather than the highlights that focus heavily on goals. As a result, making kids play football isn't as easy as telling them to pass more often – because they don't have the understanding as to WHY it's an option to, say, pass the ball backwards. As I said I like possession based football, and it's the kind of football I would like the U16 girls I've taken to play.

Although the girls have the basic skills of passing (they use their right feet, but when I tell them to use their left no passes went wayward – so the ability is there, I just have to extract it and make it part of their game rather than an effort to use the left), dribbling and controlling a ball (provided it's a good pass), they lack the intrinsic nature of wanting the ball. On Sunday I had my first coaching session ever, and my biggest problem is the culture shock.

The girls turn up in dribs and drabs and start chatting. Alright, by all means chat – but you don't need your mouths to be free to kick a ball around. Ever since I started playing (at about 14 – it took a while for me to convince mum that it was ok for me to play, I can more or less thank Gary Cole for that) when the first person rocked up to training they'd play about with the ball on their own. Someone else turns up and they chat while kicking the ball about, and so on until everyone's having a bit of a play.

Other things that I noticed - only little, but their absence or presence said a lot about how they perceived football to be, and how much they wanted (or did not want) the ball. AFL has a strong influence on kids – I've seen junior goalkeepers pick the ball up with their hands in readiness to send it far, only for them to take a few steps backwards and concede a goal. Then I watch in a bit of bemusement as the coach tries to make the kids understand why it's a goal. This specific circumstance didn't occur on Sunday, but something similar did. They would control the ball, and find they didn't have enough space between them and the ball to pass it off. Rather than rolling or tapping the ball forward, their instinct or nature is to take a few steps back. Although I didn't see it on Sunday, I wouldn't be surprised that if I got them to turn around at a cone while dribbling the ball that they would move their bodies all the way around the ball rather than stopping the ball, rolling it and swiveling about of the ball of their foot. Also, not that I want them to be Riquelme-like ball hogs, but things like not claiming the ball when it goes out. I'm not expecting them to claim it when they did kick it out, but some enthusiasm in retrieving the ball if it's yours or putting your hand up and saying “white ball” or “coloured ball.”

Speaking of colours and whites – I didn't have any bibs on Sunday, so I split them up based on their clothes. I had three girls wearing white, two wearing blue, one wearing bright orange, one wearing a pastel lime green and another wearing pale pink. The pale pink was the least bright of the girls not wearing white, so I told her the move in with the white team. They were a bit confused as to how pale pink was white. So, while it's not really football related, I interpret their inability to think laterally (i.e. not understanding my good enough solution to the problem) as an issue when it comes to teaching football. i.e. All because the goals are in front of you, doesn't mean the ball always has to move forward.

All of these girls played last season - all but two at the same club, and the other two from nearby clubs. So, if they had never played before I'd be a little more forgiving about how their heads are working – but it's a bit of culture shock really...

I know girls are social, and they're pretty inquisitive as to what everyone does, so I did have a chat to them before I got them to warm up - talked about their interests, school, what sports they like (netball and footy were favorites, only one mentioned football/soccer), what I do (at uni, playing with bacteria) and they asked why I didn't play anymore, what position I used to play, etc. We probably had about a solid 15-20 minutes of that...

In terms of socialising, as I said most of the girls played together last year - one of the newer girls goes to the same school, and the other new one was completely new. I've already told them that when I say training starts at 7pm, that's when training starts. They can get ready and chat for as long as they want before training, but during training I want their full attention. They were happy with this when I suggested it, apparently it's what their old coach did too. We'll see how it goes tonight.

I think the best way for this group of girls to learn is through game situations. Most of training on Sunday was a mini-game, where I stopped them everytime I saw something was not working. It's funny, I see so many things that could be done better, but I'm trying not to nit-pick. One thing that stood out was the obsession with playing the ball forward. There's two things going on - they don't understand why they should play the ball to the side or backwards, and because no-one understands, the option isn't there to demonstrate.

I'm sure pure drill work won't do all that much for them as they won't realise when to apply it during a game. My training plan is to warm up, stretch, continue the warm up with a couple of light drills (dribbling, passing, jockeying, that kind of thing) followed by a bit more stretching. I plan to focus on one technique or concept per night, and develop it slowly into a game.

For example, this week I'm planning on focusing on defending. So first I'll make it 1 vs. 1, the work on 1 attacker vs. 2 defenders, 1 vs. 3 defenders, 2 vs. 3, and develop it into a full game. I may not have enough time to go through the progression I have in my head, but we’ll see what happens – I think it’s important for these girls to get as much game time as possible. I rather that they solved their own on-field problems, but sometimes they get stuck so I stop the game or move them back to where they were and talk to them about what did happen, what they could’ve done about it.

I absolutely hate it when coaches join in on mini-games to show how to play and then end up playing for their enjoyment, so I don't really want to participate in the games. With these girls however, I think I may have to to illustrate a point. I want the girls to understand what it is to support each other – playing square and always having a back-door option. It's the back-door option that i think they'll have more difficulty getting to grips with. So I plan to play as the last man for them for a bit so they see how much less stressful it is no have that support, and how play can be switched using the last man as pivot point. Hopefully they'll see the benefits and begin to incorporate it into their game.

One or two concepts at a time might take forever, but I'd rather they learned things properly, and truly learn them, rather than be told to do this, this and this and not actually getting used to it. I suppose we'll see how we go tonight.

My new career...

Along with being a scientist, engineering student, and professional swooner, I've decided to begin my new career in coaching. It hasn't gotten off too well, with our first "Meet and Greet" session not going ahead due to a lack of communication between either myself and Person B or Person A and Person B. Communication between myself and Person A is pretty good.

I'll label this post and future posts related to my coaching (mis-)adventures as "Coaching" for easy access. Whether you use this feature or not is up to you, and consequently not my problem.

Anyway, so I'll be coaching the U/16 girls team at a local junior club. I once played for the senior club that the junior club wants to be a feeder for. The funny side of this is that I don't think much of the senior club. But then, I haven't played with a senior club for more than a season, so really no senior club is going to get the Cecilia Seal of Approval.

Luckily the squad size is limited to 14, so we'll only end up with 14 goalkeepers.

In other news, I stumbled across a picture that would've given Dilevski a better opportunity to stake his claim as the A-League's Best Looking Player.