Take some open space, something to kick and a few kids and you can have a soccer game. For most of the world, that's how soccer is played. While players do possess balls, there's no problem substituting a tin can, melon, or box if a ball can't be found. Few kids possess shin guards and fields with crisp white lines aren't found in most towns and villages. That soccer can be played without anything we regard as soccer essentials probably explains its popularity.

 

In our own house we had a firm rule that no balls were to be in the house, and should one roll its way in, no balls were to be kicked in the house. So the boys quickly found lots of substitutes such as bundled socks, towels wrapped in a rubber band, pillows, shoes, even a round candle. Once they fell in love with soccer, there was no stopping soccer play no matter where we were and no matter how many restrictions I imposed. They found a way around it. Eventually, we cleared out the basement, put taped goals up on the opposing walls and let the boys go. One wall was paneling that set off an office space behind and in just a week's time we were able to see through to the office without any problem.

 

Birthdays and Christmas brought more and more soccer paraphernalia to add to already overflowing drawers and closets of soccer stuff. This simple game resulted in hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars of equipment, clothing and accessories. A ball wasn't enough; it had to be the official World Cup ball. Team uniforms wouldn't suffice; we had to add warm-ups, kit bag and "spirit" gear. Of course, as they grew older, they weren't on just one team. There was the club team, the summer league team, the indoor team, high school team and ODP. Then we bought the dresser to go in the garage with a drawer for each team so we could keep track of all the uniform items. Naturally there were jerseys for their soccer idols and flags for their teams. We subscribed to magazines, many of which came from overseas so cost twice as much. Coaches recommended instructional tapes and books. We bought portable goals. Then there were the peripheral soccer items like ornaments, computer skins, movies, picture frames, bedding and rugs.

 

You probably have your own list that grows every month. It's difficult not to reward your child's passion with items that further fuel the commitment. It's great for our kids to love something and feel empowered by that enthusiasm. So we rarely begrudge them their wants. Eventually we find ourselves buried in soccer stuff. When it comes to soccer gear such as uniforms, cleats, and balls, we can donate those items to any number of agencies happy to pass on the equipment to less fortunate players in the U.S. and around the world. Despite soccer not requiring any gear, it's always nice to have some as it not only enriches the game, but helps players develop the proper skills. We usually gathered together our unused gear once a year and donated it by bringing it to our state association offices for the Passback program or to our local soccer shop that collected for the Armed Forces. Finding someplace to donate is easy and much appreciated.

 

I'm not suggesting we shouldn't supplement the uniform and basic equipment needs of our children with extras. Every family has to decide what they can afford and what seems to be appropriate for their child's needs and wants. But I do suggest that you don't get sucked into a "keeping up with the Joneses" mentality. Even with unlimited funds, there is a limit to what a child needs to fuel his or her passion. So as you sort through the catalogs or visit the soccer store, you don't need to possess every scarf, blanket, and head band that exists. We quickly and painfully discovered that buying $120 official World Cup ball was money wasted. Within ten minutes of hitting the field that ball had sailed over the fence and into the Milwaukee River canal to make its journey east back to Germany. After that we never spent more than $25 on a ball. Likewise, team affiliations change rapidly as does idol worship, so we limited the purchase of jerseys to special occasions. In time you realize how much you have spent in essentially impulse buying and you learn to curb that. My admonition before we entered the soccer shop soon became "Don't Ask!" Still there was usually one shiny object that ended up attracting all of us. You know what I'm talking about.

 

Recently Youth Soccer Insider ran an article about Bayern Munich's youth program. In many ways it is a typical youth program that we might find here in the United States. They run one youth team at each age level beginning with Under-8 and going up to U-17. They also field a U-19 and a U-23 team. Younger teams play 7 v 7 and rotate goal keepers. By U-12 they are playing 9 v 9 and at U-13 they play a full team of 11 v 11. The club differs in three important ways from most youth clubs in the United States. First, every player is scouted. You must receive an invitation to play for Bayern Munich. Second, they sponsor a residency program for players 15 and up. And third, and most significantly, they have a budget of $6.3 million.

 

When we bemoan the slow development of American players, we can look with envy at an overseas system which has for its youth budget nearly three times the salary budget for the Chicago Fire. The Bayern Munich money allows for professional scouts for each age level, for top coaching, for first-class facilities, for trainers, for travel and for marketing. While Bayern Munich stands in first place in Germany in its youth program, other clubs there and throughout Europe have similar budgets and systems. The top youth program in Europe is Barcelona. My son, Robbie, had the privilege of visiting their facilities and playing against their youth team. I think he is still wiping the saliva from his lips. His team was at U-15 ranked number one in his age group in the United States and they played the U-13 Barcelona team losing 5-2. As Robbie put it, "Those guys really knew soccer."

 

Some European clubs begin their residency programs at a very young age, with every club having a residency program so that they can scout in a larger range. But for the most part, youth players are no different than their American counterparts. They go to school, and then they travel to the club to train in the afternoons and evenings, playing games on the weekends. However, they train every day. Most American clubs don't. Additionally, these players are training with professional coaches with credentials that include coaching major teams, Olympic and World Cup wins, and long professional careers.

 

In the United States, most youth clubs are not allowed to scout players in order to maintain some equity in league play. The difference is with the USSF Development Academy which specifically encourages scouting. Each MLS team has a Development team attached to it which the MLS supports. Other clubs have made agreements with overseas teams to help support their Development teams in an effort to defray costs, provide possible players for overseas play and to market the teams in the United States. Nevertheless, the lack of residency programs hinders the ability of teams to scout too far from their home base. Robbie, for example, played for the Chicago Magic, a 240-mile round trip for us to make to practices and home games. We did that three days a week for practice and up to two additional days for games. Some of his friends played for the Chicago Fire Academy team and made a 200 mile round trip with the same conditions. Without the personal means to do this type of travel it wouldn't matter how good a player was. He couldn't play for either team. This is only one example of how geography plays into the situation. For many excellent players the nearest Academy team will be four or five states away. Germany is about the size of Montana, so teams have the luxury of scouting all over the territory without uprooting these players for huge distances. With the high speed trains, families can stay connected easily. Not so in America.

 

But the most telling aspect of player development that the article highlights is the amazing budget no youth program in America enjoys. For the Development Academy the USSF has approximately $5.9 million budgeted for April 2012 through March 2013. That's for the entire United States. It is supplemented by the participating clubs and, more importantly, by dues individual players pay. It's difficult to compete internationally when the money gap is so huge. Without the powerhouse of professional soccer that the rest of the world enjoys, America will continue to be behind in the ability to finance top youth development. A big part of that development involves scouting top players which is expensive. Traveling to tournaments, league games and championship series in a country as huge as the U.S. comes with a steep price tag. Add to that the cost of hiring top professional scouts and you can quickly break the bank.

 

The entire process of scouting players as young as age 7 creates a culture that is somewhat repugnant to most Americans. This is the land of equality, and we don't like to see someone getting a leg up or a team becoming remarkably strong because of scouting. We may need to change our thinking in order to develop our youth program in a competitive way. But all that possible success comes with a huge emotional cost to our youth players. As Werner Kern, the director of Bayern Munich's youth program, puts it, "each year, if we find better players, then the worst players must leave. We help them find new clubs." This could become the norm for top players throughout the United States. As players grow, or possibly don't grow, their status with the professional youth programs will change. Both parents and players have to be able to stand the pressure cooker existence those parameters create. However, it should be noted that even in Germany, the majority of youth players do play for fun. Only a handful of youth take that journey that could lead to a professional contract.

 

Right now I'm waiting for a pipe to thaw. No matter how many precautions we take, we always seem to have one frozen pipe a year. We added insulation, we put a in a vent to allow warm air to circulate behind the shower wall, and we keep the heat on constantly. Still, one morning we wake up to turn on the shower and are rewarded with just a dribble of water.

 

This is just one example of how we prepare for everything in life and still end up being surprised. We do it in soccer all the time. Many of you probably have an emergency box in your trunk, and still arrive at a game missing some essential like a uniform shirt or the left cleat. We can try to prepare, we can try to anticipate, but we can't win. That's because kids are so resourceful. They are great at preparing for disaster.

 

The best thing we can do is go with the flow. When we can't have things perfect, we need to enjoy the imperfection. It makes us resourceful, which can't be bad. I've run through a crowd of parents looking for a red shirt, any red shirt, when Bryce forgot his uniform. I used electrical tape to create numbers on undershirts for three kids who forgot their US Youth Soccer ODP shirts. I've make shin guards out of cardboard and made band-aids out of tape and tissues. I occasionally wear the title of not just Mom, but also Mother of Invention.

 

The problem with messes is that they frustrate us. And because in soccer they usually relate to our children, they can be the brunt of our frustration. We need to remember that even when they reach their teens, kids are still kids, who can't always be organized. We have to do our best to eliminate the disorganization. Keeping soccer bags where they can be easily accessed is important. Our rule was that once a uniform was washed it had to be put in the bag immediately, which meant that about 90 percent of the time it got in there. The other 10 percent ended up causing the problems. We keep a chest of drawers in the garage for all things soccer including gloves, hats, underclothes, socks, etc. that the boys can access quickly and easily before a game. Yet we'll still arrive at a game in 20 degrees with nothing to protect them from the cold. Once Bryce brought his shoes to the car, noticed they had grass and mud in the cleats, knocked them off outside and then set them beside the car, where they sat as we drove to a game twenty-five miles away.

 

Life is messy, and that is especially true when it comes to soccer. So, how to handle those messy moments? Try not to blow up. I know how hard that is. Your child will be as upset about the problem as you, but she has no way to solve it. Recriminations will just multiple the anxieties before a game or practice. You can't go back in time to make it all okay, so you have to adapt. Let your player know that you'll find a solution. Focus on positives. I guarantee there will be a solution. It may be rough, but it will exist. You also should include your child in the process of problem solving. Children can benefit from thinking outside the box and from the control that finding a solution creates. There are times the solution will be repugnant to your son or daughter, which is when you remind them that you promised a solution not perfection. Bryce didn't want to wear a plain red polo, but I made it clear it was red polo and playing or no red polo and no playing.

