Advice

My son is a full time goalie with 3 years club experience. He attends regular goalie trainings and is very good for his age. His 09 Coach promised a flight 1 Team during and after tryouts. He heavily recruited my son. And that’s what we expected but not the case. Some boys are not at the level they should be for this flight and so coach is backpedaling. Instead of moving players up or down, he now backtracks and says they are going to compete in flight 2. All the while, putting them in tournaments in the flight 1 Bracket. This is not helping the team morale. Also this same coach got mad when my son had to miss 1 game over the summer. But has not missed anything else. Even though some kids missed entire tournaments. Any advice on how to move forward? Not the season I was expecting. And I don’t like being told one thing and then after tryouts, another thing. Not ok.
 
My son: U16/2003 who plays up 3 years on a U19/2000 team (Gold/F1) and also a U23 Adult team.

He would not be the goalkeeper he is today if he was on a flight 1 team at U12. Rather, he started on a middle of the pack U12 team, then bronze U13 team that was very poor defensively. In this two year span, going to GK practice and playing on teams that had weak defense accelerated his development because there were games where he got 20 or more shots in a half. Was it painful to watch? Yes and no. I knew from the beginning that the best thing for a GK as a youth player is to be on a defensively poor team. Nothing will help your kid more. Rejoice you lucked into a good situation.

Every coach goes into the season trying to build a team that will play at the highest level ... and sometimes it just doesn't work out.
 
Agree with MWN. It's also pretty typical. Coaches always promise the moon when they are trying to build the team...I learned the lesson the hard way the first year and that all the talk about being a family and promises like State Cup and trips to France were nonsense. He may not have a choice, BTW, if it's a new team and the record did not sustain placement in flight 1, depending on the league of course.

The flights don't really matter at that age, particularly to a keeper. The flight 1s are just kids that are early bloomers and can run really fast. The coach obviously is mindful of the morale and doesn't want the team to get blown out the entire season. The flights are supposed to be about making sure teams don't blow each other out, but they've achieved a weird status symbol thing which is distorting soccer (as you can see from the other thread of the guy complaining about his flight 1 bench players).

The three things you say that might have me a little wary. One, that the coach seems to have had the ambition to have pushed such a young team into flight 1 so early. It may be he's one of the types that cares more about the wins than the players development. Two that he got upset at you guys for missing a week (at that age, it's expected you'll miss weeks....it may be though he's putting too much reliance and pressure on your keeper in which case your keeper might be the scape goat if they lose [happened to us the first year]). And three because he's placing a lot of reliance on your keeper, that at such a young age he doesn't have a substitute and your child is playing between the sticks the entire time. Particularly if the coach doesn't play the back pass and allow your child to always take goalkicks, without field practice, your child may not develop the footskills he needs to be a modern day keeper. See how it goes and how he uses your keeper this season, and if you aren't happy, change next year...that's how it goes with keepers (they change around a lot as their needs and skills and challenges change).
 
My son: U16/2003 who plays up 3 years on a U19/2000 team (Gold/F1) and also a U23 Adult team.

He would not be the goalkeeper he is today if he was on a flight 1 team at U12. Rather, he started on a middle of the pack U12 team, then bronze U13 team that was very poor defensively. In this two year span, going to GK practice and playing on teams that had weak defense accelerated his development because there were games where he got 20 or more shots in a half. Was it painful to watch? Yes and no. I knew from the beginning that the best thing for a GK as a youth player is to be on a defensively poor team. Nothing will help your kid more. Rejoice you lucked into a good situation.

Every coach goes into the season trying to build a team that will play at the highest level ... and sometimes it just doesn't work out.
My son: U16/2003 who plays up 3 years on a U19/2000 team (Gold/F1) and also a U23 Adult team.

He would not be the goalkeeper he is today if he was on a flight 1 team at U12. Rather, he started on a middle of the pack U12 team, then bronze U13 team that was very poor defensively. In this two year span, going to GK practice and playing on teams that had weak defense accelerated his development because there were games where he got 20 or more shots in a half. Was it painful to watch? Yes and no. I knew from the beginning that the best thing for a GK as a youth player is to be on a defensively poor team. Nothing will help your kid more. Rejoice you lucked into a good situation.

Every coach goes into the season trying to build a team that will play at the highest level ... and sometimes it just doesn't work out.

I agree for the practice stand point it is great. But sometime not for morale or confidence. The team has no defense and rely way to much on my son. And not seeing any improvement and we’ve been playing together since Jan.
 
Agree with MWN. It's also pretty typical. Coaches always promise the moon when they are trying to build the team...I learned the lesson the hard way the first year and that all the talk about being a family and promises like State Cup and trips to France were nonsense. He may not have a choice, BTW, if it's a new team and the record did not sustain placement in flight 1, depending on the league of course.

