The Beauty of the Beautiful Game: Watching them discover the game!

Soccer is so perfect.  It is so complex yet when played perfectly so simple.  Why is the game great?  You don't even need goals to play!!!!  When you see kids experience this, it can be inspiring.

My college coach once told me something so important when I informed him that I wanted to "coach" soccer.  He said, "working with older players can be a rewarding challenge, but if you ever want to discover how good or bad of a coach you really are then go coach the U-11's and younger."  "It represents a true discovery of the game right before your eyes."  Thank you Coach!

Since starting to work with the youth players, I have had moments of great satisfaction and even greater dissatisfaction with my abilities as a coach.  My session last night was a composite of both.

Recently, I was running a clinic with our town U-9/10/11 year old groups with the purpose of the players improving their ability to see a problem (cramped space) and solving it (by moving the ball to a different less cramped part of the field).  Part of my session involved "Two goal" soccer (attack two, defend two) which went very well and accomplished what I was looking for.

But another part was a game called "Don't feed the monkeys".  It involves passing/receiving with the opportunity to change the "point of attack" when needed.  I have used this activity before successfully with my older groups U-14+.  However, these types of activities involve rules and boundaries.   Some U-10's get it right away and some... not so much.   Movement off the ball was the biggest issue I had as many felt that it was a "game" and not soccer so they would stay in one area waiting for the ball to come to them.  Oh man, the waiting and standing kills me.  Is there really anything worse?
 
Then I decided to fix and make it better by scrapping the activity.  Instead......let us feed the monkeys. PLAY KEEP AWAY!  It is so old school and so dependable.  Every three passes in a row equals a point, game to 10, no boundaries.  I have used it before and always forget how incredibly productive it is.  It is represents the bulk of the game, the essence all boiled down into a game within a game.  It is everything that is great about soccer less the goals and saves. 

It was awesome watching them using their vision habits we have worked on, moving off the ball constantly to support but not crowd, getting the ball away from pressure.  But most exciting was that they were being responsible for the possession of the one item that truly matters the most in the game, the ball.

It was a moment of pure satisfaction watching the beautiful game unfold right before my eyes.  Everything I know our American youth are capable of because I have seen youth of the same age in other countries do it, came to fruition.  It was like watching evolution happen with a soccer ball.  Problem solving at its best!  The cherry on top was that when they went to play with nets it all translated.  They had brought the concept of possession into the game.