 

In the world of soccer we can get lots of problems. But we can also get plenty of solutions. Some of the solutions can come from our own prevention by carrying basics with us in our car but some solutions have to come on the fly. Despite the frustrations, it's these moments that often bring the best memories – those "we'll laugh about it later" moments. I remember with delight the game that Robbie played in two different cleats because that's all we could find. One was white and one was blue, but thank goodness they were left and right as well. Before GPS was a regular thing, I had to find a field in the farmlands of Indiana using my compass and a vague memory of the directions I had carefully printed out and left on the kitchen counter. We've forgotten entire soccer bags and had to hustle mightily once we reached the field and made the discovery. On the flipside, we've been the family who helped out a family in a mess whether they were on our team or the opponent's. The soccer world is highly interconnected. The team you play against this week will be the team you join next year. The coach you think is boorish will end up being the one who recommends your kid to the coaching staff at his first choice college. So spread the wealth when you can. You will definitely need to dip into the well at some point.

Scientists have determined that we have a "cute" center in our brains. Whenever we see baby animals, adorable behaviors or silly actions we release an audible "aww" while our brains fire off their own "Aww." Apparently cuteness goes directly to our pleasure center creating the same contentment as eating a candy bar or getting a gift. It explains why kittens falling off a couch get more hits on the Internet than summaries of the Republican candidates' debates. We'd much rather feel good than think.

 

So it's not surprising that watching our little ones play soccer gives us so much delight. Who doesn't love their wild abandon and high energy? Kids have an earnest interest in their play that translates to cuteness. Whenever I watched my boys when they were little or my grandchildren now, my face hurts from smiling and laughing. I'm not sure when those smiles get replaced by our own intense investment in the game, but at some point they do. Scoring an own goal is adorable at age 6 and unforgiveable at age 10. While I understand that as kids progress in their sport they need to progress in their abilities, I wonder if we parents need to progress so quickly to hardened observers. When we cease to give in to the pure joy of watching our kids play, they pick up that soccer is no longer for fun – it's for business.

 

I want to encourage all of us to hang on to the "cute factor" as long as possible. Rather than feel stress as the game unfolds, we should all try to feel joy. It's not easy but the rewards are tremendous. If we can identify one cute moment a game and let our brain process it as cute, rather than frustrating, we will not only reduce our own stress, but we will reduce the stress of our kids. Here are a few moments that could go either way on the emotion scale. Find the cute humor in them, and you'll be well on your way to accessing the cute center of your brain.

 

In an indoor game, two girls' teams were battling it out. These 7-year-olds played with a serious intensity that showed each team wanted to win. Late in the game with the score close and emotions running high, a player kicked the ball towards the goal, only to have it saved by the keeper. She ran the ball out to the edge of the box, wound up, and punted it backwards over her head into the goal. Both teams stopped in disbelief and only the parent coach with his hands up in a football touchdown signal gave an indication as to what happened. No one cheered, but the coach did give the keeper a quick hug and a pat on the head to let her know it was okay. Luckily the parents found it amusing, laughed, and everyone ended up with smiles on their faces as the game restarted.

 

On a crisp fall day in the midst of a Under-10 boys' game, one of the spectators lost control of his dog that bounded on the field and quickly overtook the ball. Suddenly the field erupts into total chaos as the dog knocks the ball around the pitch, kids are chasing him down and adults are trying to rein in the event. In the midst of all this, the dog ran the ball down to the goal and put it in. Unbelievably this resulted in a major discussion of rules, whether or not the goal counted, and how many minutes needed to be put back on the clock. Rather than being a trigger for the "cute center" this became a source of major contention and stress. Had everyone just accepted this as a very cute moment and forgotten about the game, it could have been a really fun anecdote and memory for all involved.

 

Two U-6 coed teams played a game on a particularly rainy spring day. This mud bowl was made even messier by a girl who took the admonishment to "tackle" literally. With the grace and enthusiasm of Clay Matthews, she took after every player with the ball without regard to uniform color and laid them out flat. Even after being pulled to the sidelines and coached about soccer tackles, she returned to her effective techniques. All the players seemed cool with the antics and eventually several more players joined in on the action. By the end of the game pig piles were the norm and parents were shaking their heads knowing they had to transport these grubby players home and figure out how to clean their uniforms. Despite the melee, everyone was laughing and enjoying the spectacle of this demon in pigtails whose wild abandon was done with glee. She was having so much fun, and none of the tackled players were upset. They too were enjoying the chance to really get down and dirty. Everyone's "cute centers" were being fired off.

 

I know you all have equally cute anecdotes from your wide soccer experience. It's important to try to keep that factor alive as long as possible when it comes to our kids. When we shift over to being concerned because somehow the rules aren't being followed or we're disappointed by a silly mistake, we bring a seriousness to the game. Once that line is crossed, it will be difficult to recapture the ability to find the cute in an incident. Hopefully we can encourage ourselves and those around us to continue to see the cuteness for as long as possible, at least until U-12 when soccer starts to get serious with games mattering and kids looking to join select teams. To help out, families could locate videos featuring baby ducks, baby monkeys, kittens, even chameleons and watch them just before going to a game in order to stimulate that "cute center." In fact, it wouldn't be a bad idea to do this daily. Feeling good can't hurt.

We're in the midst of college football bowls, NFL playoffs and an abbreviated NBA season. We grew up with these sports. Even without serious interest, we understand the rules and follow the stars. Soccer has grown over the last twenty years in the United States, but we don't have the same internalized understanding of the game. Once our sons and daughters embrace soccer, we do our best to grasp the rules, make our acquaintance with the main players and immerse ourselves in the soccer community. Now that the holidays are over, we may have some gift certificates to bookstores that we can cash in. Here are some suggestions for reading that the entire family can enjoy and can help make soccer a more understandable sport.

 

For soccer news there are several great magazines out there which will give your family a contemporaneous understanding of the game. My favorite is "Soccer America" which you can receive in an email option called "Soccer America Daily". This option includes "Youth Soccer Insider" which offers both news about youth, high schoo, and college soccer, and also information on training, coaches, and recruiting (socceramerica.com). For more experienced players, my sons love "Four Four Two" out of England. This magazine focuses on British professional soccer, but also provides great articles on health, training and player profiles. A year's subscription comes in around $69 but the magazine is substantial (fourfourtwo.magazine.co.uk). For a more global view of the sport, I recommend "World Soccer." Bylines in this magazine come from some of the top reporters and experts in the sport (worldsoccer.com). The websites for these publications offer up some great articles without even subscribing. Finally there's "Fuel" magazine from US Youth Soccer. This annual publication offers up the best from the website and articles from top youth soccer experts. You can read it online at usyouthsoccer.org or order from the website.

 

For in-depth soccer education, there are a number of excellent books available. If you want to understand the rules of soccer better, you can go right to the source "Kwik Goal FIFA Rules of the Game" ($14 on Amazon). This book is updated yearly for referees and fans alike. The NCAA and most youth soccer games operate under slightly different rules, but this book covers enough common ground for fans to learn and understand how soccer games are governed. For less detail and more understandable rules, you can pick up a copy of "Official Soccer Rules Illustrated" ($11 on Amazon). The website Soccer for Parents has downloadable rule books for each youth level (soccer-for-parents.com/soccer-rule.html). Understanding the difference between what creates a goal kick and what creates a corner kick, or what the offsides rule really means can help make the game more enjoyable and help you cheer appropriately.

 

Most youth coaches are volunteers who have minimal soccer experience. We need these coaches because their dedication and investment can't be created, but the knowledge can be taught. If some of you signed up to coach this spring, you may be looking for some information. I do suggest that everyone get their USSF "G" License through U.S. Soccer, which most clubs and state organizations require. But the course can only cover so much information about actual coaching methods, so turning to some outside help is natural. How could you doubt a book with the reassuring title "The Complete Book of Coaching Youth Soccer" by Simon Whitehead? The book is endorsed by the National Youth Soccer Coaches Association and is available on Amazon for $12. The book provides a ten-week training program for various age levels along with illustrations. For the youngest group of players "The Baffled Parents Guide to Coaching 6-and-Under Soccer" by David Williams and Scott Graham has gotten rave reviews. While most readers stated that they knew soccer, they quickly realized that knowing the game and transferring that knowledge to a wild group of young soccer players are two very different skill sets. In addition there is "The Baffled Parents Guide to Coaching Youth Soccer" by Bobby Clark for older teams. The books use photos, lesson plans, and detailed explanations to help youth coaches convey the game to younger players. David Williams and Scott Graham have been youth coaches for years and bring their expertise to the book. Bobby Clark is the coach of the men's program at Notre Dame. Both books sell for $12 each at Amazon.

 

Kids tend to stick with sports when they have role models in the game that encourage them with their own stories of both success and loss. For some fictional soccer heroes there's the series "The Wild Soccer Bunch" by Joachim Masannek which has become a world-wide sensation. (Free book has been claimed). The series began in Germany and has been translated into dozens of languages. The books are appropriate for most elementary aged players and come recommended by Landon Donovan. Each book costs $10.50 on Amazon. "A Beautiful Game: The World's Greatest Players and How Soccer Changed Their Lives" by Tom Watt looks at players the world over including from Nigeria, Italy, and the United States to discover why soccer became so important to them. Unfortunately he only interviews male players, but the book is beautiful and 5 percent of the sales are donated to UNICEF ($19 on Amazon). For girls there's "The U.S. Women's Soccer Team: An American Success Story" by Clemente A. Lisi. The book examines the women's national team from their amazing success in 1999 to the present. Many of the top stars are interviewed (Hardcover $32 on Amazon).

 

If you put "soccer" in the Amazon search engine, you'll be faced with 19,000 choices. So there's no doubt that soccer has grown in the U.S. enough to make publishers confident that they can make money off of our interest. That also means that the few books I have mentioned above can lead to others. You can easily find any number of books that would interest your kids and yourself. Bringing a few soccer magazines and books into your home can help enrich your family's interest in the sport while providing some education. For a relatively minor investment you can create a fun and permanent soccer library that will augment and enlighten the sport.

I recently saw an ESPN film about Todd Marinovich who was a quarterback for USC in 1989. His father, Marv, was strength and conditioning coach who believed he could create the perfect athlete. As he stated in an interview, "The question I asked myself was, 'How well could a kid develop if you provided him with the perfect environment?'" He set out to make Todd remarkable. Even as an infant Todd underwent training to stretch his hamstrings and develop balance. By age 10 he could easily run ten miles. He learned the mechanics of being a quarterback and in high school became a national phenomenon. By the time he entered USC he had achieved records that an NFL player would be proud to have. His freshman year he won the Rose Bowl against Michigan. In his junior year he was drafted by the Raiders.

