The Development years - Direct (Kickball) versus Possession Style

[Anonymous]

Read an article from Soccer America that goes into it a bit. This was the Arlington/Alexandria U-10 Virginia Cup Final.

https://www.socceramerica.com/publications/article/82566/a-refs-view-playing-styles-clash-amid-the-scream.html

Let the debate begin!!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Read an article from Soccer America that goes into it a bit. This was the Arlington/Alexandria U-10 Virginia Cup Final.

https://www.socceramerica.com/publications/article/82566/a-refs-view-playing-styles-clash-amid-the-scream.html

Let the debate begin!!!

Interesting read. I always felt that unlimited substitutions help the kickball teams by allowing the to infuse fresh legs every five minutes or so and play at an unrealistic pace. If you limit the number of substitutions, the teams that cannot control possession will lose most of the time.

[Anonymous]

It would be good if the refs stop the game to talk to both coaches if a coach or parent excessively yell negative comments. But I can see this gets abused with the winning team’s parent purposely yelling to waste time so the other team doesn’t have adequate time so score.

[Anonymous]

In the younger years, go with the classiest coaches.

I have moved my kids from Clubs with coaches that play antics and scream the entire game and I don't care if they are 'winning' or the biggest.best.Club in the area. They raising a generation of little sh*ts and a sideline of awful parents.

My kids play for a Club where the coaches are virtually silent during matches. They don't get overly emotional. They don't scream at the refs. They are managing their players emotions (esp the 13/14 year olds) when the testosterone is raging and they start getting mouthy. They will pull even their star out of the game and have him sit for awhile.

They have the players shake the refs hands after the match even if they didn't care for the calls. It's sport and it's over at the end.

I will never understand the screaming at a ref. I played soccer for 25 years quite competitively and the only thing I learned is that if you scream at the ref that most likely the future questionable calls will not go your way the rest of the game or you will be booted from the field and be watching it from the sidelines. My boys know this and don't do this. IF either of my sons snapped at the refs or their coach or teammates, they would be in a whole helluva lot of trouble later that day.

And, my number 1 pet peeve of all time, is the sideline coaching from parents. I literally want to neck throttle parents when they start doing it. And, once one starts in they all start getting worked up and the entire sideline changes. And, here's the thing, by the time your voice reaches the field a player has already had to make a decision in his/her head. You are already 3 steps behind. This is leaving out the fact that the majority of these sideline offenders don't even know what the hell they are watching and are often yelling things completely contradictory to what the coach has told the players to do.

Kids learn by making decisions themselves on the field. And, most often, it's the WRONG decisions that end up making the biggest change in their future play. They will never forget they were the reason a goal went in by leaving a man unmarked or that they weren't at the outside post in time when the cross was made. let.them.make.mistakes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In the younger years, go with the classiest coaches.

I have moved my kids from Clubs with coaches that play antics and scream the entire game and I don't care if they are 'winning' or the biggest.best.Club in the area. They raising a generation of little sh*ts and a sideline of awful parents.

My kids play for a Club where the coaches are virtually silent during matches. They don't get overly emotional. They don't scream at the refs. They are managing their players emotions (esp the 13/14 year olds) when the testosterone is raging and they start getting mouthy. They will pull even their star out of the game and have him sit for awhile.

They have the players shake the refs hands after the match even if they didn't care for the calls. It's sport and it's over at the end.

I will never understand the screaming at a ref. I played soccer for 25 years quite competitively and the only thing I learned is that if you scream at the ref that most likely the future questionable calls will not go your way the rest of the game or you will be booted from the field and be watching it from the sidelines. My boys know this and don't do this. IF either of my sons snapped at the refs or their coach or teammates, they would be in a whole helluva lot of trouble later that day.

And, my number 1 pet peeve of all time, is the sideline coaching from parents. I literally want to neck throttle parents when they start doing it. And, once one starts in they all start getting worked up and the entire sideline changes. And, here's the thing, by the time your voice reaches the field a player has already had to make a decision in his/her head. You are already 3 steps behind. This is leaving out the fact that the majority of these sideline offenders don't even know what the hell they are watching and are often yelling things completely contradictory to what the coach has told the players to do.

Kids learn by making decisions themselves on the field. And, most often, it's the WRONG decisions that end up making the biggest change in their future play. They will never forget they were the reason a goal went in by leaving a man unmarked or that they weren't at the outside post in time when the cross was made. let.them.make.mistakes.

I have definitely been one of these parents. I used to rationalize it but there is no good reason to say anything to any player, coach or referee during a game and I would have despised it when I was younger. (My parents never went to games and other parents stayed quiet many years ago.). I have reined it in considerably since moving to a club and team where sidewhining/yelling is strongly discouraged. Still working on losing the actual impulse to say something.

[Anonymous]

did people read the article linked there?

talks about the benefits of direct soccer
https://www.socceramerica.com/publications/article/81583/have-we-been-too-harsh-on-direct-soccer.html

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:did people read the article linked there?

talks about the benefits of direct soccer
https://www.socceramerica.com/publications/article/81583/have-we-been-too-harsh-on-direct-soccer.html

Both articles written by the same idiot. Not my words.

[Anonymous]

From the 2nd article:

The funny thing is that no self-respecting club will admit to having that “other” team. In several years of research that includes perusing scores of youth club websites, I have yet to find that “other” team. No one says, “We’re going to play Route 1 soccer and win State Cups.”

