Under 9's - Systematic errors?

Session - Possession and spacial awareness

The first session of the season for our newly formed under 9's. A simple session that comprised a skills based warm up, some 2 v 2 progressions followed by a possesion game and concluding with a small sided game

Observations
During 1 of the drills - 7 v 3 possession, 4 passes or a 1/2 to score a goal - . A systematic problem occurred hence feedback needed to be at a group level rather than at an individual level. The problem was centred on players in possession only utilising short passing , thus causing the team in possesion to compress the playing area, this made it easy for the defenders to win the ball back.

When the ball went of play we used the dead time to ask a group question - Do the team in possession want to make the pitch big or small -BIG was the unified response - WHY - more time and space for the man on the ball and the defence have to turn and chase the ball, the children knew the answer but what followed were repeats of the same problem. so despite knowing the answer they were unable to implement the solution

Our response was to introduce a conditioned drill that caused transfer of play from 1 side of the pitch to the other.

Enjoyable session, with deeper insights to the player development process

Session 4 - Skillful neglect?

Session 4 - receiving to pass - 15 players under 12 age group

Warm up
Used the warm up games to concentrate on the basics of raising the body temperature plus also added a number of simple games that were designed to activate the players decision making processes - worked a treat. Also included the group questioning methods to set the scene and to test understanding. The kids have adapted to this approach, very noticable the quality of the answers to the questions are significantly higher

Session
The session comprised a series of progressive small sided games that centred on passing and movement - Great session, tempo excellent, kids loved it

Skillful neglect
All our groups have now accepted this approach - we wait and see if the error is self correcting if not we make a note of it then discreetly discuss it with the player without anyone knowing, Tonight there were 5 interventions (all related to slowing the attacks down by having too many touches) all delivered discreetly - very interesting to see the reactions of the children - far more receptive, always delivered via questions with heavy positive spin

We have organised sessions for our parents to illustrate the blue dot exercise and to show how sideline coaching shuts down the learning system