 

But in Todd's own words he couldn't live "in the prison of achievement." In high school he began drinking and using drugs, and that behavior escalated as he grew older. By the time he got to college, he had graduated to cocaine, amphetamines and finally LSD because it didn't show up in drug tests. At one point he left school and told his mother, "I wish I could go somewhere else and be someone else. I don't want to be Todd Marinovich." Ironically, his athletic achievements became overshadowed by his off-field behavior which included more and more arrests for drugs.

 

While Todd's experience is extreme, it has important lessons for us parents. Marv constantly expressed his devotion to his children and only wanting the best for them. He believed he was giving Todd a gift that he could take both to the bank and to the Hall of Fame. He believed that if Todd achieved perfection on the field he would have a perfect life. He felt that the accolades his athleticism would engender could provide Todd with joy enough to mitigate all those years of dedication and sacrifice.

 

Anyone who has seen films of Todd playing in high school can witness his perfect mechanics and impressive abilities. But the films don't show Todd's state of mind. When his teammates left the field after practice to go home, Todd remained there for hours still training. When they gathered at a fast food restaurant for a burger and conversation, Todd was home lifting weights. Even as a youngster when he went to a friend's birthday party he brought his own cake and ice cream to avoid processed foods. He became painfully shy because he only had limited contact with his peers. Marv missed an important part of the equation in creating the "perfect person."

 

We parents all want the best for our kids. We see that spark of ability and we believe that fostering that ability needs to be an integral part of our child-rearing. Marv didn't even wait to find that spark. He created it. We watch with a bit of envy as mega-stars emerge from strong parental investments: Andre Agassi, Tiger Woods, the Williams sisters and Dominique Morceau, who famously got a restraining order against her parents. While these athletes often earn millions of dollars a year and live comfortable lives, they have also expressed regrets. Agassi wrote that he felt imprisoned by his father through both expectations and demands. He also turned to drugs to escape mentally since he couldn't escape physically.

 

As parents, we need to heed these cautionary tales. The stories we hear are from those athletes who achieved major success. While they lost their childhoods, they did earn money and respect for their athletics. We don't usually hear the stories of kids who were pushed but never achieved much success. We don't hear if they had regrets. But we need to be sensitive to where our kids want to be. In 1988, Omo Grupe completed a long-term study of children in elite sports. He concluded that these athletes were not permitted to be children, were victims of disruptive family life, were exposed to excessive psychological and physiological stress, were detached from larger society and, most significantly, faced a type of abandonment upon exiting their athletic careers. Most of us would argue that our kids don't have such an extreme experience and that is probably true. But we do need to be aware that the scales can tip quickly unless we are vigilant. We need to include our children in the discussion when advancing to more intense levels of competition and training. Kids need to know that they are open to decide, which means we parents need to suppress our own desires. If our children feel that they are restricted by our dreams, they may not express their real desires.

 

We want sports to be a liberating experience for our children. Sports should offer the opportunity to meet new friends, get some exercise, learn how to be humble in winning and losing and develop discipline. Sports should never be a prison from which kids feel they can't escape. Likewise, sports shouldn't be a prison for the family where its time and money are held hostage. Unfortunately, we're fed the propaganda that athletic success spells life success, when in reality sports for the vast majority has very little to do with success in life. Todd Marinovich became a phenomenon for a few years, but the price he paid for that renown was nearly 40 years of his life – 20 trapped by the sport and 20 trapped by the drugs he took to escape the trap of the sport. Now happily married with two kids and a thriving artistic career, he has a relationship with his father that took years to repair. We want our kids to experience that kind of peace much sooner in life, which may mean letting the sports take a back seat to other more significant aspects of growing up. Moderation can give way to the freedom to find lots of interests and lots of events outside of the prison of achievement.

When our family first got involved in youth soccer we were definitely unaware of what lay ahead. We weren't even aware that youth soccer existed in our town or that there were actually two options for youth soccer. Sitting around our community pool that first summer I got a quick education. I learned that one club was run by the city recreation department and the other club was private. I learned the rec club cost one fifth what the private club cost. I learned that kids in the rec club had more fun. But I also learned that the high school coaches only took kids who played in the private club so that if I ever wanted my children to get a soccer scholarship, I had to put my kids in the private club. I learned that the subdivision was forming its own team so they could practice at the subdivision's soccer fields. I learned that the private club had four youth teams at Bryce's age and the rec club had twenty. The discussion between the recreational parents and the private club parents got pretty intense as each side vied for my participation. I felt like the swing vote at the Iowa Republican caucus.

 

Looking back I realize how wrong everyone was. But it all sounded so convincing and life-affecting. How could I know what was was true when I had just learned that youth soccer existed? These myths get perpetuated year after year, and it isn't until after we've experienced youth soccer for ourselves that we can wean the truth from the stories. Unfortunately by the time we figure out what is best for our family and for our children, we may be a long ways down a path that doesn't work. The good news is that nothing is set in stone–despite the myth that whatever you pick, you're stuck with. While friends, relatives and neighbors are well-meaning with all their advice, each one is coming from their own bias. Bad experiences they had with particular clubs or coaches may just be a reflection of disappointment in their own child's lack of success. Likewise, glowing reports of a team's value may not translate to your own player's abilities or interests. When it comes to evaluating the youth soccer route you should be taking, only your own family and your own child can direct that journey.

 

The biggest myth out there is the recreation vs. travel club controversy. You will hear that if you really want your child to succeed in soccer you need to get them into a private club with professional coaching as soon as possible. This presupposes a lot of factors including your child will want to play soccer ten years in the future, your child will have the athletic abilities to play soccer ten years in the future and that all soccer clubs will remain exactly the same with staff and player abilities ten year in the future. I won't disagree with the fact that the more professional coaching a player can have the stronger he or she will grow. But spending the kind of money you need to spend to get that experience may not be appropriate until your child expresses a serious interest in the sport. This might not be until age 12 or 13 or it may be sooner. Only your family can determine when the best time would be to make that kind of financial and time commitment to soccer.

 

The next myth is that you have to play in a travel club to make the high school soccer team. Like any school team, soccer will have tryouts where the top players get selected. If a high school coach has a bias against players coming from a recreational background, then he or she could be overlooking some strong talent. I suspect more coaches want to put together a winning team than want to toe some hard line against recreational players. Gifted players are gifted players no matter where they train. Some high schools end up very short of players for their team, so they are grateful for any and all participants. The likelihood of a team made up primarily of select club players is high just because those are the players who wanted more intensive training and could afford it, but your son or daughter won't be precluded solely on a club pedigree if they have talent.

 

Parents will tell you that if you choose the recreational route, you won't be able to switch later on. This is the worst myth out there. It puts pressure on parents to choose select clubs earlier in their children's training than might be wise for the family. The financial and time commitment of moving to a select club becomes tremendous and only increases as the children get older. If your child is still trying out a number of youth sports, then sticking to recreational teams and leagues makes perfect sense. Making the commitment to a select team means that playing other sports in the same season will be difficult, so you need to be sure your child is ready to forgo other sports. Once a player is ready to move up to a select team, then attending tryouts at several clubs will give him or her plenty of options. In truth, select teams shouldn't be forming until older ages, but lots of clubs will create hand-picked teams as young as Under-8. That's an unfortunate trend, since players are still developing size, muscle and brain, making any prediction of future prowess unreliable. You don't want to get sucked in by a club's promises when your child is 8 and big, only to be rejected by that club when your child is 12 and normal size. So it's prudent to do what's best for your family and your child rather than be swayed by a sales pitch, which is usually self-serving for the club.

 

In soccer much of the scouting for colleges is done on the club level. This makes perfect sense since clubs will participate in big tournaments making it easier for college coaches to see large numbers of players in a weekend. Therefore if your child begins to show some promise as a player around ages 12 or 13 and expresses an interest in playing soccer in high school and college, then it's reasonable to look for a good select club with professional coaches. The player will benefit from the intensified training and from some exposure to scouts. There are lots of additional options for being scouted including the US Youth Soccer Olympic Development Program (US Youth Soccer ODP). People will promote the myth that to make it to college you have to be on one of the Developmental Academy teams sponsored by U.S. Soccer Federation, but those teams cover a limited geographical area of the United States. Colleges recognize that good soccer talent exists all over. Therefore, find a strong select club in your area and augment that training with programs like US Youth Soccer ODP. This will actually double the opportunity to be seen and increase a player's training regimen.

 

When I think about how much bad information I was bombarded with that summer, it's a wonder my sons ever got to play high school, not to mention college, soccer. Parents are well meaning, but they see the world through the narrow focus of their own children's experiences. What works best for one child may not be the best route for another. Basing your youth sports decisions on something which may or may not come true in a decade could create real problems in the present. Great players have come out of the recreational sports experiences. While playing in those early years they had the opportunity to share the experience with friends who later wouldn't be able to keep up athletically, but with whom deep and lasting friendships were formed. Limiting your child to just a pool of like-skilled participants takes away lots of options. Playing with a group of neighborhood or schoolyard buddies doesn't mean you've closed the door on playing in college or even playing pro. But for the 99 percent of players who will never move to that level, it seems silly to insist on a track that moves them in that direction. And for the 1 percent who will get there, it will be talent which determines that success, and talent will be recognized at the right time and place to be developed. No matter what our children succeed at, we all want to be sure they enjoyed the journey there.

Ugly, ugly, ugly – the only way to describe what I witnessed last Sunday at an indoor tournament. At every step of the way, responsible people could have seen that behaviors didn't escalate and that the kids understood how awful the incident was. Instead, parents and coaches inflamed the situation, police were called and no one learned a valuable lesson.

 

Two teams were playing a hotly contested game. The score remained 0-0 for much of the first half, and for those of you who know the speed of indoor soccer you also know how unusual that is. The teams were not the same age. I would imagine one team was Under-13 and the other was either U-14 or U-15. The older team was obviously flustered and not used to encountering such stiff competition and the younger team had an air of arrogance that showed they were also used to winning. It was a powder keg just waiting for a fuse and a spark. That came in the second half. I should also mention that these were girls teams.

