The answer may surprise you. Many youth soccer teams try to emulate what the coach saw on TV last week or what the head coach was coaching as a high school player 20 years ago. Unfortunately, what works at the college or professional level on television often doesn’t work very well at the youth level. The coach’s high school system may have worked well for his team 20 or 30 years ago with 6-day-a-week practices and fast runners, but it fails miserably at the youth level.
At the youth level, our job as coaches is to teach kids how to block and tackle safely and effectively. We teach them how to adopt good athletic postures, as well as the basic rules and strategies. Our most important job must be to make football fun for the player and to train our teams to reach their full potential.
However, you can have fun and win at the same time. In fact, most players who play on perennial losing teams lose their love for the game and quit. That is one of the reasons I developed these training materials for my own organization of 400 children, so that our trainers are competent enough to train children to their God-given potential. Allow our teams to play competitively so that children stay involved in our program. In fact, my materials are full of how to make practices well organized and fun.
Most of the plays or schemes that the typical youth coach has in his playbook are not designed for the talent level of most youth teams. I see teams without speed often trying to run sweeps, I see teams with kids who can’t throw or catch 20-yard passes. I see teams running bootlegs with very slow quarterbacks. I see teams running a dive play without a lead blocker in the heart of youth defenses. I see teams attempting setbacks against well-disciplined teams for big losses. I see passing patterns with 3-4 and even 5 receivers. I see teams trying to get a 9 year old to read two different defenders on option plays, etc, etc.
I Rarely See: Good forward plays off the tackle, one- or two-receiver passing patterns, optional run and pass plays, trap plays, pulls, double teams, wedge block, plays designed to lure the defense offside , unbalanced formations, movement, and great sportsmanship.
In youth soccer every year is different; You won’t always have a big team or a very fast “featured defender” who can outrun everyone in one sweep play. Unlike colleges or the pros, you don’t have hundreds of kids from all over the country to choose from or 20-40 hours of practice a week. In my opinion, the team that wins because they have the fastest guy in the league and beat everyone in sweeps and kick returns is a joke, a matter of luck. Football is a team game and a well-coached team won’t leave that speedster swept up for touchdowns or kick that speedster deep. My first-team defense hasn’t given up a one-touchdown sweep in over 5 years.
I’ve been a youth soccer coach for about 15 years and one play we’ve always been able to execute effectively, regardless of the size or talent of the team I’ve had, is up front.
takeoff power. It can be run from almost any formation, I love it from Single Wing with 4 main blockers and a double team block at the point of attack. While it’s not a terribly sexy play, in most cases it gets you 4-5 yards at a time and sets up “home run” complementary plays like the trap, play-action pass, or wing backhand. Most youth teams are set up to stop the sweep, the “holy grail” for most youth teams. Other defenses try to close the “dive” in the gaps next to the center. Very few youth football defenses are set up to stop even an average off-the-block play.
If the other team gives you the takedown, take it until they commit too much, then hit the home run play. In our championship game in 2003, the other team was so concerned about taking away our inside “wedge” game, they left the detour wide open. We started the game with 7 straight tail plays to our strong side and scored. On the next drive, they moved to our takedown hole and we ran a wedge for a 65-yard touchdown on first down. Then they tried to stop the wedge play and moved everyone up and we ran the wedge play action pass for a 60 yard score. We were up 46-0 in the third quarter when they finally gave up and tried to run out the clock. Both wedge and front plays can be executed well by children with very average skills.
In another game, the defensive team was set to stop the sweep and wedge plays, but again they were giving us the play off the plate. We run with no huddle, so we get a lot more snaps than most youth teams. In that game we had 71 plays, of which 51 were strong plays off the tackle. We got our 4-5 yards each time, nothing really big, but we did get some really big wins and touchdowns by blocking back traps, wing backhands (2 TDs), and the TB (pass for TD) run pass option. So we scored 5 touchdowns and of the 5 TDs, 4 were over 20 yards. We only got stopped on the downhills once and stumbled once too. We were 2-2 in passing for 56 yards and a TD. Now, how much fun was that for our 3 tailbacks who shared tailback duty that day and for our shooting guards? Everyone had a great time, as did our place kickers and the other 4 kids who had touchdowns playing non-running back positions. Oh yeah, our defense had fun too, they could play with abandon as we were moving the ball at will on offense.
The net is that off-the-board play at the youth level is the hardest game to stop, yet few teams try and perfect it. It takes little talent to run the game, no cues required. On my lone wing offense, we practiced that play more than any other. We block it in various ways so that we know it will work and we will execute it, regardless of what type of defense we are facing. Our kids can tackle clutter in their sleep, we often start our practices with the “Hour of Power” as Steve Calande calls it. We run our hard power off tackle for 30-40 minutes in the air, adjust and freeze and then with the players holding the hand guards at 100%. Yes, a single play often accounts for half of our offensive practice time.
If your team is doing poorly, you don’t need a sneaky play or a new offense (which most coaches do in a panic), you need to be perfect at executing the go-ahead power play off the tackle.
We know we’re playing a good team when they come out and try to set the
off-board game. From all the videos I’ve seen of youth teams across the country, regardless of offensive lineup or personnel, the best teams always have a good game off the plate. It’s not sexy, but it works and sets up everything else in your attack.
Don’t worry about making a bunch of fancy “trick” plays before you can perfectly master your play.
150 free youth soccer coaching tips for you here: Youth Soccer