Set Tactical Work, am I onto something?

"The more I learn, the more I realize there is even more to learn."

I posted this comment on my FB Fan page and Twitter feed a couple of days ago and it's because of what I have been learning this past week, the importance of patterns and "choreography" as ways to work on keeping possession and attacking.  There is much more to what I've been learning but this is a start.

Now Patterns of Play is nothing new to me but what is new and what I've been learning is the importance it has in a players develop at such an earlier age.  The two big problems with US soccer players is our skill and the knowledge of the game, our tactical depth.  Our tactical depth is by far in worse shape.  I sometimes like to listen to other coaches and see what they say to their players and see if I can learn anything.  I RARELY hear anything of quality.

I only know of four people that use patterns and choreography to help develop their players.  Two are in California and two are in Illinois that I've talked to.  I'm guessing there is more but these are the ones I know about.  I have seen all of these guys teams play and let me say that I was very impressed and I knew they were onto something that I wanted my teams to do.  Here is a video that shows what Kleiban's team looks like.  It is an After and Before, yes that's correct.  I still haven't been able to finish watching this video because the Before is such crap.  His team has actually played against a Barcelona Academy team of the same age and tied them, I think they lost the semi-final game versus them 2-3.  There is NO long ball or using the bigger faster players tactics going on.  Watch the game here.  XuXuh is in the game too.  Watching these teams play shows me that what they are doing works and I want my teams to play similar so badly!  

According to one of the blog posts it took at least 6 months to have the team look similar to this.  Even after three years they are still working on the foundation for the majority of their training sessions.  Within this past week I've been studying like crazy and developing a plan that is utilizing Futsal as the foundation to build from for outdoor.  They think that players at any level can resemble a possession style so I'll be putting their methods to the test.  I'm not delusional, I know my teams won't be able to play at that level but my goal is to resemble it and have them playing the right way at their own level.

For my futsal training I've been incorporating a lot of pattern movement.  I am sticking with one pattern that will have one progression.  Reason being is that I do not want to confuse the players, less is more.  I have already noticed a difference in my teams with futsal from only doing three practices.  I've worked on technique, 1v1, 2v1 and a big portion on the Box (2-2) Pattern.  I've incorporated the Choreography part into scrimmage, I'll do more with it later.  There is still more to do, a lot more, but what I'm doing is building the foundation.

In the video below you will see my girls vs a red team and a black team.  The red team was before we started and the black team was today 11/30/13.  Also, let me make a disclaimer.  The red team was a better team and I've edited out a lot of the not so good play.  If you see how long the video is you can tell that it is not an entire game.  For the majority of the game we did not play good but the parts that are in the video I've RARELY seen in our games.  Honestly, some of the play isn't that great but for our level it's good. This is more about what the possibilities that may lay ahead with this new way of training and I'm really excited about it.

Lastly what I'd like to say also is that we played this team before and tied them 4-4, a lot of slop goals from both teams.  I'm not sure what the score was today but I know we won easily.  Maybe 6-2, only one goal we scored would be considered slop.  Even in my boys game I was noticing improvements in our movement off the ball but the boys biggest issue was VERY POOR decision making.  We conceded a lot of goals from turn overs.  My 13s are better than that and I'm just going to put it down as a bad day and a good opponent.  But this is a good start with my girls and hopefully this is the start of something great.


Sincerely,
   Derek McMullen
@CoachDerekMc 
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ODP

This year I've been given the opportunity to coach with the Illinois ODP program.  I am an assistant coach with the 02 younger boys and I'll be working with Rick Cey who'll be the head coach for the group.  I haven't met him yet but I've been told by multiple people that he is really good to work with and I'll learn a lot.  So I am really excited to get started with my age group this weekend.

I have already helped coach within the ODP program twice now.  I helped with a clinic down in Bloomington, IL and then I helped with the 99 girls group this past weekend.  The clinic was really fun to participate in and it was a real joy to watch some of these players play.  The first group was players from my age group and the players from Morton has some good quality and they knew how to play the game right.  There were three that stood out the most but one especially had real potential to make the team.  He was very smooth on the ball and he didn't lose possession easily.  There were also quite a few girls there that had some good qualities.  One in particular, she was very quick and skillful and didn't lose possession easily.  Her decision making was good and would be a valuable asset to the team. 

When I helped out with the 99 girls it was an official ODP event and it helped me get the first one under my belt and get a good feel for the days procedure.  I worked with some really good coaches in Paul Webster and Chris Brown.  They were very supportive in any advice and questions I had.  The talent on hand was impressive, especially for me because I usually don't see players at this level.

Besides the talent, it was also really nice to not have to deal with side talking or players goofing around.  These players were focused and came to play.  This mentality is the reason they were here and could play at this level.  The players that goof around will be watching these players from the sidelines.

