How to prevent bad behaviour at soccer training

Some might argue that coaching amateur sports is one of the trickiest teaching jobs out there. Whilst teachers now have University degrees and experience of placements under their belts as they enter the classroom, football coaches are often thrust on to the hallowed turf with nothing more than a few slides from the FA to guide us on this tricky behavioral journey.

Now, I’m not saying teaching is easy for one second! My mother, a seasoned classroom veteran, is proof enough to me that it can be one of the most difficult jobs out there. However over the years she was able to develop tricks and techniques to combat bad behavior and keep a reign on the children.

It’s also worth noting that the ages at which we coach youth soccer can be notoriously tricky for the children themselves. It can often be the case that your under 10’s who behaved impeccably throughout one season can be a completely different beast at the under-11 age group. Hormones kick in, testosterone goes through the roof and fireworks can ensue. I’m sure each and every one of us can remember that time in our lives! So be patient, don’t lose your cool and use the tips below to help.

With all this in mind, I turned to my mum, who as mentioned is a seasoned primary school teacher with over 30 years experience. What she told me has helped me take control of training sessions, rule out (the majority) of bad behaviour and keep training fun, focused and worthwhile.

1. Keep them busy!

You may have noticed that a lot of training sessions start to break down when kids are stood about in lines waiting to take part in a drill. Sometimes this is inevitable, because some drills require this in order to get lots of touches for each player, lots of repetitions, and it’s important to allow for a rest period.

One of the most important ways to promote good behaviour at training sessions is through keeping players active, engaged and challenged. The last thing we want is players getting bored whilst standing at the back of a queue.

Aim to keep lines short (4 players max) and make sure that even if they’re in a line, they are moving through the drill quickly so they’re not stood around. If possible, get players into more game orientated situations where they’re having to stay alert and switched on, ready to take part as and when needed.

Games such as Rondos are ideal for keeping players moving whilst giving them all plenty of touches of the ball, and if you want to get lots of touches into a game introduce conditions such as every player must touch the ball before being able to score.

If you have a drill and you’re worried about lines forming, try running the same drill side by side. Take a dribbling drill as an example — you could have one group going from one side of the pitch to the other, and another group going from the opposite side to the other. This is easier with two coaches, but you should be able to keep an eye on both groups through standing in a good position.

2. Keep the best players challenged!

One of the hardest aspects of coaching is being able to tailor sessions for mixed abilities. This might be because you simply have one group of players who are mixed ability, or your club may have a policy of all teams training together. Even within the same team (a C team for example) you could have a real mix of abilities.

Whilst it’s easy to challenge the players at the lower end of the scale, it can be difficult to keep high achievers engaged. If they find drills too easy then it can become boring and they’ll switch off; instead turning their attention to disrupting other kids and the session as a whole.

One way in which to increase the difficulty is to set these players individual challenges. Pull them out of the drill quietly for a quick chat, give them positive encouragement and say that you’re going to set them a challenge. This will kick in their competitive nature and grab their attention. If, for example, it’s a passing drill, you could say,

“You’ve been looking up lots tonight which is great. Now I want you to try to play 5 accurate passes with your weaker foot. Do you think you could do that for me?”

This helps them develop better skills whilst also adding in that competitive edge.

Another method is to make them your ‘assistant’ for the day. The aim of this is to give the player a sense of responsibility, and to see if they can help the other players improve themselves. They’ll need a bit of guidance on the teaching aspect of it, but you might just find they really take to the role, and offer themselves up as a potential captain! Allowing them to teach others repeats the technique in their mind, and they’ll get a kick out of feeling like they’re good enough to teach someone else.

3. Lay down the law

Just like a real game of footy, training should have a set of rules too. Without rules, kids (and adults!) can end up hurting someone, messing about or generally disrupting the session. A good idea for kids is to use the existing laws of the game as a general rule for training — i.e. not talking back to the ref (or coach), no physical violence and no verbal abuse among others.

To make it much more like a real game you could introduce a yellow and red card system. Yellow cards can be for repeated minor offences (such as talking when you’re talking, messing about in drills) and red cards can be for 2 ‘yellow cards’ or a serious offence (as mentioned above).

It’s important to set your rules early in the season, and make sure parents and players both know what the situation is. It’s important to gather all parties at the beginning of the season and explain verbally what the rules and sanctions are, and then it could be useful to hand out a written list in case anyone ‘forgets’.

When setting rules always try to be positive. So instead of ‘Players must not talk when the coach is talking’ try making it ‘Players should pay attention at all times’. Not only is this telling players what their behaviour should be, but it also doesn’t give them any ideas on what they shouldn’t be doing!

Some common rules we have are:

• Players should pay attention at all times
• Players should respect each other
• Players should encourage team mates
• Players should put in 100% effort for the whole session

The above rules will cover most bad behaviour the players could get up to, for example:

Talking when the coach is talking? Well they can’t be paying attention!

One player hits another? They’re not respecting each other!

One player calls another rubbish? They’re not encouraging team mates!

Of course there are always cases when serious misbehaviour needs to be punished. If you find one of the players hitting another player or verbally abusing the other kids or coach then they should be removed from the session immediately.

The parent should be brought into this situation, with the coach explaining what has happened and they they will be taking no further part in the session. We run a zero tolerance policy — after all as a coach you have a duty of care for all the players on your team.

Hopefully these 3 points will help you tackle any bad behaviour you might be experiencing at training sessions. It can be a tricky subject, but if you set out rules early, stick by your guns and make sure players are active as much as possible, you should experience smoother sessions that benefit everyone.

As always, keep coaching.

Dave
Coaches Corner