Mean Girls

[Anonymous]

How to Help Your Child Handle Mean Girls on Her Team

DD, U13 is on the top team at a big club, been getting picked on and verbally targeted by two girls on her team.

One of them is a “star player” with a nasty, sassy attitude — the classic mean-girl type who gets away with everything. She’s loud, constantly yelling at everyone because she’s the captain, and acts like she can do no wrong. Her behavior is rude and disrespectful, both on and off the field, and her mom never steps in or corrects her. This makes practices really uncomfortable for dd and others.

The other girl is also very loud — she spends most of practice screaming at teammates to pass the ball, literally yelling her head off the entire time.

I’m trying to figure out how to help my daughter handle this situation and deal with the negativity during practices.

[Anonymous]

This has got to be a troll.

There’s zero opportunity for a parent to ‘step in’ to correct a player during practice or a game. I’m also not aware of any of the ECNL clubs near us that have captains. Maybe in the DC area, but not in our region.

If, by chance this is true, then the herd will work its magic and slowly freeze her out.

[Anonymous]

Report it to the coach . He will be able to handle the bullying.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Report it to the coach . He will be able to handle the bullying.

Report to the coach? Oh, so naive. There are coaches who not only know about and permit this behavior, they enable it under the premise of a “competitive” environment. We know the ones.

[Anonymous]

This sounds like it is written by AI. My kid also on a quote top team has to navigate social nuances at school. She also has to do it on the soccer field. Not everyone her team has to be her friend and she is ok with that.

[Anonymous]

Some clubs actively encourage this behavior and think it's all apart of winning. They call them alphas.

Not easy and maybe it gets worse before it gets better, but it sounds like your kid needs to stand up to it if she's to not be picked on. Or, try to get them to talk to the coach about it. These is all important learning moments.

Worse-case scenario, you may want to think about other clubs. Kid may want to quit the team.

Then again, depending on their birth month, they might be in another age group next year.

[Anonymous]

Typical deflections going on in the responses that lead to nothing getting done because you all have accepted it as the "norm." IT'S NOT OK and never has been. Two kids shouldn't be ruining the environment for 13 or so other kids. You are all fine with it until your kid is on the receiving end of it with no recourse. Only then will it be a problem. Par for the course for human behavior, so I'm not surprised

[Anonymous]

Hip check. Slide tackle.

Problem solved

[Anonymous]

I believe you, because I saw it happen. Not on a private team, but in middle school PE, when the sporty kids, who were in private teams, would talk down terribly to the non-sporty kids unused to the game. My non-sporty daughter decided to act completely helpless, so the self-styled captain could scream her heart out during the entire period and do all the work. At some point, the other girl finally caught on and asked DD: "Are you doing this on purpose?" DD said "What do you think?" and the girl finally calmed down.

I'm sorry your kid can't react in the same way, but they can silently rebel by taking matters into their own hands and pass the ball to someone else. There are so many ways to let someone know you don't respect them...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I believe you, because I saw it happen. Not on a private team, but in middle school PE, when the sporty kids, who were in private teams, would talk down terribly to the non-sporty kids unused to the game. My non-sporty daughter decided to act completely helpless, so the self-styled captain could scream her heart out during the entire period and do all the work. At some point, the other girl finally caught on and asked DD: "Are you doing this on purpose?" DD said "What do you think?" and the girl finally calmed down.

I'm sorry your kid can't react in the same way, but they can silently rebel by taking matters into their own hands and pass the ball to someone else. There are so many ways to let someone know you don't respect them...

Embarrassed for you

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I believe you, because I saw it happen. Not on a private team, but in middle school PE, when the sporty kids, who were in private teams, would talk down terribly to the non-sporty kids unused to the game. My non-sporty daughter decided to act completely helpless, so the self-styled captain could scream her heart out during the entire period and do all the work. At some point, the other girl finally caught on and asked DD: "Are you doing this on purpose?" DD said "What do you think?" and the girl finally calmed down.

I'm sorry your kid can't react in the same way, but they can silently rebel by taking matters into their own hands and pass the ball to someone else. There are so many ways to let someone know you don't respect them...

Embarrassed for you

You are what's wrong with kid sports, then.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I believe you, because I saw it happen. Not on a private team, but in middle school PE, when the sporty kids, who were in private teams, would talk down terribly to the non-sporty kids unused to the game. My non-sporty daughter decided to act completely helpless, so the self-styled captain could scream her heart out during the entire period and do all the work. At some point, the other girl finally caught on and asked DD: "Are you doing this on purpose?" DD said "What do you think?" and the girl finally calmed down.

I'm sorry your kid can't react in the same way, but they can silently rebel by taking matters into their own hands and pass the ball to someone else. There are so many ways to let someone know you don't respect them...

Sounds like a Charlie Brown comic with the girl bully as Lucy.

[Anonymous]

We are U12 and we have 2x girls on the team that are terrible this way. 100% it is brought on by the parents. This is how they talk to their kids in public and now the kids talk to the their teammates this way. Its exhausting. One time, we had a game where both of those players were gone and the whole team was magically happy again.

Sometimes, the Coach or Parent pushes the kid to "step-up" and be a leader on the field. -Give me a break. No Coach should ever single out some pre-teen to be a leader on the field. The kids do not have the mental capacity to handle those kids of demands on the field. The captain's arm-band should be rotated around to all players. True, healthy team leadership does not emerge until kids are about 17 years old.

I would send a message to the coach to work on some team bonding types of exercises and lay out your concerns. Explain the importance of having the kids talk to each other in a positive & supporting way.

Trust me, most of the other kids on the team probably do not like it either.

[Anonymous]

Like the last post says. Building a supportive culture where the girls encourage them to do the right things on the pitch is what you want.

Getting there requires the coach and parents to call out their kids from bullying -- not the easy part. Even better teams may face problems. That's life, nothing is perfect.

Nothing wrong with advocating for your kid -- at the same time, tho, them learning how to do it themselves becomes more and more important as they grow, especially if they want to be an elite soccer player OR elite whatever in life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I believe you, because I saw it happen. Not on a private team, but in middle school PE, when the sporty kids, who were in private teams, would talk down terribly to the non-sporty kids unused to the game. My non-sporty daughter decided to act completely helpless, so the self-styled captain could scream her heart out during the entire period and do all the work. At some point, the other girl finally caught on and asked DD: "Are you doing this on purpose?" DD said "What do you think?" and the girl finally calmed down.

I'm sorry your kid can't react in the same way, but they can silently rebel by taking matters into their own hands and pass the ball to someone else. There are so many ways to let someone know you don't respect them...

Like this post.