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Soccer Coach Information

First of all, if you have volunteered to be a coach, we thank you for taking the time to coach your child’s team with Club Sport Kids. This web page contains some important information regarding Club Sport Kids, uniforms, schedules, and coaching.

Introduction:

As a coach, before the season starts send out an email or call all parents on your team to introduce yourself. Remind parents to show up at least 30-45 minutes before the first game to allow plenty of time to find parking, find the field/coach/team, change into uniforms, meet the team and have a quick practice before the games start. Parents may want to bring chairs or blankets to sit comfortably on the side lines, bug spray to ward off the pesky mosquitoes, and lots of encouragement for the kids! Explain what time you’d like to host practice before games. Ask another parent to help on the side lines with substitutions, especially with the 3-5 year olds, as the kids tend to wander. It may be a good idea to start up a snack rotation to foster team bonding. We’d like to encourage parents to bring healthy snacks and beverages for the team, instead of soft drinks and candy.   

Uniforms:

The uniforms are in and available for pickup in the Club Sport office. Since there are over 300 kids registered, it is impossible to deliver uniforms to individual players. We are asking that coaches pick up the uniforms at their convenience at the office the week before the games. Once picked up they can either make arrangements to distribute to the parents of the children prior to the first game or arrive early at the first game and hand them out then. Our office will be open 9am to 6pm this week at 1150 94^th Ave North (in the strip plaza across from the Sears Essentials on MLK/9^th St N). If you cannot make it during this time please call and we can possibly arrange to stay later or be there early. Should you not be able to pick them up at all please make arrangements for someone from your team to pick them up this week. Any uniforms left at our office after 3 pm on gameday (or the Friday before if games are on the weekend) will be brought out to the field for pick up by the coach or team representative. The uniforms you receive are specifically ordered per your teams’ player’s size requests (late registrations not withstanding). Please go by the updated roster form included with the uniforms that lists each player’s sizes. This will avoid any problems or issues.

Schedule:

You will be able to find the schedule online at http://clubsportkids.com/leagues.htm 3-4 days before the league begins. This will also have a location of your field each week to make it easy to meet your team. We will have all of the fields set up at least an hour before the first games for your team to practice ahead of your game. Refs for 6-12 year old teams will be scheduled to arrive on time, however, they may get stuck in traffic or get held up trying to find a parking space. We will try our best to keep games on time by starting the games up with/without a ref If need be, a Club Sport representative will start the game until a ref arrives.

Coaching Basics:

Club Sport Kids and your team appreciates your time to help coach your team this soccer season. Coaching is a rewarding experience and there is nothing like your child looking up to you as coach of their team. That said, Club Sport Kids does have some guidelines we would like you to follow.

·         Club Sport Kids is JUST FOR FUN! Score is not kept. It is about fun, exercise, and learning the basics of the game. Your energetic spirit and good sportsmanship will no doubt transfer to the children and benefit their overall outlook of sports.

·         Coaches are on the field for 3-5 and 6-8 year olds to help guide the kids through the game, keep them within the parameters of the field, evenly distribute kick-ins/throw-ins, etc.

·         At no time should you yell, scold, or in any other way demean a player, on your team or another. Should this become an issue brought to our attention, you may be removed as coach.

·         As a coach, while you are not responsible for all of your players actions, you may be responsible for correcting them. If you see a player acting inappropriately on the field, please gently suggest they sub out and mention to them, the other coach, or their parents what actions are acceptable. “Yanking” or “dragging” a child off the field would not be acceptable unless there was immediate danger to another player.

·         All players that desire to should play equal time regardless of skill. Some children may opt out of playing. That’s ok, just kindly encourage them to play, but it is not mandatory. Keep an eye on the time or have an assistant that can help you rotate players so each get a fair shot at playing during a game.

·         As a Club Sport Kids policy, mandatory (or even highly suggested) practices outside your gameday are discouraged. If your team wants to informally get together outside of game day, that’s fine. But many parents/children join this league because of its little required time commitment – so requiring any time outside of the games should be no means affect the child’s playing time.

·         Most of all, encourage the players and make them feel special. The league is about personal growth and having FUN!

Coaching Tips:

The specifics of soccer are fairly straightforward. You can find the basic Club Sport Kids rules here. Please look them over. You can also find some games, drills, etc depending on the age group you are coaching here. This link will take you to the "Best Practices for Coaching Soccer in the United States", by the US Soccer Federation. Don’t panic when you open this and find 70+ pages.  I highly recommend reading the first 30 pages, as it pertains to coaching under youth under 12 years of age. Really good stuff for first time coaches or if you want to brush up on some new drills. Generally, any drills or skill building exercises you may perform during your practice are much more fun if incorporated as some sort of game the kids can play.

Also, if you are an experienced coach and would like to offer your expertise as a mentor or just be a contact for a coach that may have questions as what to expect, etc. -- please let me know!

Rainout Information:

We will update our RAINOUT line as soon as a decision to cancel games has been made. You may check our rainout line at 877-820-2582, ext 1.  It may end up being a game time decision as the evening rain showers are more prevalent this time of year. If we are rained out, we will make every effort to make up games on another day, depending on field availability. As coach, you will be responsible for sharing this information with your team.

Please do not hesitate to contact us if you have any questions. We will always have staff at the field (in a white Club Sport Kids shirt) to answer any questions or solve any problems.