Hawks Youth Withdean FC

"As a club we will experience the many issues our culture of youth football brings, we often witness 'result' orientated coaching and 'intimidation' from managers, coaches & parents but hopefully through our club awareness and the 'Saturday Soccer School' phylosophy it is possible to develop future players technically and tactically within the club and avoid the dissapointment of players deciding the game is not offering them a positive experience and giving up a sport they enjoy.
I'm under no illusion that every match day can't be completely planned and the emotion during the development of a match can be an influence on decision making which is part of the coaches reason for being there.
However communication and the information players recive prior to a game is the key to their understanding of how matchday may develop and most importantly parents will accept the decisions made when it is an honest and fair reflection throughout a season."




Keeping Your Best Players On The Pitch
A question that we often get asked is how can I keep my best players on the pitch and still effectively give everyone a game and keep everyone happy?

This is a dilemma that most coaches and managers experience in the course of a season but with a little planning, in terms of starting line up and substitutions you can achieve this tough balancing act.

You can make the process of keeping everyone happy with a little forward planning. But, before you name the starting line up it's important to manage the expectations of all players.

Reminding your players and the parents, that it doesn't matter too much what the starting line up is, because those players that you've selected for the game will play a part in the fixture. How long they play is entirely down to your judgement, we have a couple of "weaker" players in my squad, so at the beginning of the season, I was quite clear that they might not get so much time in the tougher fixtures.

So when I look at the fixture list, I can pick out the games where I want my strongest team possible on the pitch and manage expectations well in advance.

However, where I think we have a far greater chance of winning the game, then I will include the "weaker" players in the starting line up. All parents, no matter what ability level their child is at, wants to see their child in the starting line up from time to time. So be selective in your starting line ups. Make sure you know what fixtures you've got coming up and ensure that you mix and match appropriately.

But how can you manage the whole squad and ensure that the team isn't weakened by whole sale rotations during the fixture?

Well, lets work on the premise that your squad is made up of mixed abilities, you want to keep the best team on the pitch but you want to make sure that you aren't under fire from the sidelines because of your selections.

Over time, you and more importantly the parents will know who the best players are in the team. Ideally, when you name your starting line up you need to keep three or four strong players on the pitch. This rule of thumb also applies to substitutions as well.

In other words... don't take off the spine of the team all at the same time and have your best players warming the bench, while the rest of the team are struggling. To prevent this from happening, you must have a game plan in mind.

Where possible I like to start with the strongest possible team and set them the challenge of putting some early scores on the board in the first period. By having a 2 or 3 goal lead at the end of the first period, I can then change the team more freely and not worry too much about the changes in personnel and positions.

However, one thing I never do is weaken the team by making a substitution. You can avoid this by shuffling your team around and making sure that you have strength in the area's where you think you maybe weak. For example, I will tend to put weaker players up front and then shuffle stronger players into midfield or into defense.

If you think a player will struggle in a position and put your team in danger, then don't put them in that position.

It is important to realise every team has different dynamics and expectations and with everyone understanding those at the start of a season the players and parents will respect the challenges as a group for that season.

So in summary, always make sure that you...

keep key players in key positions
keep a strong spine to your team



plan your substitutions, and
manage parent and player expectations.


Have a great weekend and may your best team win...