soccertoolbox, Author at Soccer Toolbox

Dot Warm-up Drill

December 19, 2017 by soccertoolbox

Need a great way to start your training sessions? Take a look at this versatile warm-up drill appropriate for all skill levels. This drill easily adaptable to various skill levels.

In the clip below from World Class Coaching, Tom Mura explains his Dot Warm-up drill. The drill is played in a 20 x 20 area with five players. You can of course adjust the number of players and size of the playing area. Larger playing areas give the drill a conditioning component, while smaller fields place and emphasis on technical skills.

The drill requires that each player have a ball and the use of cones of three different colors. The cones are spread evenly throughout the playing area. Care should be taken to make sure that there is at least one cone of each color in every third of the field. In other words, make sure that each color of cone is spread evenly throughout the playing area.

Initially, the players are told to dribble their ball in the playing area avoiding each other and the cones. This of course requires they keep their heads up. The next progression requires that the players dribble in a predetermined pattern of their choosing. They might dribble towards the red cone, then yellow and then blue. They would then just keep repeating that sequence. (red-yellow-blue). Each player will choose their own sequence.

Next the coach will call out an action. For example, you might say that when your reach a yellow cone you must do a step over, or a specific type of turn. As you progress. add another action for when they are at a blue cone. Finally add a third action for when they arrive at a red cone.

Again this drill is courtesy of our partners at World Class Coaching, providers of many great coaching tools. You can check them out at the link above. They are also offering free access to their eBook 50 Small Sided Games that Make a Difference

The YouTube video below has audio, so please make sure that your sound is turned on and that you have access to the site. Note that some schools block access to YouTube.

Don’t forget to get your free eBook from World Class Coaching. Just click the link below

Hey Coach, I Want to be a Leader!

December 18, 2017 by soccertoolbox

Do you consider it your responsibility as a coach to teach leadership to your athletes? If you do not, you are missing an opportunity to improve your program and your players lives.

Submitted by by Cory Dobbs, Ed.D., The Academy for Sport Leadership

You’ve likely heard the proverb that reads, “Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime.” From this lesson, it follows that teaching a player to lead will feed her leadership growth for a lifetime. However, teaching leadership is far more complex than teaching someone to fish. So what do you do when there are no seven habits of this, or no five rules for that?

The truth is, the teaching and learning of leadership in a student-athletic environment is a messy pursuit. Peer-to-peer leadership is a demanding venture. For young emerging leaders tackling tough problems, even when the student-athlete is willing and able, is fraught with risk. When attempting to lead, student-athletes are likely to encounter a range of emotions that include fear, uncertainty, and doubt. How you help them learn through these emotions will, in part, determine their effectiveness and success as a team leader.

Do you consider your responsibilities as a coach to include the role of a leadership educator? I hope you do. You have the perfect leadership laboratory for developing leaders. So what gives? Why do many programs fail to produce highly qualified leaders—for the immediate moment as well as life beyond sport?

It’s been my experience as an observer of many teams over the years that often what’s lacking for the budding leader is simply opportunity. Most coaches appoint team captains or assign the role based on some type of criteria (such as seniority). And likewise, a great many coach will in the final analysis suggest that they either had effective or ineffective internal (player) leadership.

Deep down, it’s one thing to say you value leadership from your players. It’s another thing to give them extensive opportunities to lead by creating developmental culture. If you had to choose, which would it be? Would you want a very successful season in terms of wins with a player or two along the way learning how to lead at a very elementary level, or a season where every player experiences deep leadership growth and development while winning half your games? Thankfully this doesn’t have to be an either or question, but it does require you to reflect deeply on what you’re doing as a coach. Hence the dilemma: how does a coach modify his or her coaching orientation to affect the leadership experience of their student-athletes?

Let me take a moment to separate leader from leadership. A leader is a person, and leadership is a process. Now, let me go out on a limb: leaders need leadership opportunities (processes) from which to learn and grow. So, if you find yourself saying at the conclusion of a season that you didn’t have any leaders, don’t focus solely on your players. Take a hard look at the process—the real opportunities your environment provided for your leaders to grow.

To develop effective team leaders a simple way of looking at performance will help. Leadership performance is a function of the interaction of ability and willingness; that is Leadership Performance = f(A,W). If either is inadequate leader performance will be underwhelming.

However, to maximize a leader’s growth and development you need to add opportunity to practice and perform to the equation. The revised leader development formula becomes Leader Development = f(A, W,O). Even though a student-athlete may be willing and able, they need opportunities to connect with the purpose of leadership in your team setting.

Anyone wanting to lead or become a team captain will gain a solid foundation through the various (variety and quantity) leadership activities available to them. So give your young athletes lots of opportunities to gain the experience of leadership.