 

The score was 4–2 with the older team behind and five minutes left on the clock. During a fierce battle to the goal, a player from the blue older team checked a player from the pink younger team into the boards. The play was too aggressive and the ref blew his whistle. But before he could do anymore than that, the pink player sucker punched the blue player. And the battle was on. Everyone got involved. Parents from the blue team were screaming that the girl should be ejected (which the ref was in the process of doing) and saying that the entire team should be disqualified. The coaches were engaged in a war of words that threatened to come to blows if not for the impediment of the center scoring table, girls from the pink team were standing in front of the box for the blue team taunting both the team and the coach, and the girl who had been hit was backing up on the field with her arms outspread and gesturing for the girl who had hit her to come and get her so they could finish the battle. I don't excuse the punch, but that's an event which should have remained isolated to the attacker. Instead it became the catalyst to release all the pent up frustrations, bravado and brutishness festering in the players, coaches and parents. And in the meantime, the clock was ticking away.

 

After two and a half minutes of a melee filled with expletives, threats and the blue coach screaming at the girls in pink to ""get the f--- away,"" the referee managed to get the teams back on the field and play continued. The pink team was now a player down, but managed to score a goal first due to the confusion. The blue team valiantly tried to score but the pink team keeper held her own and in the end the score was 5-3.

 

Now the sour grapes began. The manager of the indoor facility was called to the box and with two coaches literally screaming in her ears, she attempted to listen to the referee to ascertain what had happened. The teams refused to leave the area, and in fact, having them in the boxes probably saved a major fist fight from breaking out. In the meantime, parents joined the situation, ostensibly to protect their daughters, but based on the posturing and language I would say they wanted to avenge their daughters. With so many emotions running high, the manager called the police and one sheriff's squad and three city police squads showed up. Eventually everyone was ushered from the facility into their cars and off the property.

 

This all happened on the field next to Bryce's game, which I ended up not watching because of the fracas at the girls game. The boys' game had its share of rough play, but it was missing one element to fuel the fire of an actual fight – outside adults. The boys had no coaches and only a handful of parents. The boys' game also had two referees because it was boys and they were over U-15. So much for stereotypes.

 

This tournament is sponsored by the local indoor facility every Thanksgiving Sunday. It attracts mostly local teams, but a few come up from Chicago or over from Madison. I doubt the tournament is listed anywhere but on the Wisconsin State Youth Soccer Association website. It holds no reputation for being a significant tournament, nor does it carry any weight for team rankings. It doesn't attract college scouts. It is simply an opportunity for teams to play three games for minimal cost in a short period of time. Many of the teams are formed just for the purpose of playing in the tournament. In other words, this tournament is for FUN. But apparently someone forgot to tell these girls, their coaches and their parents. Bryce's team won their bracket and got orange t-shirts with a turkey on the front and the word ""Champions"" on the back that all the boys found funny, since champion is a word that should be used for noble combat, not a few pick-up games on a Sunday afternoon.

 

For these two girls teams this was all about saving face. If the coach of the blue team hadn't spent so much time berating the referee for not stopping the attack and then trying to convince him to make the other team forfeit, his team very well might have had enough time to win the game. Five minutes in indoor soccer is an eternity, and with the other team a player down, eventually the blue team would have had clear opportunities to score. Instead he put his team back on the field with less than two minutes. The pink team coach should have pulled all his girls into their box rather than let them go fight his battle in front of the blue team's box. The referee should have stopped the clock. And the parents should have shut their mouths and let the referee do his job. More importantly, the coaches should have diffused the situation by reminding their players that this was just a game – nothing more, nothing less. Losing to a younger team seemed to devastate the blue team and beating an older team seemed to embolden the pink team. All for total ridiculousness. Everyone loses at some point in their lives. The pink team has probably lost before and they will lose again. The blue team will go on to win the important games and this game for an orange t-shirt that I suspect none of these girls would be caught dead in would have been long forgotten had it not resulted in a near riot.

 

I actually witnessed a similar event with Robbie's Chicago Magic team. It was an indoor adult game, although Robbie's team was U-17 and the team they were playing was in their 20's. Robbie's team was winning and ultimately the older team had their egos bruised enough that one player knocked out one of Robbie's teammates. In that case things were handled properly. The game was stopped while the coach of the older team came on the field and took the offending player off. Our coach pulled all the players off the field and calmly waited for the referee to do his job. The father of the boy who was hit stayed off the field and instead went to the manager's office to report the incident and ask that police be called since it was an assault. Despite the potential for a complete meltdown, the responsible adults behaved reasonably and trouble was avoided.

 

The problem with what happened Sunday was that everyone behaved badly. These girls witnessed despicable behavior from most of the adults involved. The amount of foul language flying from coaches, parents, and players would have made Eddie Murphy blush. No one took the high road, no one attempted to diffuse the situation and no one realized how truly insignificant this game was. The punch was unforgiveable and needed to be handled. If the coach of the pink team had been a true adult, he would have pulled his player off, reprimanded her, and he and she would have apologized. Instead he attempted to excuse what she did as being a reasonable response to the foul. The swagger of the player who got hit told me that she had probably been nipping at the pink player all through the game, getting in her head and enflaming her on purpose. If so, this would not be the first time she had done it, so the blue coach should have seen trouble brewing and told her to knock it off. The parents expressed their feelings loudly, profanely and unnecessarily. They made an uncomfortable situation worse by converging on the boxes and the tiny area at the end of the field. I'm surprised that some parents didn't come to blows in such a confined space, but luckily that didn't happen.

 

Now, a tournament that didn't matter and would normally hold little space in the memories of these players will become a very big deal. It will be replayed for days, even weeks, tainting the joy these players should feel for soccer. Players from the pink team will argue that they won the tournament but were unjustly denied the victory and players from the blue team will argue that they were cheated out of a win. Everyone will feel justified in whatever behaviors they exhibited. Furthermore, because none of the adults behaved properly, no adult reinforced the proper reactions this event should elicit. Instead of a teachable moment where the adults let the players know that being passionate and driven to win should never override temperance and good sportsmanship, the girls witnessed and exercised boorish behavior. The adults could have modeled the proper response to an explosive situation by remaining calm, encouraging their players to not stoop to foul language, taunting and threats. They could have put the event into perspective and promoted winning with humility and losing with dignity. Instead these girls witnessed the worst of behaviors for an insignificant game. Ugly, ugly, ugly.

In July, a nationwide survey of youth soccer clubs was published. The study had been conducted in March and April by Korrio, an organization which is the developer of a youth sports automation platform to help clubs with the day-to-day operations. Therefore, the survey results have to be considered with some restraint, since the questions were designed to point out how Korrio could be helping these clubs. Nevertheless I found the survey telling in several aspects.

 

The primary focus of the survey was to look at the number of and use of volunteers in youth clubs. That makes sense, since Korrio's software is intended to ease the stress on and even eliminate the need for volunteers. But the details illuminate the significant role volunteers play in the operation and success of youth clubs. We've all been part of that volunteer crew. Some of us do our required six hours and that's it, while some of us put in scores of hours serving on boards, coaching and acting as team managers. This dependence on volunteers is a double-edged sword, which the study points out. They discovered that 43 percent of clubs depend on 26 or more volunteers to keep the club running, but that 55 percent of volunteers serve a club for three years or less with only 18 percent remaining on the ""job"" five years or more. Anyone who runs a business knows that turnover makes operations more difficult. But it makes sense that people don't stick around for long. Children don't keep up their interest in the sport or they get cut from a team or they move to a new club. Turnover is inevitable, which leaves clubs constantly recruiting volunteers to fill positions.

 

Along with the revolving door of volunteers, the survey also discovered that clubs do make use of computer software to manage the club operations. Unfortunately they often use two or more programs which don't integrate with one another. In fact only 20 percent of clubs had a single platform, while 63 percent used two or three separate programs. I can attest to that. When I was club registrar I had to use a horrible, unfriendly program to do the registrations and submit them to the state registrar. But our website, which included the initial registration form, was on a completely different system. Therefore I had to re-copy all the information members submitted on our website into the registration system the state had. While Korrio has the ulterior motive to explore this topic and to offer clubs a more unified platform, it also points out the unnecessary hours volunteers have to perform duplicating work. Volunteers like to feel useful, but doing busy work merely discourages them. It's frustrating, for example, to know that all the club members filled out detailed registrations, but that those registrations don't transfer to the registration program the state uses. Likewise, any time volunteers feel their time is being wasted, they are unlikely to continue to volunteer. So Korrio makes a good point. Clubs should look to modernize as best as possible to universal, integrated software for club operations such as payroll, registration, tournament scheduling, practice schedules, field assignments, and referee scheduling to name just a few of the many tasks a club performs throughout the year.

 

Additionally, this survey looked at overall parent involvement and sportsmanship. Of the clubs surveyed, 80 percent reported that parental involvement was higher than it was five years ago. In fact, 75 percent classified parental involvement as committed or highly committed. That bodes well for getting the necessary volunteers to run clubs. In judging parents' sideline behavior, 66 percent said that behavior was either good or excellent. While that leaves room for improvement, it does indicate that parents and clubs are making a unified effort to keep sideline antics at a minimum. On the player side, 42 percent of the clubs reported that sportsmanship had improved over the last five years, 38 percent said it remained the same, and only 2 percent said it had declined. Of course, when parents provide a good example and make it clear to their kids that bad sportsmanship won't be tolerated, it usually spells more mature play from the kids.

 

This study was somewhat self-serving for Korrio, but does offer great insights for clubs. First of all, it shows that volunteers are still the lifeblood of our soccer clubs and that the years of reinforcing good behavior both on the sidelines and on the pitch have succeeded in improving behavior. It also opens the door for even further improvement. Since volunteers are not a consistent and stable work force, clubs need to find ways to create a continuum of organization. Some clubs keep notebooks of procedures and practices which are passed from volunteer to volunteer, however these are only as effective as the volunteer maintaining the records. Keeping detailed minutes of meetings can insure that details of various jobs get recorded as they come up. Following major events such as tryouts, tournaments, and camps, having each volunteer write up a short summary of the event with any suggestions can help a board refine the events to make them more efficient and improve the involvement of the volunteers.

 

When it comes to sportsmanship, it's not a bad idea to have players and parents sign a sportsmanship agreement that outlines behaviors and consequences for violating those behaviors. Various organizations require such agreements with good results. Parents think twice before acting out because the consequences include being banned from attending games. Likewise, kids learn to control their behavior on the field when they know they might have to sit out a game or even a season. Some contract examples are found at http://www.suburbanathletics.com/sportsmanship_agreement.pdf and http://www.mshsaa.org/resources/pdf/Parent percent20and percent20Student percent20Conduct percent20Contract percent20(PDF).pdf. Both our sons had to sign such agreements at the beginning of each high school season, although there was no parent agreement. We all know how disquieting it is to stand next to someone who continually taunts referees and/or players. So I'm sure we would all be grateful if sideline behavior could be confined to positive remarks.

