When Is It Too Much?

by: Coree Reuter of Girls Play Soccer

I’ve started to push my girls a lot more at practice sessions this winter. We do fitness work every Wednesday, in addition to a 1v1 tournament, then we scrimmage. We’re very lucky that we get turf space twice a week, and I’ve been doing my best to take advantage of it.
However, last night I noticed a few things.

One, these girls complain a lot!

“Are we done yet?”

“We have to go again?”

“How many more sets?”

“Are we going to do something fun?”

The last question caught me a little off guard, but I had them finish their fitness work before we went to our weekly tournament. I like doing the 1v1 tournament because it gets their competitive fire going, and it’s great for teaching them how to drive forward to the goal. I keep the playing field long, but slightly narrow, and I don’t allow them to use the walls, even though they’re indoors.

Of course, they think the best part of the tournament is that the winner gets a strip of soccer=love tape for their back pack.

After the first round of the tournament, I noticed a small group of my players had pretty much checked out. They moved to a corner while the other girls finished their 1v1s, and began talking, playing with the turf, and generally not paying a lick of attention. Instead of yelling at them, I decided to ignore them.

We calculated points, set up the championship brackets, and just continued on with practice. Finally, I called the girls in for a quick chat. The despondent group noticed, and joined the huddle.

“How many of you notice your teammates sitting in the corner?”

Most of the hands when up.
“And how many of you were ticked off?”

They stayed up.

“Then why didn’t you say something?”

Silence.

I’ve been trying to teach the girls the value of being responsible for your own teammates. The idea of building each other up positively and pushing each other to be better.

I’m not sure they’re getting it.

I pulled aside one of the girls who I believe will eventually be a captain, and asked her if she was angry that some of her teammates had checked out. She said yes. When I asked her why she didn’t say anything, she said, “I didn’t want them to think I was being mean or a snot.”

I can understand that. Feelings are tender when you’re 11. But at the same time, they have to learn eventually that asking someone to step up isn’t necessarily personal. Maybe they’re too young? I’m not sure.

After a short lecture about working hard in practice, I sent them back out. I stressed the fact that they have two tournaments coming up at the end of March, and we needed to be fit. I stressed that no one comes to practice to have their time wasted, and that I believe we are all tired of losing games. Considering they all agreed with me on that point, I’m expecting a lot more out of them in the next couple weeks.
Towards the end of practice, I noticed one of my players was sulking. I called her over, and asked what was wrong.

“I don’t think I’m a good soccer play,” she said. I asked why.

“Because every time I do a move I get the ball taken away.”

I had to explain to her that I didn’t care that she lost the ball every time. That’s why we do these 1v1 tournaments — to improve our skills. I told her about the success of failure. About how Thomas Edison failed 1000 times before he invented the light bulb, and how Michael Jordan missed hundreds of shots in his lifetime. I told her that I didn’t care how many times she got the ball taken away — the important part is that she’s trying.

I don’t know if it got through to her, but I hope it did. She’s a good player, and has the potential to be a great player if she focuses a little and starts believing in herself.

After practice was over I made the girls go around and say one positive thing about each of their teammates. I think it helped. I told them that they had to prove themselves to each other in order to succeed, and that it didn’t matter what their parents had to say afterword. I told them as long as they know they did everything they could, and as long as their teammates know and I know, then the heck with the rest of them.
Again, I don’t know if they heard it. I don’t know if they’ll understand it for a while, but maybe I planted a seed.

I left that practice wondering if I’m pushing them too hard. They are only 11, after all, but then again, I think about the other teams in the area, and I realize that they need to be pushed. They’re not going to get better by sitting in the corner picking up handfuls of turf rubber, or picking daisies. There’s no reason any of these girls shouldn’t go on to play in high school or college if that’s what they want to do, but they have to make that decision on their own, first.

I can’t force them down that path, I can only provide directions and a map.