BEHIND THE PLAY #79

Depending on where you are, your season is either over, just beginning or you’re like us in BC and are entering a secondary season that goes from April to June. Thought it would be a good idea to give soccer parents some things to consider.

1. Over and over again it has been shown that soccer is both a sport for late developers and that development in the game is not linear. Be patient and don’t expect to see clear improvement on a weekly basis.

2. What you may see as a setback (not getting to start, getting subbed off, not scoring goals, not making a team at a higher level, getting cut from a team) is more often than not a fundamental development opportunity. Challenges build resilience and resilience was the only clear trait that a German study found when they tried to find a way to detect which top, young players end up in professional and national team environments. Not physically or technically gifted players; players who could deal with adversity. Value that more both in terms of their development as both a player and a person.

3. Canada Soccer’s highest level of certification for youth soccer clubs is their National Youth Club License (NYCL). Clubs are judged on almost 200 criteria across seven categories. Is it possible to still be a well run club that has strong governance, financial, technical, administrative and player safety policies if you don’t have a NYCL? Yes. But how would you as a parent know that? NYCL clubs are given Action Plans twice a year with the expectation that they either improve in certain areas or incorporate new standards that have been added to the NYCL license. The accountability that NYCL clubs face is far, far higher than other sanctioned clubs face and a world apart from unsanctioned academies. That stamp of approval from our national governing body saves parents a lot of research time.

4. Most discipline issues in youth soccer used to be with players. More specifically U15 to U18 boys. That has changed. The largest league in the province had an unusual all clubs meeting last season. It wasn’t specifically about discipline but clubs were told that halfway through the season the number of red cards was on track to double from the year before. Two data points were of concern. More red cards were being given to younger players and far more red cards were being given to adults (coaches and parents). Look to reduce rather than stoke anger at games.

5. Research the club or clubs you are considering joining. Every club has a website and social media. They will also have Google reviews. Each of these gives you a very rough idea of what is happening under the hood but none is as good as compiling questions from those three sources and contacting a senior club staff member to get answers directly. Most clubs will find the time to talk to a potential new member if you have reasonable questions, are organized and are willing to listen to the responses. Some club websites are not updated well. A lot of club social media is promotional and self-congratulatory. Many Google reviews are wildly inaccurate in both praise and criticism so taking them all at face value may not paint an accurate picture.

6. If you, as a parent, wrote a list of all the traits, values and lessons that you wanted your child to inculcate and experience from the age of five to eighteen, a fluid team sport (ie. a sport like soccer or hockey where the play is overwhelmingly dictated by the players and not the coaches once the game has started) will tick an incredibly high number of those on your lists. Soccer is a game of assessing and deciding in a very dynamic environment amidst ongoing communication, tension and physicality. It is a mental challenge as much as it is a physical one for young brains.

7. Not every thing that doesn’t go perfectly or as expected for your child requires urgent advocacy on your behalf. Let them experience disappointment and frustration. Do not feel that every loss, referee call or coaching decision requires you requesting a meeting with the coach. You can only remove hurdles for so long. At some point they have to deal with them and no one wants to raise kids who are incapable of speaking for themselves.

8. If you sign up to play, show up. If you aren’t able to show up for a game or practice, give the coach as much notice as possible. This seems obvious but it’s a huge frustration for coaches trying to plan training sessions and games. It’s also a horrible example to set for your kids. Most parenting lessons are implicit and are learned organically. It’s not a matter of telling your child that it’s important to respect commitments you have made. It’s more about consistently modelling the importance of that.

9. The long standing notion that some players don’t get picked for a higher level of play because the coach, club staff, the TD, or whoever… doesn’t like them remains the most head-shaking notion that I come across. Any club worth being at has policy around evaluations that would make this impossible. And if there were players that, for discipline or attendance reasons, had given the club reasonable reasons to not want to put them on that higher level team, that should precipitate a conversation with the family well before the selections decisions are made so there is no surprise about non-selection. Clubs are not in the habit, and most do not have the luxury, of pushing good players down a level for arbitrary or petty reasons. We are all trying to pick teams that we will be confident can be competitive at the division they are going to be affiliated at. Undermining that with self-defeating player selection just doesn’t make sense from any perspective.

10. You’re allowed to move to a different club. Some reasons are better than others but more importantly when you make that move and how you communicate it is important. Make the move at the end of the season and let your club know. That way it makes team formation smoother and doesn’t threaten team viability as much if more than one player is leaving. If you’re at your third club in four years its increasingly likely though that (a) the club isn’t the problem and (b) the next club you move to might decline taking you knowing that history because, yes, top club staff talk to each other and most will favour taking a keen player who is much more likely to stick around more than a season than one who is a bit better technically.

My friend and former UBC teammate Murray Mollard wrote a book! I was at the launch party last week. Whitecaps and national team legend Bob Lenarduzzi spoke at it as did current Whitecaps Assistant Coach Mike D’Agostino. The books is called ‘Winning Pitch - The Canadian Men’s Soccer Team at the World Cup and Beyond’. It has been extensively researched by someone who’s even more of a national team fan than I am. I’m two thirds of the way through it and the next BTP should be my conversation with Murray about the book. Lots of well thought out ideas and interesting anecdotes from a who’s who of Canadian on-field and off-field soccer people. Buy it at most stores but Murray’s preferred store for it is Iron Dog Books. A great book to take you into a World Cup that will see Canada not just play but play here in Vancouver for up to four games.