[Jerzy]

Welcome to the brave new world of small-sided soccer. It is a bit of a change I know, but shouldn't impact you or your players play too much.

First off, formation. Without knowing you or your kids, I'd start off with a 2-3-1: gives you numbers in midfield without really sacrificing numbers in attack because everyone loves to run up and support the attack while it is much harder to do so for defense. If you feel more comfortable with the idea of a 2-2-2, then go ahead and go with it. The whole point of small sided soccer is to NOT spend a lot of time worrying about formation or strategies/systems of play, but to focus on developing the player. Soccer is not like baseball, football or basketball (typical American games that are very coach-intensive with play calling and timeouts and walks to the pitcher's mound) but is much more of a player's game. Your role as a coach is not to be a great tactician, but rather to be a facilitator, creating the environment so your kids can play.

There's lots of great ideas for games, drills and exercises here. Read Val's notes in the goodies and downloads forum and you'll get a lot to use there. If you want a good book to start with, we enjoyed Tony Carr's How to Coach a Soccer Team, which starts out very basic. If you want something to think about for NEXT season, Anticipating the Moment of Play by Harrison is one of my favorites and the basis for what I will do with my team this season.

Try to come up with a couple of lesson plans and post them here and we'll offer our critiques/thougts/suggestions.