How to support son re travel soccer tryout

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

RantingSoccerDad wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Contact the coaches and have your son practice with the team/club age-group outside of the tryout process. It's getting late in the spring season so there may not be many of those opportunities left.

I wouldn't sweat it too much. Many clubs will find a team for your player especially after the first check clears.

I really wish we'd stop saying that. At U9 and U10, the bigger clubs typically have twice as many kids trying out as they have spots available. No checks can change the basic math.

Yes, you could race around to a smaller club. Not sure if it's still the case with the merger, but Great Falls used to be pretty wide-open. Maybe Cugini, FCBescola, PAC, some other smaller club. That may or may not work.

But let's quit telling parents, "oh, anyone can play travel." It's not always true.

No it is pretty much true. Big clubs are not terribly selective, they simply find the suitable placement for the kid. They will continue to add teams as long as a basic level of talent supports another team. Arlington and Loudoun will go up to 6 teams deep if they need to. If the kid can play soccer he will find a travel team.

Just saying, Arlington teams placed in almost all ages, sexes and tournaments this past Memorial weekend. Their 6 teams, and less at older ages, are all still competitive despite the number of teams.

How does that refute that large clubs find the right level for players?

[Anonymous]

let's not talk about why Arlington teams do well in tournaments.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here, thank you all. He knows that he needs to perform differently at the next tryouts. Even if he does, I'm not sure it will be sufficient. He would be happy with an offer from any level of our league's travel teams. If it doesn't happen this year, I'll encourage him to do the summer futsal offered through our county, play rec next year, keep practicing, and try again next year.

Sounds like a good plan. My DS tried out for a travel basketball team for the first time last year and didn't make it. DH and I both thought he'd be pretty upset if he didn't make the team but he wasn't. And, I don't think he was just pretending not be upset. As parents, if we take "failure" in stride, it might help our kids do the same. And I personally want to be careful not to in any way hold back my DS in aiming for big things because I'm too worried he'll be very disappointed if he fails. I don't want to transmit any doubts I may have about his abilities but I don't want to over-inflate him either. So, I'm trying to step back.

[Anonymous]

OP here, thank you again. I think he'll ultimately be able to make peach with the situation either way, and it isn't important to me personally except that I want him to be happy. It is just really odd, because he had rec practice last night, and the level of aggression and involvement he showed was so far superior to what he showed at travel tryouts - and he's on a pretty strong rec team with a few kids who formerly did a year of travel but didn't want to continue, so the issue isn't just the quality of the other players. If he tries out again next year, I will probably ask if he can practice a few times with the team first before tryouts so he can get more comfortable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:let's not talk about why Arlington teams do well in tournaments.

I assume you mean they're playing down purposely to be successful. I don't know if they do that as a general matter, but in my kid's Virginian division last weekend, the Arlington team (Blue -- so I guess the C team if you count the DA team?) was much weaker than the other teams. I'm not sure if they intentionally challenged themselves, but they did challenge themselves.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here, thank you again. I think he'll ultimately be able to make peach with the situation either way, and it isn't important to me personally except that I want him to be happy. It is just really odd, because he had rec practice last night, and the level of aggression and involvement he showed was so far superior to what he showed at travel tryouts - and he's on a pretty strong rec team with a few kids who formerly did a year of travel but didn't want to continue, so the issue isn't just the quality of the other players. If he tries out again next year, I will probably ask if he can practice a few times with the team first before tryouts so he can get more comfortable.

Be careful about practicing with the first team. I took my DS to one practice with an A team prior to tryouts to get a feel for the level of play and skill the players had. It was an utter disaster. My DS is a strong player and is technically sound but he felt a bit out of place and lost all confidence and looked like he didn't belong in travel altogether. Furthermore, an impression was formed about him and I am certain it negatively impacted him during tryouts as he was placed on the C team. It was demoralizing for DS to see players that weren't as good as him get placed higher. He even stopped playing soccer in the backyard and asked to play pitch and catch with a baseball, something he haden't done in two years!

I strongly advise additional training throughout the year. Being on a strong rec teams almost means nothing when compared to A teams in travel. There is a significant gap.

[Anonymous]

OP here, thank you again. I think he'll ultimately be able to make peach with the situation either way, and it isn't important to me personally except that I want him to be happy. It is just really odd, because he had rec practice last night, and the level of aggression and involvement he showed was so far superior to what he showed at travel tryouts - and he's on a pretty strong rec team with a few kids who formerly did a year of travel but didn't want to continue, so the issue isn't just the quality of the other players. If he tries out again next year, I will probably ask if he can practice a few times with the team first before tryouts so he can get more comfortable.


Be careful about practicing with the first team. I took my DS to one practice with an A team prior to tryouts to get a feel for the level of play and skill the players had. It was an utter disaster. My DS is a strong player and is technically sound but he felt a bit out of place and lost all confidence and looked like he didn't belong in travel altogether. Furthermore, an impression was formed about him and I am certain it negatively impacted him during tryouts as he was placed on the C team. It was demoralizing for DS to see players that weren't as good as him get placed higher. He even stopped playing soccer in the backyard and asked to play pitch and catch with a baseball, something he haden't done in two years!

I strongly advise additional training throughout the year. Being on a strong rec teams almost means nothing when compared to A teams in travel. There is a significant gap.

That makes sense. I was not planning on asking to have him practice with the highest level team - it truly does not matter to us which level team he gets on. If he is not offered a spot in travel this year we will certainly do additional training next year while he does rec.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here, thank you again. I think he'll ultimately be able to make peach with the situation either way, and it isn't important to me personally except that I want him to be happy. It is just really odd, because he had rec practice last night, and the level of aggression and involvement he showed was so far superior to what he showed at travel tryouts - and he's on a pretty strong rec team with a few kids who formerly did a year of travel but didn't want to continue, so the issue isn't just the quality of the other players. If he tries out again next year, I will probably ask if he can practice a few times with the team first before tryouts so he can get more comfortable.