 

Ultimately, the study points out how many support systems exist for youth sports. While Korrio sells software for managing the administration of clubs, there are also groups who provide workshops on promoting good sportsmanship, how to get recruited, coaching issues and fundraising. Your club can look to the major youth soccer organizations who have plenty of resources to make your club function better. U.S. Youth Soccer Association has online resources from coaches and experts that your club can utilize. In addition, U.S. Youth Soccer Association has created an educational platform which will make even more information available (/news/story.asp?story_id=6302). Presently coaching teaching modules and an introductory course to concussion are available on the platform. If your state association doesn't yet participate, encourage them to join. The National Soccer Coaches Association of America (www.nscaa.com) offers licensing courses, online education, and news about upcoming competitions and events. A number of software products are available for soccer clubs, although I encourage any club to set up a 30-to-60-day trial before purchasing software. Software developers should offer training in the software and the ability to reprogram parts of the software to make it appropriate for your club's needs.

 

Finally, I encourage all of you to give time to your club beyond any time that is required. Each of us has special talents that we can bring to our clubs to make them stronger. The stronger your club, the more it can depend on volunteerism, and the longer it can keep someone on the job, the more competitive it will be and it should help lower costs. Some clubs are now offering incentives for volunteers in the form of reduced dues. Take them up on this. You will find it is a pretty painless way of keeping some dollars in your own pocket.

As the recent scandal at Penn State evolves, it reminds us sadly that sports unfortunately have an ugly side. That the scandal involves youth football players makes it even sadder. And it points out the importance of people in positions of power understanding their moral obligation to protect our children. While details are still being revealed, the main point is that an adult offering youth football training and experience to boys from troubled and impoverished backgrounds allegedly abused several of those boys. When it was discovered, and the "when" is still being established fully, it was simply dismissed and the door closed without doing a thing to inform the police, child welfare, and especially the parents. These children must feel so betrayed, and the after-effects will resonate in their lives for decades.

 

While it's an uncomfortable topic, it's also an unfortunate reality in youth sports. Predators gravitate to activities that offer lots of kids who look up to them and parents who trust them. So we all need to have some vigilance without panicking and without overprotecting. We can take three important steps to help reduce the likelihood of our children being put in a dangerous or compromising situation. Working in tandem with our clubs and our state associations, we can help ensure the safety of our children.

 

The first step is to confirm how your local association vets coaches and referees. You want to be comfortable that the environment your child is participating in is safe and has proper protocol in place. A primary driver in the vetting process is a background check. These checks do work. I had been involved in the process several years ago, and I was surprised at how often a basic background check revealed histories that required further investigation. In all, every year we would screen hundreds of volunteers and professionals, and occasionally we would have to inform clubs of persons that the state association could not license to work with youth players. The purpose of these checks is to reassure parents that any questionable adult has been identified and blocked from working with our children.

 

The second step involves doing your research. Make sure that your club follows through on these background checks and the information they receive. It can be difficult to tell a mom or dad who has given hours of volunteer time to the club that they have been identified as an at-risk adult. But clubs need to be diligent while being discrete. The protection of the children in the club has to take precedence over the protection of a friend of the club president. While not every potential risk can be identified, it's very important that those who are get removed from working with kids. Clubs must also make it clear that they will not tolerate any abusive behavior from anyone, including but not limited to verbal, physical, bullying and sexual acts. They should issue a code of conduct for parents, coaches, and administrators that make the limits clear as well as the consequences for crossing the line. I'm sure we've all witnessed our share of sideline abuse from overeager parents who feel that belittling players will somehow make them work harder. We've also experienced that coach whose idea of motivation is to scream obscenities and demeaning comments. While not as egregious as the alleged actions at Penn State, such behavior can still have a lasting and serious impact on our kids. So be sure that your club takes this conduct seriously and has provisions in place to deal with it. Even older teenagers can be negatively impacted by being debased. So don't tolerate a board's attitude that the kids need to toughen up. You pay the club good money to teach your kids soccer not to lower their self-esteem.

 

Finally, we need to support our children through education, intervention, and love. Be sure that they know they can tell you anything and that you will listen. That also means educating our children without alarming them on situations which can arise. There are several good organizations and websites with information you can use. Parents.com, for example, regularly addresses this issue. There's a book called "The Right Touch" for very young children. But the main thing is to let children know that they should never accept a gift or a ride from any person (friend or stranger) unless they get your permission first. While the evil threat of some roving sex offender haunts us, the more real threat is what allegedly happened at Penn State. A person in authority who has control over children and the trust of the parents uses that authority and trust to commit harm. Teach kids what boundaries they have the right to maintain, and if those boundaries are ever crossed, they need to tell you immediately.

 

Once you are aware of a concern, you need to act. If the problem is a parent on the sidelines or a coach who seems to have it out for your child, then find a time to talk to the offender calmly. If your intervention doesn't do the trick, then approach the club board with your concern. If that falls on deaf ears, then it's probably time to switch clubs. No prestige is worth your child's self-image. If the problem involves physical or sexual aspects with strong proof, then you need to inform the police and child welfare. Let the professionals sort it out. They know how to discretely investigate and what questions to ask. The Penn State situation hopefully shows the deep pain, harm, and repercussions to which covering it up can lead. The child victims come foremost, but there are adults who must face harsh consequences for ignoring the seriousness of the crimes and protecting a friend instead of doing the right thing. Their judgment was clouded by loyalty to the accused, which we parents should never tolerate.

 

Anton Chekov said, "People don't notice whether it's winter or summer when they're happy." But he didn't sit through a two hour soccer game in pouring rain, gusts to 30 mph and a bone-chilling 40 degrees. Lots of us have, and our happiness can only be measured by a victory and a hot cup of cocoa. Winter doesn't spell the end of soccer; it just condenses the time that games can be played on unlit fields. Actually soccer never ends. Around the world soccer continues all through the winter. It's a great season to share televised matches and become students of the game. And with the NBA questionable for this year, your family can easily give soccer a chance to captivate your interest. You can begin to follow particular club and players, while you develop a better understanding of team tactics and individual skills.

 

In the next two weeks, men's and women's college soccer teams will be vying for an elusive spot in the NCAA championships. The women's brackets will have been announced on November 7 and the men's will be announced on November 14. Chances are very good a game or two will be played close enough to your home to attend. If not, then you can catch some of them on television. Watching these young men and women compete provides an excellent opportunity to see the skill level your youth players will need to aspire to if they have dreams of playing college soccer. You will also be watching future professional soccer stars. Men's schedules for Division I, II, and III can be found at ncaa.com/sports/soccer-men/d1 and Women's schedules for Division I, II, and III can be found at ncaa.com/sports/soccer-women/d1.

 

Presently the play-offs for Major League Soccer are underway. The league has added several notable foreign players such as Thierry Henry and David Beckham, but it is primarily dependent upon U.S. talent. These young men rose out of the ranks of programs your son and daughter participate in like US Youth Soccer Association and the Olympic Development Program. Players that my sons either played with or against are now in the MLS, so that we feel a very personal connection to the teams and the competitions. It's fun to see someone streaking down the field and to remember washing his uniform during an ODP tournament! Schedules for the games can be found atmlssoccer.com/mlscup/2011/playoffschedule.

 

The United European Football Association (UEFA) Champions League runs nearly year round with the finals in mid-May and new qualifying rounds beginning in late June with winners laying claim to the European Cup. Every country in Europe can enter up to four teams into the qualifying rounds. The Champions League should not be confused with the UEFA Cup also known as the Europa League. Both leagues' qualifiers, knock-out rounds, and play-offs run nearly in tandem one with the other so it can be confusing sometimes as to which competition you're viewing. Schedules for the competitions can be found at uefa.com/uefachampionsleague/index.html and uefa.com/uefaeuropaleague/index.html.

 

If you don't want to watch all of Europe compete, you can concentrate on the English Premier League (EPL), which sponsors some of the top soccer competition in the world. EPL games are broadcast regularly on Fox Soccer, Fox Soccer Plus, Gol TV, and ESPN. Sirius-XM radio broadcasts EPL games on the weekends. The league also boasts a number of U.S. players who again came up through the ranks of youth soccer programs. The EPL teams have thousands of U.S. followers and even some U.S. owners, so the Atlantic Ocean isn't much of a barrier to enjoying the battles on the English pitch. Your family can select a team to follow and be sure to catch the games that come up each week. Developing an interest in professional soccer gives your kids the role models in the sport that help them maintain their commitment and inspire them. Sharing in that interest lets kids know that you value their choices. Follow the games on the website and through the Fox Soccer schedule:  premierleague.com/page/Home and

msn.foxsports.com/foxsoccer/tvschedule.

 

While looking at that Fox Soccer schedule don't forget to look for the US Youth Soccer Show. This thirty minute program focuses on youth soccer events and training, giving viewers access to great coaching tips, player bios, and highlights from some of the best youth soccer games. I have a special place in my heart for this program since Robbie had a brief interview in the very first episode. So I naturally tuned in to catch his moment, but ended up loving the entire show, most of which didn't feature Robbie's smile. Nevertheless I have tuned in every episode since because the program gives great information for parents of youth players and players themselves. A new episode premiered on November 4 and airs again November 18 at 6 p.m. ET and December 1 at 7 p.m. ET, so check it out.

 

While some of you in the southern climes can enjoy soccer outdoors in the winter, most of us have to deal with the cold, snow, rain and ice which make outdoor soccer less viable in the winter. Short daylight hours also put a crimp in any outdoor play if fields don't have lights. So most of us hunker down indoors and await the thaw and daylight savings time. Take this opportunity to enjoy some of the winter soccer happening all over the world and available to us via our cable and satellite TV. While our winter's discontent with long nights, higher heating bills and gray days can't be completely eliminated, watching a great soccer match can bring a few hours of delight.

