Anonymous
Post 09/08/2021 16:49     Subject: Quality Play
DS always enjoys playing against SYC and the labor day tournament was no exception. Always a highly competitive game which is a lot of fun to watch.
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2021 12:39     Subject: Re:Quality Play
Anonymous wrote:One thing you need to be prepared for is the different level of abilities and interest. So make your games where each kid works on improving their individual performance as opposed to have just one "winner". For example, Say you have 10 kids on your team. Make some boundaries and then maybe make 12 "gates" which are just two cones maybe a yard apart. Have every player with a ball and see how many gates (they can't dribble through the same gate twice) they can dribble through in 30 seconds. Ask the kids to raise there hand if they got 20 gates, 15 gates, 10 gates, 5 gates, Praise them and then ask them to see if they can each improve their score by 2-3 gates. Say go and then maybe give them a few extra seconds to guarantee some improvement and then see who improved by how many and praise them all for their improvement rather than just crowning one "champion" who got the most gates. Then maybe you can add one or two kids to be gate monsters where they try to move around and block gates so kids can't use those gates. Lots of dribbling. lots of touches. Lots of fun. Lots of focusing on improvement.


Ha ha looks like this one was posted to wrong thread.
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2021 12:21     Subject: Re:Quality Play
One thing you need to be prepared for is the different level of abilities and interest. So make your games where each kid works on improving their individual performance as opposed to have just one "winner". For example, Say you have 10 kids on your team. Make some boundaries and then maybe make 12 "gates" which are just two cones maybe a yard apart. Have every player with a ball and see how many gates (they can't dribble through the same gate twice) they can dribble through in 30 seconds. Ask the kids to raise there hand if they got 20 gates, 15 gates, 10 gates, 5 gates, Praise them and then ask them to see if they can each improve their score by 2-3 gates. Say go and then maybe give them a few extra seconds to guarantee some improvement and then see who improved by how many and praise them all for their improvement rather than just crowning one "champion" who got the most gates. Then maybe you can add one or two kids to be gate monsters where they try to move around and block gates so kids can't use those gates. Lots of dribbling. lots of touches. Lots of fun. Lots of focusing on improvement.
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2021 11:38     Subject: Re:Quality Play

One of the biggest problem with the tournaments is 4 games in 2-3 days. When players get tired the quality of the games goes down and it usually becomes a kick ball wrestling match.


Yup. My son is U13. He was fine for the first game, but the second was only two hours later, and he was struggling a bit at that point. We didn't have many subs, so he played all but 10 minutes of the first game, and all of the second.
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2021 11:35     Subject: Re:Quality Play
Anonymous wrote:In my opinion, it's truly difficult to find quality of play in tournaments like these that don't draw the top top teams. Maybe some age groups and genders had a few top teams but in general, they were mostly B teams or middle of the road clubs. And there is nothing wrong with these teams playing and competing and having fun but in general the quality of soccer is terrible. I'd say 95% of the kids have a horrible first touch. Can't trap the ball out of the air. Don't have any accuracy with playing a driven ball. Can't receive, turn, and drive. Speed of play is snail pace. The shooting is terrible. The shots either look like they are chipping the ball to the keeper, passing it right at him, or bombing it over the goal or wide. Of course there are exceptions to all of this but, in general, these tournaments are about kids having fun and very little quality soccer. And this is certainly my kid too! So I'm saying there were very, very few quality TEAMS there but of course there were a few quality PLAYERS. This goes for all of the local Labor Day Tournaments such as OBGC, Dulles, Rush, etc. You might see some quality teams when WAGS rolls around.


On the girl’s side some of lower teams play fairly well. The “top” teams speed of play is nit that much better but they run faster. So the players have success making contact and being physical. When you see a team with a high speed of play the ball is gone before contact.

