Fun – Enjoyment – Player Development - Lifelong Soccer Fans – Sportsmanship

Our U14 House League players are all recreational players. They decided not to play Travel, but still love the game and want to continue to play. Even though the attitude is light, we still have to provide excellent, challenging training sessions and games that the players will enjoy.  It is our goal to continue the growth of our House League program and field U16 and U18 House League teams in the near future. 

All teams at DSC play Nine versus Nine in a 3-2-3 formation; 3 defenders, 2 central midfielders and three forwards.  This should be an easy transition from 7 v 7. We just add two central midfielders between the defense and the forwards. With a sheet of paper, cones or a dry erase clip board with magnets you can simply point out the positions; goalie; left defender; central defender; right defender; left central midfielder; right central midfielder; left forward; center forward and right forward.  During the game your instructions don’t really go beyond; ‘win the ball back’, ‘go forward’, ‘spread out’ and ‘don’t steal the ball from your teammate’. Let the kids play! Don’t be a joystick coach. Keep the game going and don’t forget; everyone attacks and everyone defends! 

Training Goals

·       Understand basic concept of soccer more in depth.

·       Improve  basic technical skills; dribbling, passing, receiving, shooting at the goal

·       Improve combination play, possession play.

·       Improve basic tactical skills; positioning in 4v4 and 7v7.

·       Improve motor skills and movement

·       Have fun!

Practice Themes

·       Small sided games; 2v2, 3v3, 4v4, 5v5

·       Technique; dribbling, passing, receiving, shooting, 1v1 duels

·       Combination plays; give and go, 2v1, 3v2

·       Possession play; 4v1, 5v2

·       Coordination

Practice Set Up

1.    When you arrive at practice immediately set up a field with two goals and have your players start to play a game right away.  Get them in a soccer mode! 

2.    After about 10 minutes start with your practice session. Follow the lesson plan as closely as possible.

3.    End practice with a game. Play either 4v4 or 5v5 (with substitutes of necessary), but don’t make the games any larger. It is useless to have a pile of twelve six year old kids on top of each other.  You can also set up two games of 3v3. Just make sure the play a lot.

4.    At the end of practice talk about the upcoming game for a couple of minutes. What went well and not so well during the last game and what do we have to think about during this upcoming game.