Quote:

Obadiah - each comment you have made you have made a respectable point in a manner that doesnt seem to offend people and most can respect. For that I appreciate very much....



Your welcome & thanks to you too. Isn't it nice when people can get along

I know I said I was going to give AYSO 722 or ACT the last post, but you put some of that irrestible bait on that "hook" of yours to bring me back . That's not fair.

As an aside... Sorry ACT/soccerluvr et al, looks like you may need to wait for a bit longer to get that last post in. I do believe that the post you made for me (while be it umteen pages ago) was meant to be light hearted anyway, so I really would have let it stand. Trust me on that one

Back to topic...

Anyway, with all the side jibber-jabber going on the following will probably get lost so I'll type as fast as I can - please forgive my spelling mistakes. Since you asked a good question, I'll give another shot at trying to be a constructive in this thread.

Quote:

is it more degrading for the parents and kids to have the opposing team dribbling back and forth for the whole half of the game making the other team look terrible never touching the ball



That is a question that we all battle or have battled (especially at the rec level). It won't happen to you (as much) when you move your teams up to academy play, but you still have to be on the look out for the pending mismatch. It has a multitude of solutions - none of which is perfect and is guarenteed to work in every game situation. Sometimes nothing may work, but you as the coach have to be able to read what is on the pitch and take responsiblity to adjust appropriately as quickly as possible. Some coaches are better than others at pulling this off well. It does take experience and sometimes a williness to give up a goal or two in the process, but long term it is well worth it. If you're really serious about getting answers to this question, it's been discussed many times on this forum and you can search for some solutions posted by others, but I'll list a few here that are U10 specific...

Put your weakest players in scoring position.... Duh, I know... pretty obvious, but I have to start somewhere. (I'm typing this off the top of my head). Be aware that sometimes this simply won't work well by itself (especially on select teams) because the whole group may be very capable of putting the ball in the net quite well.

Limit the kids touches.... Don't just dribble back & forth, but rather make the kids pass to a team mate as quickly as possible after they get control of the ball. (maybe one or two touches to control, find a team mate, and get rid of the ball). At U10, lots of passes will be errant & get picked off by the opposing team - that's OK and goes a long way to helping keep the blow out from occuring. Use the opportunity to teach the kids to concentrate on "playing the way they face" and build-up out of the back. Drop back to a single forward & post them up as a target forward (playing back to goal) and distribute back out of the center of the field wide. As the kids get better, you'll probably also have to add...

Use the "off foot" on shots and/or passes.... If the players are right footed, restrict them to using their left foot as much as possible (or vice-versa). It's a great way for them to build up their skill sets and increase their dimensionality (is that a word?) as all around players.

There are lots of other methods out there to add to this, (scoring on headers only, shots from outside the 18, etc) but the real trick is recognizing early that you are on the upper end of a mismatch, and knowing the age appropriate methods to adjust for the situation.

I was trying to think about examples I've used and seen, and I've got to tell you about one of the best ever I have seen pulled off well. It was this season - and no... I can't take credit for it.

.
.
.
.
.

My hat goes off to the CSC Chargers team that plays in the CESA U14-G development league. We have a brand new team of girls new to our group this season (some of who have never played before) & we had to play CSC our very first game. CSC is a VERY good team (read that as "select quality") - well coached with highly skilled players. They put in 2 or 3 goals so fast on us it would make your head spin. Their coach recognized immediately the pending disaster, made the appropriate adjustments and the game finished 5-0 (one from a set play) with our girls having multiple opportunities on goal - and no one but the experienced around the field were any the wiser about what happened. CSC was able to work on stuff they probably normally just practice with, and our girls came off the field all smiles having learned many things themselves about space and positioning they hadn't yet grasped. Had CSC kept the pedal to the metal, our girls probably wouldn't have wanted to go back out for the 2nd half and I expect some would not want to continue to learn the game at all. That CSC group / coach earned both my gratitude and respect for how they handled this. We play them again in a few weeks, and I look forward to the rematch to see what our girls have learned since that last outing.

Bottom line, it CAN be done. You just have to forget about winning and think about development.