So far the overall experience with ODP, Rick and Jen has been really positive.  It has opened a lot of doors and opportunities that I did not have access to before.  I've been part of meetings that have allowed me to network and brainstorm ideas.  It's always a pleasure to see how other clubs and coaches operate.  I've been included in the development of the training sessions for the entire ODP process.  I've really grabbed onto this opportunity and I feel only more good things will happen being a part of ODP and Illinois Youth Soccer.

If you don't know what ODP is or want to learn more, here are a few links:

About Illinois ODP

ODP FAQ

Sincerely,
   Derek McMullen
@CoachDerekMc 
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Observations from the Schwaben Cup

Before the tournament FoxSoccer posted this Article on their website. I'd advise reading this article first before continuing on into this.

So my teams just participated in the Schwaben Cup and once again I was left disappointed and frustrated with soccer in America.  The problem is our soccer culture in this country.  There are way too many uneducated parents that do not understand player development.  This leads parents being misguided and the people that suffer are the players.  There is no accountability for coaches and they are able to lead parents into thinking that what they are doing is right because they are winning games.

I want to highlight a few games from this tourney to help show why in the Article that the US has developed more professional hockey players than it has soccer players.

There’s also this damning fact: despite America having tens of millions of kids playing the game at every level, the returns are very slim indeed. Far more top-level athletes are produced in hockey than in soccer in this country, despite hockey having a vastly smaller pool. According to the most recently available numbers, registered youth soccer players outnumber registered youth hockey players by six to one in the USA. This doesn’t count the millions of unaffiliated soccer players.

Game 1: The other coach makes the comment that she is glad we are playing the ball out the ball because then they can get an easy goal.  Meanwhile this team continuously punts the ball down the field when their goalie gets the ball.  What does this tell me?  She is focused on winning the game and not the bigger picture (Now when I go to a tournament I would like to win it but I won't be distracted by the bigger picture).  They were a faster and stronger team that took advantage of our mistakes.  Our number one mistake was that we used the goalie too much.  The girls made it the first option when the first option should be to play it forward, it didn't help girls weren't moving into open space.  I told them that I'd like to see them use the goalie just twice in the game but it turned out to be a lot more.  I didn't say anything because I didn't want to discourage it.  The main goal is to build comfort in using the goalie and then go from there.  These girls we played were good and could become really good, but without proper training and a style of play these girls will fade and not become anything special.

Game 2: During the game my player plays a back pass to the goalie and I hear the other coach say, with an English accent: "What is that crap!"  This is also the coach who praised his goalie for a great kick down the field that resulted in two goals.  These kind of goals make me absolutely sick!  Then when I hear coaches and parents cheering because of it, I get really pissed off!  You try doing that in Spain or Germany and you'll be booed.  And we cheer, it shows our ignorance.  It takes a lot of effort for me not to go off on these people (I did make a comment so the other coach could hear me, but for me it was pretty tame).  They cheer because they think the players were successful, but it was actually a fail.  It was a failure for player development because the players lose out on the values of playing the ball out the back.

Game 3: This coach wouldn't shut up.  Problem is that parents think this is coaching and he is doing a great job because he is telling the players what to do.  They don't realize that "Master Coaches" are the complete opposite.  A study was done based on John Wooden.  The researchers were surprised to find that John spoke very little during a training session.  They timed him, and on average he spoke for 4 seconds in length at a time. 

John Wooden is a Master Coach

Game 4: This game points to a common problem I see when coaches are winning.  They decide then, when winning, to work on possession or anything else.  That irritates me because why not do it from the beginning? If they believe it is of value and want it to be part of their style of play, why not do it from the beginning?  They want to win the game and they are afraid to have their teams do it because the players could make a mistake and cost a goal(s).  Which will happen because it is risky but for the long run it is very valuable to have the confidence.  But player development is an after thought and that is sad.

For example, last season the other team was beating us during an indoor game.  So the coach decides now is the time to work on a back pass to the goalie.  The player failed multiple times and the coach gets very upset and yanks the player out of the game.  It was obvious that they never worked on this because if they did she wouldn't have messed it up so badly.  But instead of admitting he was making a mistake, he takes it out on the kid.  Then you compare it to my girls team and they did it even when we were losing and having some success with it.  So who do you think values player development the most?

Now I don't want to be completely negative.  I saw quite a few positives for the boys teams we played.  The team that I want to highlight is the Schwaben team my U13Bs played.  They were about an even team to us and I really liked how they tried to keep possession and try and play through the lines.  I could tell this was a coach that valued playing the game right and player development.

We need more coaches like this and a more educated culture on player development if we want this country to be truly successful in developing quality players.

Sincerely,
    Derek McMullen
@CoachDerekMc 
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