Building a Girl's Team and League: A Blog

[Val]

I had the wonderful honor and privilege to coach a U10 girls team in my county's inaugural U10 girls' league. Easily the most fun I've ever had coaching (despite our shellacking in the season-ending tourney). I'm really committed to building our girls program.

The first thing I want to do is give the girls the opportunity to play soccer over the spring and summer. I recommended to all my girls that they play YMCA ball, which is much less organized and poorly run, but hey, according to the theory of GRC, that may actually be a good thing. I am going to take the spring off from coaching a team because I'd like to work on my tennis game for one, but because I need a break and I'd like to be able observe some other leagues in our region.

I, and another coach, are planning on inviting the girls out to play one day a week, probably on Sundays, and having it be relatively coaching free. I want to be able to show them couple of games that they can play by themselves, most notably smashball, a game I call Wimbledon, and a game I call shooting goalies. (It took me way too long to realize that naming your favorite drills is a great way to help kids retain them). Hopefully, after a couple of weeks, the girls will be able to rotate around these exercises pretty freely and that they will serve as a warmup for a fairly unstructured game.

My initial problem is that there is a nice tournament two counties away from me on 7 April that I had hoped to enter when I started thinking about this spring gig, but the registration is just 7 March and that's just going to be too soon I fear for me to get to know the kids. I could recruit a lot of the girls I got to know this past fall, but for the rest of the girls, it just may be too soon. On the other hand, calling the girls in February (which is really cold and dreary around here) with the promise of outdoor play may just work and kickoff the spring Sunday plan.

And having decent turnout is important because the highlight of my plan is to have a summer clinic of my own. But more on that later.

[Val]

Originally Posted by Val

My initial problem is that there is a nice tournament two counties away from me on 7 April that I had hoped to enter when I started thinking about this spring gig, but the registration is just 7 March and that's just going to be too soon I fear for me to get to know the kids. I could recruit a lot of the girls I got to know this past fall, but for the rest of the girls, it just may be too soon. On the other hand, calling the girls in February (which is really cold and dreary around here) with the promise of outdoor play may just work and kickoff the spring Sunday plan.

I think I have decided that I want to go ahead with this tournament. The nicest thing about the tournament is that it is relatively close (we're pretty much out in the boonies, so too much travel is a negative). I'd also been a little concerned about the cost, but if I make an 11 person team, the fee will only be $30 for the day, which isn't so outrageous. Then, I;ve got to get uniforms, and by sticking with a jersey only, it'll cost about $20, which I think I will split with the players 50/50 and then I will own the jerseys. There is a 3 v 3 tournament about an hour from us in July, so I'd be able to use them then, and if they I get them a little large, we should be able to use them next spring as well.

I've looked at the numbers in some depth, and there are about 30 girls in the U10 age range that are ready to take the game to a deeper level. I'll call them all in January and offer this tournament for $40 and I'm thinking I should get at least 10-12 girls. I've got 6 that I've coached alone, so I think I can get numbers. We would start practising in March, 1 or 2 times a week. After the tournament, I would open these Sunday afternoon gatherings to every girl in the age group, and we can see who comes. Then, for these girls who come, I'd make the offer of my summer clinic, which I want to run early in the summer so we could have that benefit prior to the 3v3 tournament.

Now, I'll have a bit more detail work because I'll need to the players carded for both tournaments, and I have no idea yet what that costs, so this could get a little expensive. I'll have to find out if the cards expire, or if I'll be able to use them next spring...

[Val]

Originally Posted by Val

I think I have decided that I want to go ahead with this tournament. ...

Well, another week/month of thought and I've changed my mind again. I am not going to rush a team, a concept just for one tournament. I've decided that I want to try and build a core group of girls organically: I'm going to let them decide who wants to play more competitively. At this point, I know which girls I'd invite, but I don't know which parents are the most supportive and which girls really want to do this. I'm going to continue with my plans to have girls' outings all spring on Sunday afternoons. I've got two teens who want to help coach, I've got a pair of 11 year olds to help (again, I'm targeting the U10 girls) and a couple of girls coaches have expressed an interest in helping out. I've been working on a series of practices around Harrison's book that's been recommended here Anticipating the Moment of Play and I've got my notes from my D Course. Then, out of this group of girls I'll make my invitations for my summer clinic.

Although I've reversed my thinking at least three times now about this tournament, this is the best I've thought about it. I want to be very deliberate and intentional, and rushing around for the tournament just doesn't make any sense.

[ian.curry]

Val, do you charge subs(subscriptions)? I hope you do, asking parents directly to pay for half the kit is totally unheard of here - perhaps less so for tracksuits. Maybe $4 per week tp help pay for insurance, pitches, referees, tournaments, full kit?

[74offsuit]

I'm not sure about totally unheard of. A parent bought/sponsored our kit last season, in return his company logo is on our shirts.

Or am I misunderstanding the issue?