Two weeks ago my grandson won his big game, making his team the champions of their town. A week later his brother lost his big game, denying his team the championship. That loss was made all the more bitter when framed in the light of his younger brother's victory. His injured pride had suffered the double-whammy of a loss and having to listen to his brother's bragging rights. Closer to home, my oldest son's team continues to win in its drive to a championship and my youngest son's team continues to lose. Additionally Bryce, the older son, plays every minute of every game and Robbie only plays about 30 to 40 minutes a game. Talk about sibling rivalry. No matter if they are pre-teens, teens, or post-teens, being on the losing end of a competition isn't easy. Handling our children's disappointment can be complicated since we usually have our own disappointment festering in the background. Add a second child having success into the mix gives you an uncomfortable and difficult situation.

 

While we understand as parents that every loss will be offset later with a win and vice versa, kids don't have the experience and therefore the context to be so wise. Kids just see others succeeding while they are not. When it is a brother or sister who is achieving success, it makes the defeats all the more defeating. Experts suggest not focusing on wins and losses but on hard work. You should support a big win and show your pride in that success, but you also should shift your continuing praise to the good performance of skills and effort the child showed in that win. That way when a sibling loses a game, you can commiserate on the loss, but then shift again to those excellent qualities your child exhibited in that loss. The praise becomes about the process rather than the product, which allows you to give equal support in an unequal situation.

 

Additionally, you want to avoid comparing your children. Don't talk about how well Johnny dribbles and then say, ""Hopefully Susie you can soon dribble as well as Johnny."" Keep the accomplishments separate. Any rewards for success shouldn't be based on wins and losses. You can develop a point system for working hard in practice, doing something well in a game, and even being a good helper to the coach. When enough points are earned you can go as a family to enjoy a treat like ice cream or a movie. This system lets the child earn a reward which benefits everyone. It should help siblings encourage one another in the pursuit of a reward. I even witnessed my younger grandson telling his parents that his brother had made a good tackle during a game and that he should earn a point for that. Instead of being jealous of his brother, he had a stake in looking out for things to praise.

 

It's also not surprising following a big loss for a child to express a wish to quit. So much energy gets put into working towards a win, that a loss can mean more than just that loss. Kids can begin to question their abilities, their commitment to the sport, and their teammates. Putting so much of their hopes and dreams on the line again seems overwhelming and unreasonable. Parents should give kids the time to vent. You can certainly be sympathetic without succumbing to reinforcing the negatives. Kids want to shift the blame from themselves to others because that helps diminish their own complicity in the loss. However, no matter how many mistakes others made that may have contributed to the bad outcome, these are your child's teammates, so no one should be a scapegoat. Talk in general about how the team may have faltered or lacked energy, or even better talk about how the other team was just stronger and more skilled today. When talk of quitting comes up, tell your child that the discussion has to be tabled until after a cooling off period of a week or two. If it's the end of the season, then you can't use the commitment card, but you can talk about successes up to that point and remind your child of the fun he or she had during the season. When quitting gets brought up out of jealousy of a sibling's success, then time usually dissipates those impulses as long as the sibling's success isn't overly promoted in the family.

 

Devastating losses that occur in tandem with monumental successes can have the effect of diminishing a success by putting a damper on the celebration. In this case, sibling rivalry can be resentment from the successful child towards his or her sibling for stealing thunder. Once again, parents have a difficult tight rope to walk in which they give proper respect to the win and proper deference to the loss. When it's a significant win such as a league championship, having a family celebration seems in order. Dwell on the great things each child did respectively for their teams and encourage the one sibling to congratulate his brother or sister on the win. Make sure that both children know that this is a family success because everyone supports one another and therefore shares in the pride. Likewise, when there is a loss, every family member shares in the disappointment, but never loses their respect for the child's abilities. Make sure to reassure both children that your love and pride are not dependent upon wins. You value effort and improvement. Make sure that while wins come and go, commitment, determination, and growth continue to be the ultimate goals. Allow a child to have pride in his or her win, but don't allow smugness. Likewise, allow a child to feel badly about a loss, but don't allow wallowing. Remind them that every season brings new challenges and new opportunities that they can rise to and seize.

Helping children learn to accept their wins humbly and their losses stoically can be a significant life lesson to come from soccer. Helping them to be loving, supportive siblings is even bigger. As parents, we have to set the tone which should be that wins and losses don't define our children's worth. While winning is wonderful and deserves joy and praise, losing will never diminish any child. We can make the case for our children that losing just sets the bar for the next encounter in our lives. By not over-emphasizing the power of a win or a loss to define our children's activities, we set the stage for our kids to share in their siblings' successes and letdowns without making these a reason to compete within the family. Encourage them to place their rivalry on the pitch against their opponents and not in the living room against their siblings. We can express the pride we feel in our children's willingness to train and compete in their sport and in their growth as a player. We will have plenty of opportunities to tell our kids how proud we are of them, even if they never win or even if one wins and one doesn't. They each embody qualities worthy of our praise.

Just outside my window sits a thermometer. Without it, I could end up leaving for a soccer game completely unprepared, since weather can be deceptive. Take today for instance. The sun is shining, the sky is clear blue, and the temperature is 44 degrees. If I judged the weather by empirically charting the view, I'd end up under- or over- dressed time after time. Weather determines so much when it comes to soccer: what we wear, what the kids wear, times, locations, snacks, driving times, accessories, and seating. Fall and spring soccer stretch across several weather patterns, disrupting and changing plans regularly. Preparing for the weather turns into a major preoccupation for soccer families. Here are a few suggestions based on years of wrestling with Mother Nature.

 

Let's start with the worst scenario. Rain will never be sufficient for canceling a game or practice. But rain will create all kinds of problems. The best case would be for torrential rains closing the field. But be careful what you wish for, because all canceled games must be rescheduled and that free weekend on the calendar can now become the busiest weekend on the calendar as missed games get squeezed into available time. If the game does happen, you'll need plenty of accessories to insure that the ride home doesn't devalue your car drastically by ruining the interior with mud, muck, and water. Put large garbage bags on the floors to catch all cast-off grime, wipes to remove mud from hands, faces and legs, towels to dry hair, plastic bags to hold muddy cleats, and even more plastic bags to hold disgusting socks, shorts, and jerseys. Having a box for rainy days sitting packed in your garage makes these days less onerous. I can't emphasize enough the importance of kids not taking socks off in the car while traveling. In my experience they are the gift that keeps on giving crumpled under the driver's seat, pushed up against the heater, and emanating their distinctive smell for weeks, even after being discovered and removed.

 

Cold weather seems an easy fix; just add more clothing. But there are rules about uniforms and extra clothing that some referees take very seriously. If you can afford to, buy some long john underwear that can easily be worn under the shorts with socks pulled up over, so that no uniform rules are violated. Add some insulated long-sleeved underwear and you've created a warmer player with ease of movement. While you can get the performance clothing options, you can also go to any hunting gear outlet to find similar products for less money. My favorite cold weather products are ""space blankets"" which are those colorful blankets lined with silvery Kevlar. They cost less than $15, can be found at big box stores and sporting good stores, fold into a tiny package and serve as a great wind break and reflector of body heat. You can put two or three easily in a soccer bag for the kids on the bench to use. I also love those hand and foot warmers which feel like packs of sand. Once you activate them, they last long enough for warm-ups, the soccer game, and the trip home. They cost around $2.50 for three disposable pairs. At the end of every winter, I raid stores for their stocking hats and stretch gloves. I can get them as cheap as three for a dollar. I store them in the garage and toss several hats and pairs of gloves in the soccer bags to be used as needed. These have saved the day several times when the winds of winter unexpectantly whipped up in April. For parents' comfort you can invest in a Tempachair or stadium cushion that has a heated seat. You can even recharge it using your car battery, so it's great for tournament weekends.

 

On some occasions you'll need to deal with actual snow and ice. While all the cold weather suggestions would definitely apply, adding snow and ice to the mix creates an additional set of requirements. You can use a water-proof tarp to throw over the bench and onto the ground where the kids put their feet. Place some towels on top of the tarp on the ground giving the players a warmer dry place to set their feet and a place to absorb the cold melting snow off their boots. Having a small broom and collapsible shovel can help if field lines need to be cleared off or someone's car gets stuck.

 

Hot weather soccer can be the worst. First and foremost be sure that your player has extra water and/or sports drinks to keep hydrated. Hydration is vital for any soccer game, but even more important on hot days when fluids are lost both from activity and evaporation. Add a spray bottle for misting faces, necks, and forearms to help with cooling by evaporation. Some fancier spray bottles include a battery-powered fan, which is nice, but not necessary. If you want to be really fancy, there is a portable misting tower for $40 from Improvements that needs an outdoor spigot and hose to operate. Not practical for most games, but could be a great addition to your club park. You can also bring a small cooler filled with ice water and washcloths that the kids can apply to the back of their necks during breaks. For parents on the sidelines I swear by my pop-up hood chair. But a beach umbrella works too. Just plant it in the ground and angle to give you the shade you crave. Ambitious parents with big car trunks can bring along a rolling canopy. Most can be set up in a minute or two and provide shade for the team bench or a group of parents. The value packs with a roller bag and a side wall run for less than $150.

 

Lightning kills more people annually than tornadoes or hurricanes, so treating this weather nemesis with respect is vital for our young players. There are lightning detectors that clubs can invest in which are very high tech and extremely reliable, but also costly running around $500 to $1000. There are personal lightning detectors which are less accurate, but still provide information that will help warn when lightning approaches before you can hear the thunder or see the strikes. These cost under $100. In addition having a good weather radio on hand will help with any severe weather that threatens but hasn't yet materialized. Most good weather radios can operate on electricity, battery and crank power. The radios should provide the NOAA channel. Eton offers a Red Cross approved radio that is also solar powered and has a cell phone charger for $30.00. Having a radio available for the team will help everyone make important decisions and give timelines for when a storm will pass. Consider having a flashlight available as well since overwhelming storms can really darken the skies. A ball of twine, the aforementioned tarp, and some tent stakes can provide a shelter or a wind break.

 

Most of these weather-related items cost under $20 and are readily available, so can be inexpensively gathered. All of these can be stored in boxes or cases marked for the various conditions to throw in the car as you leave for a game or practice. Soccer and most youth sports follow the U.S. Postal Service motto of "Neither snow nor rain nor heat. . ." when it comes to completing games and practices, so you need to be prepared. Understanding that youth sports come with filthy uniforms, runny noses, wind-chapped lips, and sweaty brows will help you get through the bad weather spells. Most days will be glorious, so enjoy them. And for those that aren't, you can power through with a few helpful tools.

