Playing Time.

I have met a lot of people through soccer and over the years have become a resource person or sounding board for many of these. There are two main concerns people raise with me;  lack of playing time and the position being played.  In today's writing I will share my philosophy on playing time and how I arrived at it.

I remember being an assistant coach for my eldest son Grant's U10 club team.  The head coach was a local high school coach by the name of Dan.  At 11 years of age, Grant was pudgy and did not look the part of a soccer player. Even back then though Grant had a high soccer IQ.  Dan didn't play Grant much and at one point even suggested Grant should maybe think about playing football. Well, okay then.  To say that Grant did not get a lot of playing time would be an understatement.  I never made a big deal over the lack of playing time. I did observe closely how Grant and others who received a disproportionately low amount of playing time responded. 

One example remains in my mind to this day for two specific reasons.  In a tightly contested match that a lot of importance was placed upon Dan reluctantly sent Grant in to play as the left back.  Grant was admonished to "just stay in position and don't let them score against you."  Conversely, Grant and I had been discussing the importance of making the most out of every opportunity he did receive.  As the attack traveled up the right flank I noticed (and Grant did too) there was a lot of open space on the weak side.  Grant began inching forward and "out of position." It was okay though, because Dan was focused solely on the ball.  As the action played itself out there was Grant running full tilt toward the back post and when the shot / cross came he was there to make a play.  No goal. That would have been too perfect an ending.  But the run itself and the subsequent recovery run were brilliant.

Flash forward a few years and Dan is now coaching a different team.  I received a call literally the night before his team was to play in a tournament. Dan needed players.  He accepted my then U12 son Treg to play for his U14 team.  Treg acquitted himself well on a team that played with 9 men.  How does one enter a tournament and be so undermanned when it comes time to play?  

These two stories are related as we will discover. 

My philosophy on playing time is simple; if you attend and participate in training, I will play you in the match.  No guarantee of how many minutes, but you will have a defined role in terms of expectations for your play while in the game.

I have seen a lot of coaches get caught up in a singular expectation for winning the match.  They will use pursuit of a win as a reason to avoid playing those considered to be weaker players. High school coaches can be especially bad in this regard but so too can club coaches.  With unlimited substitutions allowed in both high school and club soccer I find this approach to be reprehensible.  If a player is good enough to make your roster, he is good enough to play in matches for you.

Dan and I later crossed paths when I was the head coach for a U12 team and he served as my assistant. We each had a son on this club team. If you know anything about prepubescent boys you appreciate how they can run like a deer one day and stumble around like a new born foal the next as their bodies undergo the change.  I was observant of the players and when they looked like deer they got a lot of playing time. When they looked like a new born foal they received less. But everyone played.  I spoke with both players and parents alike about the fluctuations in playing time and counseled patience as these prepubescent growth spurts were temporary and in no way indicative of what type of an athlete the player would be when he emerged on the other end of puberty. Most bought into this reality in the moment. Some it took a couple of years to appreciate and understand. 

I limited the roles of the foals but not the significance of their contributions.  My guiding light is a firm belief that it is the responsibility of the coach to place players in positions and situations from which they enjoy a reasonable expectation for success. If a player was struggling to run due to "growing pains", it simply made no sense to play him on the flank where a lot of running would be necessary, right?  Why frustrate the player by placing him in a position where he was likely to struggle?

These lessons I carried with me when I took on the head coaching job at Lima Central Catholic.  This program was moribund having never had a winning season and really struggling for enough players to field a team.  That first year we had 17 players total. In all honesty, about 6 were of varsity caliber with another handful of junior varsity caliber. It would have been difficult to justify keeping the rest on a high school roster were the numbers in the program better.

I played everyone who was healthy in every game that season.

The next season our numbers in the program jumped to 29 girls and we fielded a junior varsity team for a limited schedule. That set a record for number of players in a season. Playing every girl in every match and placing them in positions / situations from which they had a reasonable expectation to experience success built a chemistry in the program that others wanted to be a part of.  That we had the best season in school history while doing so was even more incentive for others to come out for the team.

The curious case of Adam.

The head coach at our local high school was something of a legend having accumulated 330 wins over the course of his career.  I got my start in high school soccer as a goalkeeper coach under him and am eternally grateful for having had the opportunity.  Dick topped out as a coach the year the team made it to the state semi-finals.  It was viewed as a deep and talented roster with as many as 20 players receiving playing time regularly.  From that point on getting back to state consumed him and players suffered for it.

The season after having gone to state we had 53 athletes come out for soccer.  There were 36 spots available between the varsity and junior varsity teams.  Dick told me he lobbied to some extent for a third team, but was denied. He eventually kept 40 players in the program.  Fast forward a few years and we find his last season saw 32 players in the entire program and many of those would have been cut in previous years.

Why?  What changed?  It's more a matter of who changed; Dick had.

