Summary

COACHES AND PARENTS OF SOCCER PLAYERS OF ALL LEVELS, THIS IS THE BOOK FOR YOU!Revised and updated with new information, drills, diagrams, and photos, this friendly, easy-to-use, fully illustrated guide shows coaches how to run a successful soccer team -- no matter how much experience they have or what level of soccer they coach. From building a roster to making sure everyone has a ride home at the end of the game and everything in between: SETTING UP THE FIRST PRACTICE TEACHING THE BASICS DEVELOPING SKILL THROUGH DRILLS AND EXERCISES LEARNING THE RULES ENCOURAGING FAIR PLAY AND HEALTHY COMPETITIONEmphasizing that kids should have fun, stay active, and learn about team spirit and competition, win or lose, the authors detail every step of building a soccer team that plays well and plays healthy, while having a great time.Whether you're a seasoned professional or new to the game,Coaching Kids to Play Soccerhas the answers to every coach's questions. Don't start the season without it!

Author Biography

Jim San Marco was a teacher, athletic director, and coach at Edgemont High School in Scarsdale, New York, who finished his eighteen-year soccer coaching career with a 211-67-24 soccer record. He was recognized as the Section I Soccer Coach of the Year, New York State Section I Athletic Director of the Year, and he has served as a New York State soccer coaching clinician and a New York State Physical Education Convention speaker. He lives in Briarcliff Manor, New York.

Kurt Aschermann is currently helping to launch Charity Partners, a firm that creates fund-raising platforms for national charities, and he is a sought-after speaker, workshop leader, and consultant. A physical educator and coach, Kurt is also coauthor of Coaching Kids to Play Baseball and Softball, also published by Fireside. He is a graduate of Springfield College in Springfield, Massachusetts.

Foreword	p. xiii
Preface	p. xv
It's All Yours, Coach	p. 1
General Guidelines for Parents, Players, and Coaches	p. 4
Practice Preparation	p. 6
Ten Important Things Your Players and Parents Should Know	p. 15
The Rules of the Game and Dimensions of the Field	p. 17
Juggling	p. 31
The Skills of Soccer	p. 35
Exercises to Improve Skills	p. 54
Goalkeeping	p. 92
Offensive Tactics	p. 108
Defensive Tactics	p. 129
Restarts	p. 137
Systems of Play	p. 150
Pregame Check List	p. 153
Practice and Pregame Warm-up Routine	p. 155
Pregame, Halftime, and Postgame Talks	p. 158
Some Concluding Thoughts	p. 163
Glossary	p. 165
General Resources	p. 167
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.

Supplemental Materials

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Excerpts

1
IT'S ALL YOURS, COACH

A simple, important, sobering fact needs to be stated at the outset: as a youth soccer coach you have a huge responsibility to everyone on the team. Not only do these youngsters want to learn soccer from you, but they also want to win, want to score some goals -- and they don't want to be yelled at. Your impact in the game is rivaled only by that of the parent, and, in certain circumstances, it surpasses that infl uence. You will fi nd that your kids want to please you more than anyone else, and this simple fact can place tremendous pressure on you. It should guide your every action.

We believe that your responsibilities as a youth soccer coach are easily stated:

Fun

Learning

Individual development

Winning

...in that order!Let's look at each one in turn.

Fun:It may come as a surprise to some of the parents of the players, but 99 percent of their kids are playing soccer because they want to have fun playing it. Those kids in your charge, Coach, have joined the league and your team to enjoy themselves. The minute you lose sight of that as your principal motivating factor, you're in trouble.

Learning:Twenty years ago we said youth league soccer coaches had further to go than youth league coaches in other sports because we didn't know this game! We said players' and coaches' ignorance meant coaches had more work to do to learn the game. That isn't nearly as true today as then -- soccer is part of physical education programs now, and most colleges have teams. But though PE teachers are taught how to coach soccer, most adult coaches still need to know the game to make sure their players learn. To us, learning is the second most important responsibility of the youth league coach. The days of the uninformed soccer coach throwing out the ball to scrimmage and calling it a practice are over. Your goal is to make your players into students of the game and help them learn all they can about this great sport.

Individual Development:A nine- year- old should be compared with himself, not every other nine- year- old. You help a team develop by helping each individual. And if you've succeeded in helping most of your athletes become better soccer players by the last week of the season, you're a winning coach, regardless of your record.

Winning:We believe the outcome of the game yields winners and learners -- there are no losers. Winning is important and needs to be an important part of the development of soccer players. But perspective becomes the important consideration, because while winning is important and must be part of the education process of an athlete, it needs to be understood as the result of hard work and individual development. The coach who succeeds in teaching the sport -- individually and to a group -- will fi nd success in the won/ lost column. The coach who helps the team keep winning or losing in perspective will fi nd success in the personal development column.

THE BALL STOPS HERE

Coaches in volunteer leagues are often acquired like goalies: no one wants to do the job, so someone gets drafted. You may have come to your soccer duties purely out of love for the sport or, like many, out of love for your child. Any coach, regardless of experience, though, has to have knowledge of the sport and the ability to impart that knowledge to the kids. If you have come to your soccer team because your child wanted to play and no one else was there to teach or lead the team, how you deal with these two issues may well determine if the players have a positive or a negative experience.

Excerpted from Coaching Kids to Play Soccer: Everything You Need to Know to Coach Kids from 6 To 16 by Kurt Aschermann, Jim San Marco
All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.