While watching the National League Championship game Wednesday night, the commentators began discussing the St. Louis Cardinals third baseman David Freese. Apparently he became so burned out by baseball that he quit after high school. Eventually he decided to try playing at a junior college, and then he transferred to a Division I school. By the time he was offered a professional contract he was ready to recommit to the sport he had once abandoned.

 

The discussion then moved to a more general criticism of the intensity of youth sports overall, and baseball in particular. These experts spoke directly to the notion that if a child isn't identified as a youth player then he or she has no chance of becoming a pro. They called that idea hogwash. These former professional players argued that youth participants also need to be kids. While I can talk about not overwhelming our children with continual competitive sports, most people might not accept my admonishments since my only credentials are soccer mom. But I'm not alone.

 

Tim Keown of ESPN.com wrote a column on August 24, 2011 that directly addresses this issue. He cites the problems with try outs at ages as young as eight to weed out kids and build a formidable team. For what? To win! And somehow winning is supposed to magically translate into improved skills, strong interest in the game, and growth into a top-rated player at the older ages. As Keown points out, we have gone crazy trying to place our preteen players on teams that offer professional coaches, intense competition, travel, and even year-round play. We live in fear that our kids will miss out on some significant connection that would lead them to a professional contract. We want to be sure that we have greased the wheels as well as we can. But the truth is that for kids under the age of 13, it isn't their athleticism, but their physical maturity that dictates their abilities. If you have a late bloomer, then he or she will probably have trouble getting into these "elite" programs until they catch up. On the other hand, the early bloomer may get onto top teams for many years, but as she is passed up by other players, she may find herself suddenly cut from the same teams where she used to be a star.

 

Sandy Henshaw (Cummings,) an All-American college basketball player and now a youth coach, didn't start playing competitive basketball until age 12. She states:

 

 

 

 

Kids and gravity have an affinity one for the other. A gaggle of five year olds dribbling towards the goal never fail to tangle feet and indelicately land in a pile. Then out of the spaghetti comes one foot pushing the ball into the goal. They all rise, wipe their hands and begin again. Their resilience is amazing. Maybe they don't get hurt because they are so close to the ground. Maybe they have extra padding, although I have plenty of padding and get hurt every time I fall. No matter the reason, kids run, fall, get up and run again as if they have super balls in their pants.

 

Most young players treat soccer as a contact sport. They love to jostle, push, wrestle, and tackle. This roughhousing becomes an important aspect of playing the game. While we would love for our children to glide effortlessly onto the pitch, weave their way spectacularly down the field, and fire a shot directly into the center of the net, the scene looks much different. They arrive on the turf, greeting one another with slaps and giggles or a friendly hug and tackle. Someone actually puts a foot on the ball, but not necessarily in the right direction. While the adults gesticulate wildly to get the team back on track, someone notices something interesting on the ground and bends over to examine it. Another player, watching the parents, trips over his teammate and lands face first in the grass. Most of the players run to see what the pile-up is all about, while one lone dribbler takes the ball and scores – in the wrong net. Everyone jumps up and down, cheering until they all tumble onto the earth.

 

Some players believe that landing on the ground is part of the process. Bryce used to kick the ball and then fall on his rear end. Every single kick ended with a flop. He wouldn't dribble because he couldn't do it from the ground. When we asked why he fell, he answered, ""Because it's fun."" I saw a game recently where one adventurous player had obviously seen a bicycle kick goal. He would take the ball, throw it in the air and then attempt to flip himself and kick it. When the coach tried to explain that he couldn't touch the ball with his hands, the player burst into tears. So everyone agreed that if the ball came close to him he could pick it up for his fancy play. I've watched kids slide across a muddy field after scoring a goal, which happens twenty times in a game for five and six year old strikers. Kids will fall down for no apparent reason perhaps because the earth's magnetic pull is too strong for them. Kids will fall down and discover hidden treasure among the blades of grass. And kids will definitely fall down if falling will insure a mess.

 

Parents would do well to stock up on stain remover, bleach, and band-aids, since, yes, occasionally a fall results in a boo-boo. Hitting the ground running has a far more literal translation for the youngest soccer players. Despite the mud, the grass stains, and the cuts and bruises, we can't ask the kids to stop. The helter-skelter nature of the game appeals to young fans. They can play an unbridled hour of running, jumping, and falling, all of which have an equal part in the fun. Chances for any major injury are minimal, so the opportunity to behave like wild horses has to be respected. This abandon has no gender and no limits. Girls love having permission to act rowdy and muck around in the goo just like the boys. Pretty pink shorts and socks can come home from practice looking as gritty and brown as any self-respecting mud pie can look. 

 

If you haven't experienced the falling of autumn, then you'll certainly enjoy it come spring. April showers will bring May flowers and weeks of laundry. But watching how much joy these tiny players have cavorting and falling, it's difficult to deny them the explosion of letting loose completely. While soccer eventually must become a game of finesse and skill, it also needs to be a game of fun. And apparently part of that fun comes from making contact with the ground in dozens of interesting ways. The next time you see your child or your child's friend hitting the ground and laughing, laugh with them. The day will come soon enough when kids won't want to be on the ground, especially in a soccer game. Right now, for many of them, it's the only place they want to be when on the field. While we can worry that they aren't getting the point of soccer, they are convinced they have it all figured out. You can't buy that kind of confidence even if it's being exercised on the ground level.

I love "The Amazing Race." Other than Fox Soccer and a few other TV shows, this would have to be my companion on a desert island. So imagine my delight when the show premiered last Sunday and one of the contestants was a familiar face, Ethan Zohn. Some of you may know Ethan from "Survivor" where he was the winner of the third season, Survivor: Africa. I don't watch "Survivor" but I learned of Ethan through his soccer playing and his founding of "Grassroot Soccer." Ethan was a goalkeeper at Vassar and played for the United Soccer League and in Zimbabwe for their Highlanders F.C. He has done soccer commentating and hosting over the years, so you may have seen him on Fox Soccer or MSG.

 

I think of Ethan often when I see my own sons working on their soccer. While Ethan did live the dream of playing college and professional soccer, it was how he parlayed that interest and success into something more significant. We parents want our children to achieve, but we also want them to develop into adults with integrity and honor. Most kids won't play soccer much beyond their youth experience. Therefore, that time should be spent joyfully benefitting from the important essentials of youth soccer: exercise, learning to work with others, traveling, accepting defeat, winning with humility, and sharing time with family and friends. Additionally soccer can teach tolerance and introduce players to the world. It's these last lessons which Ethan has expanded and built upon. He's the ultimate soccer role model for my children.

 

From his experiences in Africa, he recognized the horrible toll HIV/AIDS has taken throughout the continent. In an effort to stem the spread of the disease, education was essential. So Ethan used soccer as a tool to bring young people together and then teach them how to prevent infection in their own lives and the lives of their loved ones. Called "Grassroot Soccer," it combines education through their "Skillz" curriculum with developing soccer skills. As their web site (grassrootsoccer.org) explains:

 

 

 

 

His great example demonstrates that youth soccer can stretch beyond just being a competitive sport and help players participate in the world arena by doing community service. For example, kids could raise money for organizations by running a dribble-thon where teams sign up contributors who pledge an amount for every field length completed by a player. Or they can have a cone contest where teams compete against one another in dribbling a ball through cones in a tag-team manner. Youth soccer can also build character by offering players service opportunities that will hopefully become a part of their life skills. Some clubs have had food drives where players have to donate a can or box of food each time a goal is scored.  Other clubs run soccer clinics for kids who don't have the means to participate regularly in soccer and provide each player with a ball.

 

There are also dozens of soccer-oriented organizations that youth teams can support by donating gently used gear. U.S. Soccer Foundation's "Pass Back" program usually has donation centers at local soccer stores and at state association offices. "Peace Passers" asks you to contact their web site and they will tell you how to get the gear to them. "Operation Give" collects gear that U.S. military troops distribute in Iraq. Fedex provides free shipping to their warehouse (address on the website) so there is no cost to your team to ship the items.

Augmenting the sports aspect of youth soccer with community service and charitable work promises a richer development of our children's character. The amazing part is that you can add these with little extra effort and tons of rewards. While Ethan Zohn is a survivor on several levels, I suspect that's not proactive enough for the life he's created. Surviving wasn't a terminus; it was a point from which to launch even more success. Likewise soccer shouldn't be a terminus experience. We want our kids to celebrate, grow, and build good memories. As a global sport, soccer should give youth players a sense of being part of the global community. That means stretching beyond drills and games to embrace the experiences of other cultures both abroad and in our own cities. Connecting through service can lead to even greater relationships. As Ethan states in the introduction to his series of youth soccer books, Soccer World, "Soccer is played in almost every nation, so this game is like a common language that brings people together. I can just show up at a field with a ball and instantly make 20 cool new friends." Hopefully youth soccer can be the springboard for compassion, altruism, and tolerance in adulthood. Whatever our children aspire to be, they won't all be professional soccer players, but hopefully they will all be good citizens. 

Certainly youth soccer affords great opportunities for our kids to get fit. That fitness extends to mind, body, and spirit. Players exercise by running, leaping, stretching, juggling, dribbling and occasionally sliding. Most soccer practices consist of a warm up, a constantly active training session and a cool down. Soccer coaches will add life lessons about being supportive, sportsmanship and integrity. Most kids will willingly extend their soccer activity past the end of practice or a game because they are so enthusiastic about playing. And the wonderful thing about soccer is that children of any athletic level or fitness condition can enter the sport and improve their skills. Every child can benefit from the fitness that soccer offers.

But what about us parents? How does youth soccer affect our fitness? I can tell you honestly, and I'm sure many of you will agree, that my fitness improved beginning the day my boys started playing soccer. While I don't make a practice of playing the game and although I'm left-footed I have nothing beyond that to offer to soccer, the game has nonetheless made me healthier.

Here's my parent fitness report:

            Equipment Aerobics – I have done every kind of crunch, press, and lift while retrieving and servicing soccer equipment. There's the "My Cleat's Untied Squat" that most parents practice at least twice during any practice or game, not to mention at home, leaping out of the car and just before kick-off. The "Soccer Bag Jerk" where you lift bags into and out of the trunk, carry them to and from the field and bend and lift the dirty clothes out of the bag and into the washer. The "I'm Missing a Shin Guard Push-up" where you look under every couch, chair, table, bed and bookcase or commando crawl through a pile at the bottom of a closet.