The flights don't really matter at that age, particularly to a keeper. The flight 1s are just kids that are early bloomers and can run really fast. The coach obviously is mindful of the morale and doesn't want the team to get blown out the entire season. The flights are supposed to be about making sure teams don't blow each other out, but they've achieved a weird status symbol thing which is distorting soccer (as you can see from the other thread of the guy complaining about his flight 1 bench players).

The three things you say that might have me a little wary. One, that the coach seems to have had the ambition to have pushed such a young team into flight 1 so early. It may be he's one of the types that cares more about the wins than the players development. Two that he got upset at you guys for missing a week (at that age, it's expected you'll miss weeks....it may be though he's putting too much reliance and pressure on your keeper in which case your keeper might be the scape goat if they lose [happened to us the first year]). And three because he's placing a lot of reliance on your keeper, that at such a young age he doesn't have a substitute and your child is playing between the sticks the entire time. Particularly if the coach doesn't play the back pass and allow your child to always take goalkicks, without field practice, your child may not develop the footskills he needs to be a modern day keeper. See how it goes and how he uses your keeper this season, and if you aren't happy, change next year...that's how it goes with keepers (they change around a lot as their needs and skills and challenges change).
The team plays back a lot but sometimes rely too much on my son. Defense has always been weak but I was hoping there would be improvement or changes in positions. No improvement and they have been playing since Jan together. One time my son was visibly upset one game but kept playing. If this was a lower division, wouldn’t be so frustrated but this is supposed to be the highest team for their age group.
 
The easiest thing for the coach to do is placing the team in flight 1 and satisfy the parents...........for now. Based on your description of the team (poor defense, no improvement), it sounds like he is actually doing the unpopular but the right thing by placing the team in the appropriate flight.

Sure, we all want our kids to play in the highest flight as soon as possible. But if your flight 1 team finishes 1-11 or worse in the league with no realistic chance of winning some of the games, it gets very old very quickly. There is not much in-game learning when the score is 5-0 or worse. In most cases the team will disband after the season.

The bracket for the fall league is already out. How has your team fared against other flight 1 teams during spring/summer tournaments? Is your team truly competitive? Sometimes a U-little team will have their strongest players play center backs and lose most games by only 2-0 or 3-0. But they often generate very little scoring opportunities and have no realistic chance of winning at all.
 
I'm going to take a step back because I responded without taking into consideration a very critical point, which is age. 2009 = U10, right? 9 year olds playing 7v7?

I personally don't believe any 9 year old should be pigeon holed in goal at 9. Each kid on this team should spend a half in goal and your boy needs to see the field. My "personal belief" is based on being an E-Licensed Coach, Grade 7 Referee, experienced parent of a GK and heavily involved in youth soccer through my work.

There is a fundamental flaw with everybody involved in your boys team, from DOC, to Coach to Parent (yes, Parent). At age 9 the sole objective should be to instill a love of the sport, have fun, and develop individual skills. Quite frankly we should probably make 7v7 tournaments illegal (US Soccer wants us to do that).

Your boy MUST spend 1/2 the time in the field. Its criminal to have a 9 year old between the sticks full-time at this age because:

1) 9 year old's lack the mental capacity to not internalize their mistakes properly.
2) 9 year old's are all about fun, they cry when stuff doesn't go their way ... because they are not mentally developed enough.
3) 9 year old's want soccer to be fun.

That said, the mistakes have been made and your boy is on a team. This is what I would tell my son if he was in your kid's situation:

A. The Goalkeeper is the first player on offence and the last player on defense. When your team scores, it took 11 players ... starting at you to get that goal. When the team is scored upon it took 10 of your teammates to fail for that ball to get to you.

B. The score is ultimately meaningless. Adults have created these little games and trophies to make themselves feel important. Go out and do your best. If the team wins, great. If the team loses? Only the parents of the players care. These adults made a grave mistake of trying to make a little kids game more important that it should be. Sorry son, I made a mistake.

C. Your only job while you are practicing and playing is to have fun and do your best. Whether the team wins or loses, if you did your best then you won. The score is meaningless.

The other stuff I wrote is relevant for 12 or 13 year old's and up. uLittles simply lack the mental capacity to separate the team failures versus their own.
 
Completely agree with @MWN

I can only speak to the girls’ side but much of this is universal: my older kid is a gk and plays at a high level. She always played 1/2 in goal and half up top until u13. I cringe a little when I see a u-little team with a gk in full gk kit because they all need time on the field. And with the evolution of the position, every excellent gk must be, as @MWN states, an offensive and defensive player. In my kid’s situation, she generated as much attention in games when she barely made a save but had the ball at her feet dozens of times as in games when she had to face all kinds of shots. I believe she benefits and her college will benefit next year from all the time her coaches played her at forward, made her juggle, allowed her to take PKs in shootouts, etc.
 
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