I haven’t written the past couple of days because I have been getting ready for the soccer season to start and going over and over lineup decisions and how to work the team in a way that is fair across the board. This is the part of the season I hate.

I want to teach all the kids something that will make them each better. Some kids listen, and some kids don’t. The sad part is that the ones who don’t are usually the ones that if they did would be the best players. This preseason was short, and we lost a lot of time to rain and flu.

On top of that, I have spent extra hours a day working with Ellie because if I have any chance of a good season, it’s on her foot. So we have spent countless hours on the pitch just shooting and passing. It is funny how things work, but I will get to that.

I got a message today before our last practice before the season starts from one of the other coaches about scrimmage tonight. Honestly, I knew going into that scrimmage we would get beat, and I wanted us to be. I needed a few kids on the team to realize it takes a team and not a solo player to win a game. The worst part of the night was actually when I pulled up to the field, the field crew measured out a 9v9 size field for an 11v11 team. So we decided to run 10v10. Which takes one player and throws them out of the practiced equation. Sadly, that player was my daughter. She’s the second striker or stretch 9, depending on how you view the position. The issue was that’s the first position I had decided I would drop if we went to 10v10 when I plotted the year.

So here I am with my second best leg in a limbo position and  her ability to move and dribble not as strong, so the wing is out of the picture. My mid-fielders are strong, and my striker is the best around, so my daughter is out of a job. Being a scrimmage, I moved kids all over the board to try them out and see what they could do in different spots. The game went as expected. We got beat but not nearly as bad as I thought we might. The good news is that my front 5 seems to work well and like each other. A couple of them got burnt bad, and I pointed out to them why and how to fix it, and they fixed it. It was nice and rare for that to fix so fast.

Now, my issue is my back end. I normally have a strong defense. It’s something I take pride in and something I look for strong players to run. I lost my center back to aging out this season, but I got a new one this year that is so far up to today more aggressive but has a weaker leg. Today, that disappeared, and she shrank out the picture completely, but I’ve seen too much in practice to think tonight was a fluke. I decided to throw my daughter back on defense and boom. The difference was there. We stopped playing so much defense and spent more time on the offense after she started booting balls back into play.

We lost 3 to 0, but we had multiple shots on goal and 2 weak goals against us, including 1 that was 100% a my team fighting each other error and scored on a corner that shouldn’t have even happened. So, learning to be a team and not a solo act gives up 2 goals in a scrimmage is not a bad trade. I think if we had played a bit longer, we would have put at least one in so no big deal.

I had to have a conversation with my daughter after the game that put her playing left back for the season for the team. This is the hardest part of coaching, especially your kids. She wants to be the striker, but we have a striker she is going to be the best defender on the team if she buys into defense. She moves better without a ball, and she is aggressive and has a boom tower of a leg. So I had to spend time with her explaining why she wasn’t the best option at certain positions, and lucky for me, she understood logic on positions. She told me right off the bat who was best suited for each position, and it makes sense for her why I wanted her there, but she doesn’t like it. So I got to get some buy-in from her.

The other part that I hate is the kids who think they need to play a certain position, and I have to break it to them that they have to earn it. The only way to earn a new position is to get your chance in the game and kill it. So, I had to deal with multiple kids on the sidelines mad because I’m not defense, OK Sit! Nope, I’m good. I can defend. Put me in at wing or striker. Nope, I’m testing lines and pairings. I want to play goalie. You’ve never been in goal. I want to play striker. You can’t kick that hard.

It’s the time of the season when I get to watch my team play after all the practice. Listen to people ask why I didn’t spend more time on this or that. Watch the team forget how to do the drill we spend days on. But the days leading up to this weekend are the most stressful on me. I’ve been coaching long enough. I know some of the kids are going to be practice warriors, and some of them will show out in the game. I wonder who it will be. Will my daughter play like she can or will she forget how. Will the team gell as a team, or will they implode and fight each other. All these things weigh on me at this time of the season.

In good news, though, in 2 days, we start playing, and I will know if we have something or not pretty quick with two games on Saturday. One against a new coach and another against the leagues defending champions player (not coach, but the main players are from the championship team last season). So this should be a good test for the team.

I rambled on a bit tonight, but I have so much on my mind. I want to finally win a season so badly, but at the same time, I want a team, not just a couple of players winning the year for us. I made 3rd one season on the back of one kid, and I hated it. I spend hours thinking about how I react to certain kids and wonder if I overreact to it or if I did not react hard enough. There is so much to think about and but at the same time, I know if I’m spending time worried about if I’m doing it right, I am because my mind is worried about everything so I care.

I’m sure I’ll probably write about Saturdays games on Saturday so let’s see how this season starts. 

Oh and I picked up my 6U baseball team today also so Let’s go its baseball season too.