My U14 girl is headed into her 2nd year on the full sized field. Endurance to last the full 70 minute game is what she needed to adjust to the most. Mine is born near the beginning of November and considered small too. Her coach told the girls to jog for 2 miles, working up to 4 miles on off weekends.

Coaches kept telling our daughter to just keep at it and she'll be a better player than other girls at 11v11 compared to 7v7 and 9v9. She has good foot skills/ball skills and on the bigger field, she has more space to pass/dribble. Size matters but not as much as on the small field.

^ eg the kids praised for the big kicks on the smaller field who ended up lacking endurance on the big field were subsequently yelled at by coaches for “big kicks to nowhere”. Technical and strategic kids definitely ended up as better players than ones that just had “big kicks” in the younger years.

One thing notable on our team when we moved from 12 U to the big field is some of the kids that seem to stand out no longer did because they haven’t didn’t have the endurance. Meanwhile, girls with really good technical skills who didn’t stand out as much on the smaller field certainly did on the bigger field. Some players who used to be the goal scoring strikers were put in as Center mids and were not happy about it, but ended up being the strongest part of the team. These are all just anatomical examples but a word of advice for your player to work hard and go with the flow. Be willing to play any position. My daughter who used to be a striker is now a very strong center back and loving it.

Anonymous wrote:My daughter is U 15 and there’s no one over 5’5 on her team. All teams are different when it comes to size. Running is super important so if she can work on endurance over the next several weeks that will help her. Good players do not get subbed out very often.

+1 Practicing running for endurance is the biggest thing. Everyone will need to figure out how to adjust their passing on the bigger field, but the girls who consistently get tired during the first half are going to get less playing time. It's great if she's fast, but she needs to be able to sustain that over (potentially) a whole game, especially if she plays wing.

My daughter is U 15 and there’s no one over 5’5 on her team. All teams are different when it comes to size. Running is super important so if she can work on endurance over the next several weeks that will help her. Good players do not get subbed out very often.

Scoring drops off significantly moving to the larger field and more players.

Shooting becomes much more important with fewer scoring chances, and usually from farther away.

Players continue to hit puberty. My DD played U13 (age 12) at 5’7”, 140 pounds, and was the third tallest on her team.

Speed is good, but learning to make diagonal runs without the ball is more important. As previously mentioned, it’s hard to outrun a pass.

There will be more chances to use her speed with more space on the larger field. But one of the biggest changes for players moving to 11v11 is to learn to not always use their speed because they will tire out and the ball can travel faster than they can run. A good team will have defenders chasing the ball around the field. Technical skills will matter more as she gets older so she should always be working on those. The transition isn't usually a big deal because all U13's are going through the same learning curves.

I find 11v11 is much better to watch kids play. More time and space, more passes strung together, more tactical with different formations.

FWIW, I have a kid the same age, also younger and smaller playing the same positions who reported that after getting used to 11x11 in the first match, the transition was NBD.

Moving up now in age, DD will be playing 11x11 on the larger field per U13. Unfortunately, with a birthday in Dec, she is also the youngest on her team She's about 5 foot 1 so she's not too small but a lot of her peers are taller/bigger than her being a year or so older.

Was just curious how transitioning play to U13.. what helped/would help a girl get ready for 11x11 play? Do the girls play for a much shorter time on the field?

She also moved up to a pretty strong team level for the Fall so will be a new team she is on. I'm a bit nervous because of that too..

She plays striker but sometimes wing/midfielder. In the past, they liked to play her defense too but really offense is where she's been hugely successful in comparison and she enjoys the striker position. She's crazy psycho fast, but her speed is not endurance based - it's just that ability to zoom when she wants - she told me it comes when she really wants to get to the ball in specific situations, she can just be so Fing fast. She runs fast too but it's different to see on the field between when she's running and zooming LOL Her coaches say she's pretty strong technically although I don't really see it but I don't play soccer either I think in practice she's technical but on the field, I feel like she could really improve her reaction times. By her own mission, she doesn't really dribble that well..

Just curious how her speed may be affected and what to watch out for transitioning to 11x11 larger field.