Adam played on an elite club team. He started every game and played dang near every minute as a center back on a team that won nearly 90% of its games. Adam rode the bench and often did not play for Dick as a high school senior that final season.  Why?   Only Dick can answer that but the impact of allowing players to sit the bench with no chance of playing continued to drive numbers down in the program. 

There is a direct correlation between playing time and numbers in the program. It extends to the quality of the program as well.  By the time Dick finally walked away the high school program was in a shambles having been decimated both of talent and of numbers participating.

By the way, Adam went on to play in college.   Yep, he couldn't buy playing time on a mediocre high school team yet found a spot on a college team.  That's just difficult to explain.

Now, I am sure both Dan and Dick in defense of their decision making would suggest players need to earn playing time.  This is likely a ruse to deflect away from an issue of trust, or lack thereof.  Did Dick trust Adam to play for him?  Obviously not.

And I think playing time as well as the path of the various programs mentioned here comes down to that one word, trust as was written about in Truth. Trust. Belief.  A coach can give these things to players and teams or he can deny them to players and teams.

When players or parents come to me with issues about playing time my response is to work on the player / coach relationship. Come early and stay late. Work hard. If a role is not defined for you, attempt to identify what your team needs and strive to provide that. Talk with the coach about what you need to do to improve and earn their trust to gain more playing time.  It's a shame the onus for developing a trusting relationship sometimes falls upon the player, but it is also a reality of sports.  In some instances, nothing can be done to change a coaches perception of a player. That's when it is time to change clubs, refrain from playing high school soccer or transfer to a different school if playing high school soccer means that much to you. 

By Invitation Only?

Today I wish to share one small secret about youth soccer with you. It is a proven truth with me and I believe it can be for you as well. Let me know what you think.

When I worked with local soccer associations there were always an abundance of players at the U6 and U8 ages.  Enough so that in-house leagues could be held at those ages.  By U10 and U12 the number of participants were in decline and a league with surrounding communities was needed for matches. By U14 the local associations were down to one team in each gender.  Why do so many players leave the youth game?

There are actually a lot of reasons why kids leave the game. Today, I want to discuss one reason only. They do not feel like they belong. They do not feel appreciated, valued, wanted.  While I believe this holds true for both genders it might be particularly true of boys. Allow me to illustrate with a story.

For as long as I can remember our club struggled to field quality teams in the U16 through U19  age groups. Some years it was an issue just to secure enough players to field a team let alone a quality side. The club ran the usual publicized tryouts and as a coach I would scout and recruit for the team with only marginal success. Finally in utter exasperation at attempting to field a U15 team I turned to the core group of players and announced "If we are going to have a team, you will need to find players. And the competitive level we will play at will be determined by the players you bring to the team."  

BINGO!

With the kids recruiting the players we fielded a full team and a decent side. With each succeeding year we had a larger player pool and played at a higher level of play.  The difference was found in the players asking others to join them.  Kids who were not inclined to just show up for open tryouts came when they were invited by their peers. Word spread through the player grapevine to the point where we had nearly 50 U19 players last spring. That is simply an unheard of number for rural west-central Ohio.  There was competition for roster spots and some ended up self selecting when they realized they would not make the "A" team. We ended up with 38 players overall divided amongst two teams.

When a coach with a rival area club asked how we were getting so many players while they struggled to field a lone age appropriate team my answer was simple - our players reached out to others and asked them to join up. I did absolutely nothing aside from close the deal with a few parents in terms of explaining philosophy, expectations and costs.

And I think it significant enough to point out the players themselves were selective. They did not invite just anyone. If they felt a player would not be a good fit for the program, they did not talk with them about playing together. In fact, more than once they selected what many would consider personality or character over talent.

The result was a tight knit group that strung together a 47-8-5 (?) record with league titles, showcase and tournament championships. All the credit goes to the players making others feel welcomed.

Thinking back to those middle school years I remember how everything around me was constantly changing.  From our bodies hitting puberty to who we hung around with. Everyone was seeking places to fit in and even more importantly no one wanted to feel rejected.  Remember being afraid to ask a girl to go out with you?  Or how about those school dances where everyone hung out along a wall because they were afraid they would make a fool of themselves if they danced? I remember our eldest son being a bit reserved until a girl from our church invited him to join a group that hung out together.  That invitation was all it took for him to begin spreading his wings. It gave him confidence in himself knowing he was accepted and wanted as part of that group. It didn't hurt any that the girl was a couple of years older and pretty as well!

I believe our core group of players addressed the insecurities many teen aged boys have when they approached others and asked them to join us. This eliminated the fear of rejection that can be associated with "trying out" and is in general so prevalent in young people.

So what do you think?

Instead of open tryouts would tryouts by invitation only bring out better numbers?  

I know it did for us, but are we an isolated example?