To find out more about and order Sport Leadership Books authored by Dr. Dobbs including Coaching for Leadership, click this link: The Academy for Sport Leadership Books
About the Author

A former basketball coach, Cory’s coaching background includes experience at the NCAA DII, NJCAA, and high school levels of competition. While coaching, he researched and developed the transformative Becoming a Team Leader program for student-athletes. Cory has worked with professional athletes, collegiate athletic programs and high schools teaching leadership as a part of the sports experience and education process. Cory cut his teeth as a corporate leader with Fortune 500 member, The Dial Corp. As a consultant and trainer Dr. Dobbs has worked with such organizations as American Express, Honeywell, and Avnet.

Cory has taught a variety of courses on leadership and change for the following universities:

Northern Arizona University (Graduate Schools of Business and Education)

Ohio University (Graduate School of Education / Management and Leadership in Sport)

Grand Canyon University (Sports Marketing and Sports Management in the Colangelo School of Sports Business)

Visit www.corydobbs.com to read Cory’s leadership blog.

Goalkeeping Fundamental Drills

December 17, 2017 by soccertoolbox

In this post you will get 4 drills from Houston Dynamo Goalkeeper Coach Paul Rodgers designedto help teach technique and fundamentals to your goalkeeper.

In the clip below, Coach Rodgers leads several drills during his Goalkeeping – Training a Pro demonstration. Coach Rogers is very experienced and has been a goalkeeper coach in the past for the United States Women’s National Team. These drills are designed for professional players, but could be used by high school or any age group of goalkeepers. Also, you can use these drills for a pre-game warm up or in a regular practice session. The main objective should always be to get your goalkeeper good practice and reps, while continuing to work on the proper techniques and fundamentals.

The four drills that are demonstrated are listed below:

Shuffle and Save

The goalkeeper shuffles around several cones moving forward before a volley shot is taken by a coach or player from 5 – 10 yards away. This very simple drill gets the goalkeeper practicing on their footwork while finishing with a point blank shot to save.

Side steps and Shuffle

This drill involves the goalkeeper doing side steps over small hurdles, crossing over, and then saving a volley shot. The goalkeeper is now practicing moving to the side with quick footwork before coming back and saving another shot

Side steps, back pedal, and forward

The goalkeeper now side steps over the small hurdles, then back pedals, and goes forward before saving a volley shot. This drill is important for goalkeepers to practice moving forward while keeping balance and staying on their toes.

Quick steps, back pedal, and settle in

This drill involves the goalkeeper taking quick steps forward over small hurdles, back pedaling, and then settling in to save a volley shot. This gives a goalkeeper practice and reps with moving backwards to save shots, which can happen in a game. There should be a focus on the goalkeeper staying on their toes to make sure they are able to dive either direction depending on the shot.

The clip is just a small portion of Coach Rodgers Goalkeeping presentation at a recent Glazier Soccer Clinic. For information about how to gain access to his entire presentation, as well as hundreds of other great clinic presentations, click the link Glazier Soccer Clinics

The YouTube video below has audio, so please make sure that your sound is turned up. Note some schools block access to YouTube.

National Team Game a Must for Coaches

December 15, 2017 by soccertoolbox

By Matt Settles

Coach Settles is entering his 12th season as a high school coach in Indiana. The former collegiate player at the University of Southern Indiana is also a regular contributor to the Soccer Toolbox

I have played in tons of soccer games since starting when I was a little kid and playing club, high school, and collegiate soccer. Also, I have coached hundreds of games with club soccer for many years and now going into my 13th year of coaching high school soccer. I experienced a first on July 8th, 2017 in Nashville, TN when I attended a U.S. Men’s National Team Game with my family. It has always been on my list as something I wanted to do, but never got the opportunity as most of their games were not anywhere close to where I live. When the 2017 Gold Cup venues were announced and Nashville, TN was on the list, I knew this may be my best chance. Even better, our family would be returning from vacation that day so we could stop on the way back home. My wife and I made it a surprise for our two young daughters as we did not tell them about our tickets until we were pulling into the stadium. Not only was it a great family trip and unbelievable experience, there were several things I took away as a soccer coach that I think every coach must experience.

First, the atmosphere of the fans and stadium was like nothing I have ever seen before. If you are looking to motivate yourself as a coach or your players, go and experience a national team game. Soccer is alive and well in our country and only growing and getting bigger. Second, if you do go to a game, get there early and watch the warm ups. Most casual fans did not care or pay much attention, but I found the pre-game warm ups very interesting as a coach. There are obviously a lot more resources on the national team with more coaches, trainers, and other staff members around helping, but everything is structured and there is a lot of preparation put into warming up the players. From dynamic stretching to small sided drills to the starters working together as a group, the warm up covered everything and prepared the players to start the game at a high level. Third, the tactical changes made by the coaching staff were very interesting to watch. There were changes made during the game, at halftime, and when substitutions were made. The coaching staff was constantly looking for ways to take advantage of the other team and you could see this through their instructions to the players on the field or when they sent a player in. I found this very interesting because I think a lot of soccer coaches wait for halftime to make any kind of tactical change. They either don’t want to switch up their game plan or don’t want to distract their players on the field. If you wait until halftime, you could be waiting too long or may see the other team make a tactical change that takes away the opportunity.

