Show Off!

Can showing off in practice accomplish anything? Is this a blatant rhetorical question? The answer to both would have to be an emphatic yes. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not condoning showing off as something to be done often in your soccer practice, but I do feel that it has it’s uses (otherwise I wouldn’t be writing about it).

I remember years ago as a young soccer player the impact that a Milwaukee Wave player (who I’ll leave anonymous) made on me. We respected what he said because he knew how to play and had fun doing so. At one point during the camp he bet one of the players he could hit the crossbar from midfield. Impossible we thought – and this time we were right, he just barely missed it. Double-or-nothing and he hit it square on. We spent the next month before each practice trying to hit the crossbar from as far away as possible. He didn’t tell us to try practice hitting the crossbar on our own, we didn’t spend a practice on hitting the crossbar, nor did he show off and bet anyone else for the remainder of the camp he could do it again, but it made a lasting impact and made us want to practice.

By no means am I as skilled as any professional player. But in a small town in the middle of nowhere, having played college soccer is close enough for most U10 boys. Last week I happened to finish my training with another team a little early and made my way over to a U10 boy’s practice that was about to have an inner squad scrimmage. They were a little short on players; they had about 8 players and 2 or 3 older brothers who were there for fun. After talking with the coach we decided to join in. Now even though the topic today is showing off, most of the time I played simple passes to the players on my team so they could work with the ball. But on a few occasions I did do a little showing off. At one point during the game the opposing keeper hadn’t had a shot on goal for a while. He looked like he was starting to fall asleep in the back, so I lofted a shot from midfield (mind you it was a U10 field). By the time it got to him it had lost some of it’s pace, but is still reached the keeper about two feet over his head. He tried to save and got a hand on it, but because he wasn’t expecting a shot it was too late and the ball ricocheted into the net. At a latter stage in the game I went back into goal. The other team had a very talented young striker, which coupled with my relatively inexperienced backs led to a number of shots on goal. A number of his shots were right to me and were easily saved, a few of them were well placed shot to the sides that I had to make diving saves to stop. All in all he probably had about a dozen shots that I saved. If that wasn’t enough, I obliged the kids with some bicycle kicks after practice was over (needless to say the next day my hips were killing me and I couldn’t figure out well until I got to practice).

Okay great, I have just shown what a jerk I am when playing against ten year olds (and I haven’t even told you all the other little things I did at that practice). But there’s a point to this and I’ll get to it now. Last night I happened to be pulling out of the parking lot when I was flagged down by a coach. We talked a bit about his practice, but all the while a number of kid’s from the aforementioned U10 boys team kept saying my name. The boys informed me that they had practiced all week and could do a bicycle kick while holding the ball. I told them that that was great and asked if they were working on doing them out of the air too (duh! Of coarse they were). That’s not all. During the practice last week I a number of the boys were trying out some of the skills I “showed off” during the scrimmage. And probably the most impressive thing that came from the scrimmage was from the forward I had denied 12 times. Needless to say, that 13th shot of his was a rocket to the corner that I had no chance at stopping. Now that’s showing off to the show off. I think that one shot of his did more to his confidence than letting him score all of his other shots.

In conclusion, I would like to say that showing off has it’s place in practice, whether it’s from a coach, assistant or player. It’s not something that should be resorted to all the time, in fact, it should probably be used sparingly. And showing off doesn’t have to be about dribbling through ten players and nutmegging the goalie. It can be something as simple as doing bunny-hops with the ball between your legs*. But it does have it’s benefits—namely, that most players will try to emulate what you are doing on their own, without you telling them to. What more could you ask from a training session than to have them go home and practice skills they’ve see others do and be excited about coming back and showing every else? Now that’s what soccer should be about.**

*What? So this may be overkill, but I have just one more example of showing off as a teaching tool. I was working last night with a U6 team. We were playing a game of amoeba tag. I was one of the last players with the ball and the amoebas decided to gang up on me. I put the ball between my feet and bunny-hopped around them and down to the end line. Well sure enough, the next round of amoeba tag found eight, U6-ers trying to bunny hop with the ball down the field…and some of them did it exceptionally well.

**I’m feeling a little self-conscience now and am worried that everyone reading this article will feel that I’m a total jerk – not only do I show off with the ten year olds, but the six year olds! I would just like to say that you have probably never seen a slower or more inept freeze monster than me. Most practices involve me getting beat in everyway imaginable by the kids. As a coach I think it’s good for kids to see you lose graciously, whether it’s on purpose against a group of six year olds or unintentional against a talented ten year old with a well placed shot.

It’s not the size of the field but the…

Who am I kidding? It usually is the size of the field. If you are having a session that just isn't working out quite right odd are your field size is the culprit. Changing the size and/or shape of the field can help out considerable, problem is though, this isn't always the easiest thing to do. A proper balance needs to be struck between fields that are too challenging for player development with fields that don't test the players. Two examples will hopefully get you thinking about how your fields can affect your practices.

Example 01

This first example involves six U6 players on a field approximately 10 x 30 yards (Figure 1). In my opinion this field presents several problems for your average four and five year old. The first is that the width does not provide enough space to dribble in. The U6 players were constantly kicking the ball out-of-bounds. Too much time was spent practicing throw-ins and not enough on dribbling (which was the main focus of the practice).

Figure 1

What I did to help the practice along was pick up all the cones except for the two goals. That way they had as much space to dribble in as needed. Granted, a few players had to be reeled in, but everyone was having success dribbling the ball. I also added in a few more balls so that the players had more chances to be successful. Still, the main change that made this game worthwhile was the size of the field.

Example 02

The next example I would like to look at deals with some older kids, but still has some of the same problems. The second practice I observed was a U12 boy’s inter-squad scrimmage. The team had 12 players total, so it was a 5v5 game plus keepers. They were playing on a full size field approximately 50x80 yards. Where the last example had a field that was too small for the players, this practice presented one that was too big.

What happened during this session wasn’t soccer, but a fitness test. One player would win the ball and with a few big touches dribble out of the pack from one end of the field to the next. A few players would chase the attacker for a minute and then lose interest and fall to the wayside, resulting in way too many 1 v 1’s with the goal keeper.
To remedy this solution it is necessary to make the field a bit small and challenge the players. If you are lucky enough to have portable goals bring them in to mid-field or less. If you are like most of us, use your corner flags for your second goal and have teams trade at half. Most importantly though, make it challenging and interesting for your kids. In this last example too many kids were standing around uninterested because they knew there was no chance for them to get the ball. By making the space smaller everyone is connected with the game and has an easier opportunity to defend or attack.

I can’t stress enough how important it is to always evaluate the effectiveness of your practice and how the size of your field can “solve” many of the problems you make be having.