One of the biggest problem with the tournaments is 4 games in 2-3 days. When players get tired the quality of the games goes down and it usually becomes a kick ball wrestling match.
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2021 11:29     Subject: Re:Quality Play
My DS plays for Alexandria. We've played against PAC a few times over the past couple years. They really move the ball well from the backline to the front and do a great job of controlling the mid field. They do however lack goal scoring up front and their defensive backs lack speed and sometimes get beat when they play up too high. Its pretty hard to find quality at every aspect of the game. I think we at Alexandria are overall strong quality. Defense and Goalkeeping seem to be our biggest weakness. Just a view from an Alexandria parent.
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2021 11:16     Subject: Re:Quality Play
In my opinion, it's truly difficult to find quality of play in tournaments like these that don't draw the top top teams. Maybe some age groups and genders had a few top teams but in general, they were mostly B teams or middle of the road clubs. And there is nothing wrong with these teams playing and competing and having fun but in general the quality of soccer is terrible. I'd say 95% of the kids have a horrible first touch. Can't trap the ball out of the air. Don't have any accuracy with playing a driven ball. Can't receive, turn, and drive. Speed of play is snail pace. The shooting is terrible. The shots either look like they are chipping the ball to the keeper, passing it right at him, or bombing it over the goal or wide. Of course there are exceptions to all of this but, in general, these tournaments are about kids having fun and very little quality soccer. And this is certainly my kid too! So I'm saying there were very, very few quality TEAMS there but of course there were a few quality PLAYERS. This goes for all of the local Labor Day Tournaments such as OBGC, Dulles, Rush, etc. You might see some quality teams when WAGS rolls around.
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2021 11:13     Subject: Quality Play
Anonymous wrote:These threads tend to tilt towards the negative so I wanted to see if one that is more positive could survive. From these past few weeks of tournament play, what team outside of your DC's team did you see play good quality of soccer. List the club, team, age group, and what you saw that you liked about them. Obviously someone's opinion of a good team may not be true or the same for someone else so it would be great to avoid the team bashing if you disagree with a PP. We already have too many threads bashing other clubs/teams.


None. My DS has just played a bunch of shit teams.
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2021 10:32     Subject: Quality Play
DC's club did pretty well in the age groups i'm familiar with. I honestly hope no one even mentions it on this thread since some poster(s) have an obsession with our club.

The OBGC tournament was well done by the organizers. We saw a lot of teams from the area that we hadn't even heard of and saw a lot of underdogs winning against the favored teams.
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2021 09:44     Subject: Quality Play
2008G VYS Phoenix played very well. We played against them. They had big and fast players but played Possession-type game instead of Kick-n-Run. They also played very clean without any dirty fouls, etc.
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2021 09:43     Subject: Quality Play
Anonymous wrote:It’s what happens in the anonymous internet. You can’t change it.

Did you want to lead off with an example?


I figured I should have added my own right after I hit submit. Two weeks ago I saw VA Union 07 G and thought they played well. I think they were playing up a year. My DD played after them in the field next to theirs and thought their passing was crisp and they attacked as a team instead of relying on just one player. All the players seemed very skilled. I'm not a McLean parent, DD is older age group, and no connection with the club.
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2021 09:36     Subject: Re:Quality Play
I'd be interested to hear what anyone thought of Paragon's 2010s. They're off to an auspicious start, winning the top U12 flight at OBGC with some impressive totals. My son is U12 at another club in their EDP division and I assume any commentary will be positive. I'm not trying to derail the positivity of the thread.
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2021 09:31     Subject: Quality Play
U9 girls team connected 3 passes
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2021 09:24     Subject: Quality Play
It’s what happens in the anonymous internet. You can’t change it.

Did you want to lead off with an example?
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2021 09:18     Subject: Quality Play
These threads tend to tilt towards the negative so I wanted to see if one that is more positive could survive. From these past few weeks of tournament play, what team outside of your DC's team did you see play good quality of soccer. List the club, team, age group, and what you saw that you liked about them. Obviously someone's opinion of a good team may not be true or the same for someone else so it would be great to avoid the team bashing if you disagree with a PP. We already have too many threads bashing other clubs/teams.