A simple, important, sobering fact needs to be stated at the outset: as a youth soccer coach you have a huge responsibility to everyone on the team. Not only do these youngsters want to learn soccer from you, but they also want to win, want to score some goals -- and they don't want to be yelled at. Your impact in the game is rivaled only by that of the parent, and, in certain circumstances, it surpasses that infl uence. You will fi nd that your kids want to please you more than anyone else, and this simple fact can place tremendous pressure on you. It should guide your every action.

We believe that your responsibilities as a youth soccer coach are easily stated:

Fun

Learning

Individual development

Winning

...in that order!Let's look at each one in turn.

Fun:It may come as a surprise to some of the parents of the players, but 99 percent of their kids are playing soccer because they want to have fun playing it. Those kids in your charge, Coach, have joined the league and your team to enjoy themselves. The minute you lose sight of that as your principal motivating factor, you're in trouble.

Learning:Twenty years ago we said youth league soccer coaches had further to go than youth league coaches in other sports because we didn't know this game! We said players' and coaches' ignorance meant coaches had more work to do to learn the game. That isn't nearly as true today as then -- soccer is part of physical education programs now, and most colleges have teams. But though PE teachers are taught how to coach soccer, most adult coaches still need to know the game to make sure their players learn. To us, learning is the second most important responsibility of the youth league coach. The days of the uninformed soccer coach throwing out the ball to scrimmage and calling it a practice are over. Your goal is to make your players into students of the game and help them learn all they can about this great sport.

Individual Development:A nine- year- old should be compared with himself, not every other nine- year- old. You help a team develop by helping each individual. And if you've succeeded in helping most of your athletes become better soccer players by the last week of the season, you're a winning coach, regardless of your record.

Winning:We believe the outcome of the game yields winners and learners -- there are no losers. Winning is important and needs to be an important part of the development of soccer players. But perspective becomes the important consideration, because while winning is important and must be part of the education process of an athlete, it needs to be understood as the result of hard work and individual development. The coach who succeeds in teaching the sport -- individually and to a group -- will fi nd success in the won/ lost column. The coach who helps the team keep winning or losing in perspective will fi nd success in the personal development column.

THE BALL STOPS HERE

Coaches in volunteer leagues are often acquired like goalies: no one wants to do the job, so someone gets drafted. You may have come to your soccer duties purely out of love for the sport or, like many, out of love for your child. Any coach, regardless of experience, though, has to have knowledge of the sport and the ability to impart that knowledge to the kids. If you have come to your soccer team because your child wanted to play and no one else was there to teach or lead the team, how you deal with these two issues may well determine if the players have a positive or a negative experience.

Copyright © 1987, 2007 by Jim San Marco and Kurt Aschermann

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Excerpted from Coaching Kids to Play Soccer: Everything You Need to Know to Coach Kids from 6 To 16 by Kurt Aschermann, Jim San Marco
All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.