I definitely had a well-known U15/U16/U17 boys' coach in the area tell me, during a discussion of tryouts, that it is his deliberate decision to play big, fast boys who run hard at the goal and not teach them possession or tactics in order to be as competitive as possible. And his teams have won State cups in past years up to U15. Funny how that advantage melts away after U15.

So some people definitely DO say that.

[Anonymous]

It works... as long as no other team can play any form of possession soccer. Watch 1A / 2A boys soccer high school teams (small high schools from small towns across virginia) in the state finals and see for yourself.

[Anonymous]

Which team was the team the ref liked better?

[Anonymous]

Direct soccer is not the same as kickball. Kickball is simply kicking the ball forward to advance it with no real intent on getting the ball to a certain teammate. We can all agree the pure kickball is a poor approach unless completely outmatched and the team is simply fighting for its life. Even then it would be better to attempt to play good soccer.

Direct soccer is a conscious tactic to swiftly but accurately positively penetrate the other team’s defense causing a breakdown or numbers mismatch and therefore a scoring opportunity. Direct soccer tactics are great and when mixed with possession soccer create superior results. Just ask Liverpool and France. Too much possession stagnates an offense (see Germany’s performance in 2018 WC and Japan women’s recent performance against Argentina). Too much direct soccer spreads your own defense thin leading to counter attack opportunities. They must be balanced and taught consistently by coaches including the subtle art of understanding when to possess and when to be direct.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Direct soccer is not the same as kickball. Kickball is simply kicking the ball forward to advance it with no real intent on getting the ball to a certain teammate. We can all agree the pure kickball is a poor approach unless completely outmatched and the team is simply fighting for its life. Even then it would be better to attempt to play good soccer.

Direct soccer is a conscious tactic to swiftly but accurately positively penetrate the other team’s defense causing a breakdown or numbers mismatch and therefore a scoring opportunity. Direct soccer tactics are great and when mixed with possession soccer create superior results. Just ask Liverpool and France. Too much possession stagnates an offense (see Germany’s performance in 2018 WC and Japan women’s recent performance against Argentina). Too much direct soccer spreads your own defense thin leading to counter attack opportunities. They must be balanced and taught consistently by coaches including the subtle art of understanding when to possess and when to be direct.

Thank you. All of these people talking about kickball, but misunderstanding actual tactics of playing direct.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Read an article from Soccer America that goes into it a bit. This was the Arlington/Alexandria U-10 Virginia Cup Final.

https://www.socceramerica.com/publications/article/82566/a-refs-view-playing-styles-clash-amid-the-scream.html

Let the debate begin!!!

Interesting article, in that the referee/author had an obvious bias toward one of the teams.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Direct soccer is not the same as kickball. Kickball is simply kicking the ball forward to advance it with no real intent on getting the ball to a certain teammate. We can all agree the pure kickball is a poor approach unless completely outmatched and the team is simply fighting for its life. Even then it would be better to attempt to play good soccer.

Direct soccer is a conscious tactic to swiftly but accurately positively penetrate the other team’s defense causing a breakdown or numbers mismatch and therefore a scoring opportunity. Direct soccer tactics are great and when mixed with possession soccer create superior results. Just ask Liverpool and France. Too much possession stagnates an offense (see Germany’s performance in 2018 WC and Japan women’s recent performance against Argentina). Too much direct soccer spreads your own defense thin leading to counter attack opportunities. They must be balanced and taught consistently by coaches including the subtle art of understanding when to possess and when to be direct.

Thank you. All of these people talking about kickball, but misunderstanding actual tactics of playing direct.

But again, direct play is not something that should be prioritized at any of the youngest age groups. The focus on results and direct play at the young ages is why we have "top" players unable to do the basics like passing and trapping accurately to the correct foot, with the correct foot and with the body in the correct position. Those are the intricacies that are not taught here and kids at U9 are definitely capable of starting to learn these things so that they become engrained in them as players.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Direct soccer is not the same as kickball. Kickball is simply kicking the ball forward to advance it with no real intent on getting the ball to a certain teammate. We can all agree the pure kickball is a poor approach unless completely outmatched and the team is simply fighting for its life. Even then it would be better to attempt to play good soccer.

Direct soccer is a conscious tactic to swiftly but accurately positively penetrate the other team’s defense causing a breakdown or numbers mismatch and therefore a scoring opportunity. Direct soccer tactics are great and when mixed with possession soccer create superior results. Just ask Liverpool and France. Too much possession stagnates an offense (see Germany’s performance in 2018 WC and Japan women’s recent performance against Argentina). Too much direct soccer spreads your own defense thin leading to counter attack opportunities. They must be balanced and taught consistently by coaches including the subtle art of understanding when to possess and when to be direct.

Thank you. All of these people talking about kickball, but misunderstanding actual tactics of playing direct.

But again, direct play is not something that should be prioritized at any of the youngest age groups. The focus on results and direct play at the young ages is why we have "top" players unable to do the basics like passing and trapping accurately to the correct foot, with the correct foot and with the body in the correct position. Those are the intricacies that are not taught here and kids at U9 are definitely capable of starting to learn these things so that they become engrained in them as players.

My impression of Arlington (the team accused of kickball here) is that at the younger ages the focus is very heavy on the technical basics, and much less on tactical game day play (i.e. possession, direct, etc). Ironically the author in another thread praised the Arlington White team for playing his approved-of style, even though they have the same coach and training as the team he dislikes so much, so this should all be taken with a little salt for sure.