The game ended in a 1-1 tie and was not the result the U.S. wanted, but turned out to be the start of their journey to a Gold Cup championship. All the players selected for the roster had lots to prove with the World Cup coming up next year in 2018. It will be interesting to see how the roster looks in the coming year with new players looking to earn a spot and how strong our team will be heading into the largest sporting event in the world. If the get the opportunity to make it to a national team in the future, I would highly recommend it and you won’t leave disappointed.

Team Leadership Model

December 12, 2017 by soccertoolbox

The Team Leadership model creates an environment in which members are accountable not just to the coach, but to the team as a whole. If you are willing to give up some control, and believe that all team members can inspire each other, your team will reap the benefits

This article can also be found on the Coaches Toolbox, a collection of free resources for coaches of all sports

Cory Dobbs, Ed.D., The Academy for Sport Leadership

One thing I know is true: everyone I meet has more learning and doing capacity than I am aware of, just like the mighty oak hidden in every tiny acorn. My work with The Academy for Sport Leadership has led me to conclude that a shared leadership system is far more productive than the hierarchical model embodied in the traditional team captain model. I call the participative model, which rests on the practice of mutual learning, the Team Leadership Model.

The Team Leadership Model promotes the processes of team leadership and team building as growth opportunities. It advances the assumption that all members have the ability to inspire others, to reflect on their actions, to increase self-awareness and to leverage their relational capabilities and build positive, impactful relationships.

At the heart of the leader in every locker framework is the core belief that every student-athlete has the ability to learn and develop leadership skills. The transformational coach encourages every student-athlete to reach into their reservoir of beliefs about what is possible for them to accomplish when engaging in learning how to lead and team build. When the student-athlete does this they come to believe that more is always possible.

The coach with the ability to see more than a small capped nut will always be rewarded. More importantly, his players will grow in ways that can only happen in the right environment.

Teams that I’ve worked with that have utilized the team leadership framework—a leader in every locker—have enhanced interpersonal activity and collective effectiveness in the four domains of team sport—the physical, intellectual, emotional, and social domains. The essence of the leader in every locker model is that student-athletes learn to teach and learn in an interactive way so everyone grows individually while expanding the technical and the relational capacity of the team.

The Team Leadership model creates an environment in which members are accountable not just to the coach, but to the team as a whole. This sounds good to coaches, but very few actually practice the Team Leadership concepts. The reasons coaches balk at the idea of Team Leadership—leadership from every locker—is that, in general, they are either hooked on control or of the firm belief that leaders are simply born which leads to the conclusion that leaders are in short supply.

Some coaches will admit this, many won’t. The old way of thinking is comfortable and less time consuming. But, let me say again, my research strongly suggests the traditional captain mode is very limited. The team captain model as practiced by most coaches is a sink or swim proposition.

When you choose to make leadership and team building skills and abilities for all players a priority, not only do you increase responsibility and reliance on one another, you change how your student-athletes interact as leaders and followers.

Okay, lift the hood. Kick the tires. Compare the assumptions that undergird the two models.

The Two Major Leadership Frameworks

Traditional Team Captain Model (Rank-Based) VS. Team Leadership Model (Peer-Based)

Starts from a position that leadership is exclusive; leaders possess the “right stuff”

Starts from a position of leadership as inclusive; everyone is invited to lead self, others, and with others to create individual and team well-being

Fixed mindset; leadership can be learned to some extent, but mostly a unique genetic endowment

Growth mindset; basic and advanced qualities and skills can be cultivated

Scarcity mindset

Abundance mindset

Grounded in leadership as a “power” position

Grounded in leadership as an “influence” position

Hierarchical command and control over others

Peer-based influence as a source of strength

Performance oriented

Participant- oriented

Leader accountable to coaching staff; invested in pleasing coaches

Leader acts from deep sense of responsibility and accountability to others

Leadership learning “passed” down to future leaders

Individualized leadership development

Followers are recipients of an act of leadership

Followers are central to any act of leadership

Leader-centric (focus on person)

Leadership-Centric (focus on process and context)

About the Author

Dr. Cory Dobbs is a national expert on sport leadership and team building and is the founder of The Academy for Sport Leadership. A teacher, speaker, consultant, and writer, Dr. Dobbs has worked with professional, collegiate, and high school athletes and coaches teaching leadership as a part of the sports experience. He facilitates workshops, seminars, and consults with a wide-range of professional organizations and teams. Dr. Dobbs previously taught in the graduate colleges of business and education at Northern Arizona University, Sport Management and Leadership at Ohio University, and the Jerry Colangelo College of Sports Business at Grand Canyon University.

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Coaching for Leadership: How to Develop a Leader in Every Locker. ($24.99)

The Academy for Sport Leadership

The Academy for Sport Leadership’s underlying convictions are as follows: 1) the most important lessons of leadership are learned in real-life situations, 2) team leaders develop best through active practice, structured reflection, and informative feedback, 3) learning to lead is an on-going process in which guidance from a mentor, coach, or colleague helps facilitate learning and growth, and 4) leadership lessons learned in sport should transcend the game and assist student-athletes in developing the capacity to lead in today’s changing environment.