Be careful about practicing with the first team. I took my DS to one practice with an A team prior to tryouts to get a feel for the level of play and skill the players had. It was an utter disaster. My DS is a strong player and is technically sound but he felt a bit out of place and lost all confidence and looked like he didn't belong in travel altogether. Furthermore, an impression was formed about him and I am certain it negatively impacted him during tryouts as he was placed on the C team. It was demoralizing for DS to see players that weren't as good as him get placed higher. He even stopped playing soccer in the backyard and asked to play pitch and catch with a baseball, something he haden't done in two years!

I strongly advise additional training throughout the year. Being on a strong rec teams almost means nothing when compared to A teams in travel. There is a significant gap.

Yep rec and travel are different sports. The older the age group the hard to break in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here, thank you all. He knows that he needs to perform differently at the next tryouts. Even if he does, I'm not sure it will be sufficient. He would be happy with an offer from any level of our league's travel teams. If it doesn't happen this year, I'll encourage him to do the summer futsal offered through our county, play rec next year, keep practicing, and try again next year.

As another poster mentioned earlier, best thing you can do is help him shift his focus. Two general points - people perform best when they focus on (1) things they can control; and (2) the present. If he is at the tryout and thinking about whether he's going to make it or not, his focus is on a future event that is beyond his control. So no wonder he's nervous. Then the lack of focus on the present has the immediate consequence of reduced performance level, which makes his confidence plummet even further, ... it's a vicious cycle and can be incredibly painful to watch.

In my experience if your player has anxiety issues it's important to talk to them about these things. Help them understand what is happening when they allow their thoughts to drift that way. Assure them that feeling nervous is normal, and OK. Point out that there are many things about the game they can't control - what the coach thinks, how good the other players are, whether anyone passes to them or not, ... even whether they play well or not. Everyone has bad days. So it does no good to worry or focus on those things. What they can control is their effort and focus.

"Do you believe you can work hard and give your best effort for all 90 minutes of the session?"
"Do you believe you can pay attention and listen to the coach every time he or she speaks?"
"Can you try to be one of the 1st to come back after every water break? Can you jog back every time instead of walking?"
"Can you try to have a positive reaction every time you make a mistake?"

Depending on their level and experience in the game, you could also add some technical things to focus on.

"Can you try to remember to stay on your toes, move to open space, and be vocal when your team has the ball?"
"Can you remember to keep looking around the field and try to think about what you are going to do before the ball gets to you?"
"Can you remember to stay low, keep your feet moving, eyes on the ball and force the attacker one way when you're defending 1v1?"

These are just examples, but the point is it's useful to give them some specific and helpful things to focus on, rather than just generally "you need to play better". And really, really emphasize the importance of effort. Remind them that no matter how well or poorly they play, they will still feel good about themselves afterwords if they can walk off the field knowing that at least they tried their best.

Hopefully that helps, but don't expect that you're just going to be able to just give your kid one good pep talk and all of his issues will magically go away forever. It's a process, but you have to start somewhere.

Good luck.

[Anonymous]

This is fantastic advice. Are you a coach?! (Please say yes!)

[Anonymous]

RantingSoccerDad wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Contact the coaches and have your son practice with the team/club age-group outside of the tryout process. It's getting late in the spring season so there may not be many of those opportunities left.

I wouldn't sweat it too much. Many clubs will find a team for your player especially after the first check clears.

I really wish we'd stop saying that. At U9 and U10, the bigger clubs typically have twice as many kids trying out as they have spots available. No checks can change the basic math.

Yes, you could race around to a smaller club. Not sure if it's still the case with the merger, but Great Falls used to be pretty wide-open. Maybe Cugini, FCBescola, PAC, some other smaller club. That may or may not work.

But let's quit telling parents, "oh, anyone can play travel." It's not always true.

Not a soccer parent here.

Don't almost all if not all kids who play soccer past 3rd grade play on some sort of travel team, be it a Travel team.or a "travel" team?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

RantingSoccerDad wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Contact the coaches and have your son practice with the team/club age-group outside of the tryout process. It's getting late in the spring season so there may not be many of those opportunities left.

I wouldn't sweat it too much. Many clubs will find a team for your player especially after the first check clears.

I really wish we'd stop saying that. At U9 and U10, the bigger clubs typically have twice as many kids trying out as they have spots available. No checks can change the basic math.

Yes, you could race around to a smaller club. Not sure if it's still the case with the merger, but Great Falls used to be pretty wide-open. Maybe Cugini, FCBescola, PAC, some other smaller club. That may or may not work.

But let's quit telling parents, "oh, anyone can play travel." It's not always true.

Not a soccer parent here.

Don't almost all if not all kids who play soccer past 3rd grade play on some sort of travel team, be it a Travel team.or a "travel" team?

No.

[Anonymous]

All your kid needs is one good tryout. Don't lose hope. If your child winds up not making it, there are plenty of other clubs who are desperate for players at that age.

[Anonymous]

Any updates? Did he try out anywhere else? Did he make it?

Rooting for him ...

[Anonymous]

OP here. Thank you. They are supposed to let us know by today. Unfortunately, since I WOH full time, I need him to be able to carpool with other kids some days, which limits our ability to try for other leagues. I am really hoping it works out, but if it doesn't will try again next year. We also just met a family that lives near us that does a league a bit farther away, so will try for that one next year as well. We would be happy with any level of team, any reasonable driving distance.