[ian.curry]

That would be getting sponsorship from a local company yes? Of course that does happen, I suspect its how most clubs get by. I meant individual parents paying here and there for shirts, jumpers etc

[lanesra]

Val may not have sponsors yet, as it seems like he's doing this outside of his club. We have a big problem here with tournaments, seems like the spring up all the time, they're quite expensive, and there's a heavy emphasis placed on winning (since they cost so much). The neighboring county has a nice recreational tournament, but those are rare.

[Val]

After a wet spring (the only rain we've had has been on 3 of the past 4 Sundays), I had my first "spring" practise, and it was brisk and windy, so I only had 4 girls out, but in the round of phone calls I made, I got several nice compliments from mothers of girls I'd had two years ago and who'd had poor experiences the last couple of seasons. That alone was enough to keep me going. I had another girl who had never played soccer before last season and who'd made nice progress, but who I would never have expected to want to play, come running out to me at the end of the practise explaining that she couldn't come because of another committment, but she wanted to stop by and say hi. So lots of positive feedback. My blast e-mail to all 71 girls who played last year goes out tonight.

The small number was all right because I was able to introduce a couple of drills that I want to do all spring/summer like 1v1s in a narrow channel and passing around the triangle to get the girls comfortable on receiving the ball on their back foot. My high school helpers have not materialized, so the girls will have to be demonstrators.

And I was so glad not to have to go the tournament I so agonized over. It was frigid, low 40s and windy, and we're 50 miles south of the tourney location and we got an inch of snow that morning. Not really how you want to have to play your inaugural matches.

[Val]

Had my second practice over the weekend and had a really good turnout, maybe too good as I had 14 kids, 7 who I'd never coached before and 7 who I had.

Really felt like a **** coach out there, though, you know the old saying about the finest laid plans of mice and men...

Because I'd had four or five girls last year and we worked a lot on wallball and one simple shooting drill, I thought I'd be able to send them off with a couple of the newcomers and let them show them how the games were played, but no, I couldn't. Had consistent chaos until I gathered all the girls back to me. So, the first 20 minutes were wasted. Then I tried to introduce the concept of 1v1 in a narrow channel (esp since I got a couple of the most athletic girls in the age group out) and I tried to have 4 groups going at the same time. Kids did well enough when I was watching them directly, but it got out of hand as I moved from line to line. Next time, have all the girls in one group and then model and instruct each pair in front of everyone else. Another 15 minutes less than productive.

So, I moved to a team favorite, team handball, which usually plays well, but the girls had major cases of dropitis. On one team, I had a couple of weaker players who are friends, so I put the two stronger girls, thinking they'd balance out, but they never moved, never showed, were useless. One of the weaker girls, one who'd so developed playing this game for me last year, showed beautifully, but dropped every ball she touched. Every one. Game never got flowing. So, that was a little ragged.

Closed with a game of 5v5, and that went a little better as I just walked off and tlkaed to parents. The girls were a little surprised to see me go, I don't know if that'd ever happened in one of their practices before.

All in all, a little ragged, so I'm going to try to get less accomplished in two weeks, but take more time explaining.

[Val]

I read huffsw's post about the girls tryouts with some interest because I'm having similar problems with turnout. I've had weekend kick-abouts for the the last four weeks now, with 2, 4, 14, and 9 girls showing up. Most of the girls are girls that I've coached previously. Two girls have brought friends, and these girls seemed to have really enjoyed themselves and had been a little too timid to play last season. But of the 50 odd girls who I've been e-mailing who I've not had before, only 2 have showed up. I've had e-mails from another 4 parents expressing interest, but that's it. I even contacted the coaches of last year's girls teams to ask them to send out introductory e-mails on my behalf to their team, but no real bump this week. Now the two friends who came made me happy because I'm trying to build an entire league, but in terms of that nexus between talent and dedication, upon which I was hoping to build next year's travel team, it has been bare. So far, there is only one girl who I would choose at this point for that team. When I realize that just as recently as January I was thinking about forming that team this spring, I realize my level of naivete.

On the plus side, I may have found a couple of assistants, kids who I helped coach 12 years ago and who are now strapping young men of 22 and 25. It's taken me a couple of years now, but I am convinced that we don't teach our kids how to dribble, and I want to correct that. Not that I am a Coerver disciple or anything, but I am going to work more on dribbling and turns than I've done in the past. And these two guys were perfect! I ran them in 20x10 channel 1v1 and let them go at it, and two of the girls, well, their eyes popped just to see what could be done with the ball. I'd only asked them to come out for just one weekend, but they already told me that they'd come out every other week or so to help. Plus, maybe in another year or two, they'll be ready to join our coaching pool. So that was a major positive.

I shouldn't be too disappointed. I was hoping to have more girls coming out regularly because of summer coming up, but the last two weeks I had to play on Saturday (two weeks ago was Mother's Day) and Monday (last weekend was Memorial Day). Hard to get up a full head of steam when your Sunday Soccer program is playing on Saturdays and Mondays...