The Soccer Coach's Blueprint (eBook)

The first part of building a culture is your vision. Turn your desire to become a great role model and leader into actions. You need to look at the long-term goal of your club or team. You need to focus on the performances both at practice sessions and at the games. When the environment you are in is committed to learning, then the winning will take care of itself. The vision can start with a mission statement, a statement that emphasizes your beliefs and goals. A mission statement is not merely a description of a soccer club by an external party, but an expression, made by its leaders, of their desires and intentions for the soccer club. The purpose of a mission statement is to focus and direct the organization itself. It communicates primarily to the people who make up the soccer club: its coaching staff and its members. It gives everyone a shared understanding of the club’s intended direction. Your mission statement and your playing philosophy are promoted within the club. You should also mention on the club website that you do have a development plan.

You will be able to judge your performance from the players’ (and parents’) reactions. Players can quietly let you know how they feel about your performance as a coach. If you start with twenty players at practice and in a few weeks it’s down to ten, then something is going wrong. There are many other ways to judge how you are performing—don’t be too quick to blame the players. More often than not, you are the one who picked the team and now you have to coach them!

I have worked with a few coaches that refused to follow any plan, and I can honestly say that their teams did not improve. The teams stayed in the same low division, and the players did not look like they understood the game. When you do not have a process on development, you will not see improvement.

When implementing a club blueprint, you need loyal, hard-working people by your side. When I sat down with coaches that wanted to join my club, I had an open mind. I took the club blueprint with me and was excited to talk soccer. While I was in conversation with a potential coach, I was thinking:

•Where can this person take me?

•Am I being inspired by listening to this person?

•Is this person capable of encouraging young players to give it their best effort?

•What is their body language when I show them the blueprint?

•How can I inspire them to commit?

•Is this person capable of following the plan and also adding some of their experiences to it?

MISSION STATEMENT

Understanding your mission statement and following through on it are so important when building a team culture. Everyone involved has to share this vision. Your core values have to be included in your statement. You cannot just write something down because it looks good on paper. You have to really believe in what you are doing. As you can see, the above statement does not just include soccer skills, it also involves life skills. You can learn valuable life lessons from sports. Yes, you want to teach the players how to play the game, but you also want them to learn how to treat others and to understand work ethic. If a player is working hard and they feel and see their self-improvement, then the player will be on board with your teaching process. Players thrive on structure and guidelines. If the guidelines are not followed by the coach, then the coach will lose the respect from the players and they will feel cheated.

What does the mission statement mean?

The game of soccer – You are teaching the players excellence. Yes, you allow them to play and learn from their mistakes, but you also have to guide them along. Times have changed. I became a decent soccer player by playing on the streets and with friends. If I had worked with a coach to learn more about the game, I would have been a much better soccer player. Game intelligence is key to building a club culture. Players need to feel like they are improving. If players do not get a sense of self-improvement, they will move to another team or sport. You will not be able to create a team culture if you keep losing players every year.

Teamwork – Picking the best players does not necessarily mean you will have the best team. The All Blacks—the most successful rugby team in the world—have a motto on building a team: “Better people make better players.” They recruit players that fit into their team. This is why Sir Alex Ferguson at Manchester United and Bill Belichick at the New England Patriots were (and are) so successful. Their vision of what a team should look like never wavered. If any player disrupted that teamwork, they were kicked off the team, no matter what skill sets they had. This book is similar to that approach. Before you kick a player off the team, try to find out about their background. Communicate with the player and let them know that your job as the coach is to help them. If they continue to work against the team philosophy, then you will have no choice but to let them go. The strength of the team as a whole is the decisive factor in determining the outcome.

Comparing the above professional teams to your team may seem like comparing apples and oranges, but when it comes to teamwork, you should be mimicking the process of the aforementioned teams.

1. How Do You Handle Your Players?

Team building is a product of the coach’s credibility. The coach must be honest and must be a good teacher. He or she needs to communicate the vision to the players and have realistic targets while building for the future. For the coach to reach the maximum potential of the team, he or she may need to work on two or three priorities to get the group moving forward.

2. Do You Communicate?

Good communication is a way of perfecting team building; it creates the right atmosphere for players to learn. In your practice sessions, you will communicate the exercise and demonstrate, then watch your players solve the problems.

3. How Do Your Players Get On With Each Other?

There will be a pecking order within the team. The team leader must be one that is respected by all the players. They must also have a close relationship with the coach. Players do not necessarily have to be best friends off the pitch, but it does help. As long as they know their task when they are on the field and in the locker room, your team will be strong.

Work ethic – Once again, the coach sets the standards. The coach is always the first to arrive at practices and games. The players will be more likely to jump on board the development train if they see their coach working hard to make them a better player and a better person. Challenge the players to self-manage. Allow the players to be the disciplinarians of work ethic. Working hard does not guarantee a win; in the coach’s eyes it is a win, but not in the players’ eyes. You have to educate the players on the importance of work ethic.

I always tell my players, “Be the best you can be today. It may be different than yesterday, but get out there and give it your best effort. Have the mindset of can, will, and do!”

Your practice sessions will be competitive. Every action the players take will have a result. When your practice involves players winning and losing, be sure to watch the reaction of all the players once the exercise is over.

Discipline – Being disciplined does not mean you will not make mistakes. Some coaches equate making mistakes with not trying. This is just not the case. Do not get the two mixed up. No player wants to be punished for making a mistake. Do not punish the whole group if some players decide to disrespect the practice or game. Sit out the players who are not disciplined. Explain why they are sitting out and then ask them, “Are you ready to give it your best?” If a player has good discipline, they will learn quicker and the group will progress at a faster rate. The development process...