TThe 2013 Outdoor season is gearing up once again! Players who missed our registration session can still register for the soccer season online:

 

Please Note: A late fee will be charged for players registering after March 25, 2013. Players who register after March 31st will have to do so through RSA. If you have any questions, you can contact the club registrar at tcooke@accesscomm.ca.

 

On Friday, Dom will lead a coaching development session with all of the clubs coaches. Saturday and Sunday will see Dom on the field with two groups of female athletes. On Saturday evening Dom will make a presentation to interested parents and players on Post secondary playing opportunities within the CIS and NCAA.

 

Click here for Dom’s Bio http://www.ottawafury.com/coach-doliveri

Female players wishing to take part in the camp can register at www.baseacademy.ca

 

The Parent/Player session will be held at Sheldon on Saturday April 20 from 6-9pm.

I am certain there will be a good many soccer moms and dads who will be upset, confused, downright angry when the summer season begins for their sons and daughters playing in the under nine, 10 and 11-year-old levels.

None of these players will be competing to win a league. None of them will be fighting to finish at the top of the table. Why? Because there won’t be any leagues.

Soccer associations across the country — and especially in Eastern Ontario — are adopting a completely new system for teaching youngsters to develop their skills and learn to love the game. And it does not include a league system of any sort.

I can hear the screams. Parents want their kids to play only in a competitive atmosphere, want their kids to be on the top team, want their kids to win the league. Of course that’s the best way to measure their ability, right?

Wrong.

Whatever the sport, all of us know that when kids are young it is inevitably the biggest, strongest ones who dominate. We are not talking skills and understanding of the game, we are talking about size, about who can kick farthest and hardest. It’s almost like rewarding the bullies.

The U.S. Olympic Development Programme for soccer kids used to assess maybe 350 athletes in a region and then pick around 60 to receive higher level training as teenagers. That changed after research revealed that almost 80 per cent of those selected were born between January and May. You guessed right. It was because they were bigger and stronger. Now the U.S. makes sure a percentage of those selected come from birthdays later in the year.

And it is not only the parents who are screaming. There’s a fair share of coaches — the ones who put all the emphasis on winning — doing the same. They rely on the big kids and fail to properly teach the fundamentals of the game because all they want to do is finish top of the league.

Who are these people doing this for? Themselves, I suggest. Certainly not for kids who are not getting the chance to learn the game. On these teams, how much time is spent teaching a child how to kick a ball, how to dribble a ball, how to tackle, how to head, how to work as a team? Precious little.

And, in league games, how much playing time do the weaker players get when the team is fighting for the title? Not much.

I make absolutely no apology for beating the drum for Long Term Player Development (LTPD), the programme that must be phased in by 2014 but is launching this summer under the Eastern Ontario District Soccer Association.

Parents have to understand they are doing their children no favours by badmouthing the system. They absolutely must get the picture, because it is happening and nothing will change it.

If it makes them feel better, nobody is suggesting that kids are not naturally competitive. If you put a ball down in front of a group of young people, they will compete for it. That’s human nature. Of course, if two teams play one another at any sport, every player will know who won a game or who scored the goals.

LTPD most certainly does not advocate killing competition. In fact, it encourages five-on-five games in practice. It encourages one team to play another. But winning titles, winning $5 medals, is not what it’s about any more.

What is happening here is a move to join most of the developed soccer world in recognizing the absolute necessity for learning how to play the game first and teaching the FUNdamentals, you might say. Without them, how can you hope to be competitive when the time comes to play in a league?

Developing skills first leads to a love of the game for life. It means playing the game better. And, yes, it means a better chance of being a league winner in teenage years and beyond, and maybe being good enough to play professionally or represent your country. Without fundamental skills, your children have absolutely no chance of achieving those goals.

Skills first, competition later has been happening in Spain for years and it is the best side in the world. It’s been happening in Germany for almost a decade and the changes at the top level are extraordinary. And it is now being adopted in England, where the national team has underachieved for so long.

Are they all wrong?

Are Denmark and South Africa wrong for taking the Canadian Long Term Development plan almost word for word, diagram-by-diagram and putting it into practice before even we’ve got there?

In Japan, the emphasis is always on possession, ball control and multiple short passes, all of which have been instilled in the young during five-on-five restricted practice games. It won that country a Women’s World Cup and it opened American eyes. Athleticism and fitness alone is no longer the winning combination.

Please parents, please coaches, embrace the future. For your kids’ sakes, do not fight it. You will be denying them the chance to develop.

The Long Term Athlete Development (soccer chooses to call it LTPD) model has become a Canadian mandate. Ignore that mandate and your sport will lose federal funding. Sport Canada means business.