            Tournament Track - The fittest of us owe our muscle tone to field location during a tournament. "Distance Event"– If the parking lot is located by Fields 3 through 5, your child's team is due to play on Field 32. "Relays"– If the finals are set for Field 3, they will be changed to Field 29. This is of course after you have found the perfect parking place steps away from the sideline and you have already set up your chairs. "Sprints"– Port-a-Johns will always be located ten fields from any place your five year old is standing when the urge arrives. "Steeplechase"– No matter what the weather, the trip to your team's fields will travel across a creek without a bridge, a bog or inexplicable mud zones.

           Gym Equipment Rotation – Until our kids began playing soccer, few of us realized that our lives revolved around some pretty sophisticated home exercise equipment without ordering a Nordic Track or Bowflex. "The Step Climber" – Before every practice we will make at least four trips up and down the stairs in order to hurry along and change into uniform or find the missing shin guard (see above). "Treadmill" – The continual cycle of running we all do in order to get through the calendar of events. I run in my dreams. "Punching Bag" – We stuff clothes into our washers, force that extra pair of socks into a crammed bag, break through the brambles behind the goal to find that $125 ball we bought earlier in the day and shove five suitcases into a trunk that holds four. While you may not strike an actual blow, you definitely are punching.

           

Fitness doesn't always come from a membership and gleaming equipment under fluorescent lights. When we're busy, we have to find our health where we can. Even if the above exercise routine can't completely fulfill your daily quota, some of it can be tailored to work to your benefit. Do a few laps around the soccer field before the kick-off, take a bike ride during practices, find a buddy and walk while the kids train or even jog in place while watching a game. Clubs might even be willing to offer a fitness session for parents while the kids practice. Bringing in an instructor and charging a nominal fee could kick off a fitness opportunity to match what the kids are getting. But with or without a club's assistance, parents can use their kids' fitness time as their own. Youth soccer can bring out the best in us all, even if we have to be a bit creative to discover it.

When the boys were young our family was oblivious to the existence of youth soccer teams in our town. But we soon discovered that soccer played a key role in the social networking of both children and adults. I got a phone call asking me to put in an application for Bryce to play soccer. The parents were collecting these applications to submit together for a team of friends. And thus began our soccer journey.

 

I'm sure many of you have similar stories that include a group of childhood friends. Around our house are team pictures from those years with the sweet faces of young boys who are now young men. Because these teammates went to local schools, belonged to the same Cub Scout dens, swam at the same city parks, and attended local houses of worship, we managed to stay in contact over the years. While some teammates continued with soccer, others opted to switch to football in the summer before 5^th grade. As the boys grew and developed, some showed more athletic skills than others and tried out for select soccer teams. Eventually over the years that core group of friends splintered choosing different activities. The boys kept some of the connections they had created in those early soccer years and lost others.

 

When I was administrator of the soccer club and it came time for tryouts, the real nervousness for the girls' parents wasn't if their daughters would make a team, but if they would make the team of their friends. Friendship, rather than athletic skills or team strength, became the overriding factor. Girls would be devastated if their friends moved on to a different team, and some girls would opt for a less competitive team just to stay together with a group of girls. I would get phone calls from parents hoping I could intercede and get their daughter on a particular team that all her friends had made. I would hear the real anguish in their voices because they saw this exclusion as extending to their daughter's entire social experience. These parents understood that friendships may bend or break when one friend has a different schedule than another friend.

 

But with every new experience come new people. As our lives expand and shift, we lose contact with some friends and come in contact with new friends. Playing soccer offers both kids and parents the opportunity to meet new people and form bonds. While the boys began playing soccer with friends they saw every day in all kinds of social settings, they grew to play soccer with kids who came from outside the community. Their connection became solely soccer. Nevertheless some friendships transcended that single bond. Bryce had a friend from his Under-14 soccer team, who due to illness had to quit the team. Bryce moved to several different teams over the next few years, and then went to San Francisco for college. But he and his friend kept in contact. When Bryce transferred to our local state university his friend was already there, and they reconnected. Robbie has many teammates playing in colleges all over the United States and remains in contact with all of them even though they haven't played soccer together for several years. While soccer drew them together, true friendship kept them involved.

 

And what happened with those players from that first packet of applications?  Bryce remains in contact with several of those boys, and one has been a good friend all these years despite having only played soccer with Bryce that first year and then at U-18. While soccer formed the friendship, the endurance of that friendship came from sharing other interests. Throughout my own soccer journey I have made the acquaintance of people that I consider friends even if we don't converse regularly. I have also had the privilege of watching dozens of boys grow up into young men who continue to play soccer both at the college level and professionally. Sharing in their careers makes soccer more personal and exciting.

 

Friendships can spring out of any organized activity or even the most mundane experience. But we all cherish those first friends our children have. My favorite picture is one of Robbie's third grade class sprawling across the new colorful playground equipment at the school. I know each child by name and many of them I still run into today. We can't always maintain the purity of those early friendships, but we can be sure to memorialize them. When you get the team pictures ask each player to sign his or her name under their face and write out full names on the back of the picture. Take pictures with small groups of players so you can have memories of specific friends. When Robbie graduated from high school a friend's mother put in the year book a picture of four twelve year old soccer players smiling with arms across one another's shoulders. Next to this photo was a picture of the same four boys celebrating their senior year state championship in soccer. Side by side these pictures showed four boys enjoying their sport together over the span of six years. What an amazing tribute to friendship!

A few years ago Robbie had a soccer game in April against a long-time rival team. So the entire family packed into the mini-van and headed to the field. April in Wisconsin can be spectacular or foreboding. This particular afternoon it was the latter. Dark clouds crowded the sky, which had a sick hue of green. The air hung heavy around us and carried an electricity that threatened to discharge unexpectedly. But was no rain, thunder or lightning, so the game got under way. Naturally, within minutes of the kick-off, the clouds released their rains and the air let loose with violent claps of thunder. We rushed to our cars. For nearly two hours we were trapped in our vehicles waiting out nature's fury. It turned out to be one of the best days we ever spent together as a family. We played word games, talked about school, told jokes and generally became better acquainted. When the coach finally rapped on our window to tell us the game would continue, we all let out a collective "ahhh" of disappointment.

 

Making everyone in the family feel a part of an activity can be tricky. After all, most kids don't want to just sit on the sidelines cheering on a brother or sister. Finding ways to include everyone ensures that soccer time is family fun time. Keep a calendar in a public area that clearly indicates the soccer game schedule. That way there aren't any surprises which can lead to hard feelings. Let family members act as the game statisticians keeping track of your player's touches, runs, and goals, as well as team accomplishments. Use sideline time to have conversations about everyone's activities, share some corny jokes and make plans for after the game. Let the children who aren't playing choose an activity for the family to share later in the day or the next day.

 

Travel time can be family time too.  During short trips, throw out a topic and let each person give one piece of information. For example ask "What would be your perfect meal?" or "What are your three favorite movies?" On longer trips you can play trivia on a topic of someone's choosing. The person who gets the right answer gets to ask the next question. We once did soccer uniform trivia, where we had to declare the manufacturer of a professional team's kit. The boys giggled with delight as Bruce and I failed again and again to get the right answers! We also had a game box for longer road trips that included road bingo cards, magnetic art boards, and fun facts flash cards. While popping in a DVD or video game can whittle away a couple hours, they are isolating activities. So insist on some group activities on the road to get the family interacting. You can play the license plate game or the alphabet game which can open the door for some additional conversation.

 

Youth soccer doesn't just need to happen with the team. Play as a family at a local park or put some Pugg goals up in the back yard for some regular family sport. Just like you can play basketball "HORSE" in the driveway, you can play it with soccer. Share the fun with everyone in the family. Set up some cones and do a dribbling race with the winner getting to choose where to go get a treat. Play soccer tennis with a rope strung between two trees. Before a big game, have everyone in the family write a note of encouragement on the player's soccer ball. During dinner do a soccer rule contest.     

Families can design and set up a "Wall of Fame" to contain the various triumphs of sport, school, and church. Give each child a poster board to decorate, then fasten them to a hallway or family room wall and let the children decide what they want to display. You can occasionally take a picture of the wall to send to grandparents and other relatives so they can share in the pride. Don't limit the wall to just the exemplary efforts, but also to those things that show the spunk or creativity of a child. That's why kids should have a say in what goes up on the wall. You can create a new board each year on the child's birthday so that the wall gets updated. Then you can fold and store them away as a wonderful memory to discover years later.

 

 At any moment a family bonding time can arise. Just as we discovered that stormy day to be a wonderful couple of hours to connect, other soccer families can find those moments too.  Be open to recognizing when you can share these times whether it be at a fast food restaurant laughing over a slip on the pitch when you can all share your most embarrassing moments, or after practice when your player wants to shoot just a few more balls in the net and you can all join in. Soccer brings everyone together, so cherish those moments and find ways to enhance them. Let go of deadlines in order to extend the togetherness. Listen to your kids and follow up on what they say. Soccer talk can lead to family talk.

Last weekend I watched my youngest son's team lose a game 4-1 with two of the goals occurring within minutes of one another. The coach left the field first, looking grim, and the boys did their cool downs and then walked slowly across the field with their heads down. The goalkeeper's mother stopped to talk to me and then saw that her son was standing at the railing surround the field talking to his father. "Oh he's talking. I didn't think he would want to talk." We've all been there: the utter dejection of a horrible loss. And in those moments it's difficult to remember that this is all supposed to be fun.

But without the fun, there would be no way to get past the times when we feel let down, disappointed, frustrated, or defeated. It's the fun we experience either watching or playing soccer that keeps us coming back. When kids look forward to playing, to practice, to traveling, and to being with their team, then they are developing the attitudes that will get them over the humps. So how do we make it fun for our kids and, by association, for us?

First, be supportive. No matter what happens on the field, begin your conversation with your child with a positive statement. If kids feel that their efforts are being appreciated, they are far more likely to want to continue in an activity. After all, who wants to stop watching "SpongeBob" to hit the pitch if all you hear is what you're doing wrong. Being supportive also means showing that you're happy your kids are playing soccer. I know some parents just don't like soccer. We weren't raised on the sport, so it can seem confusing and occasionally boring. This is all the more reason to sit down together as a family and watch a game on TV together. Talk about which players have your child's position, watch how they play and cheer for a team. Watching a game together validates your child's choice for a sport and can be a great way to bond. Don't show your discomfort with soccer, if you have any, and develop an enthusiasm for the game. The most important thing is for your child to feel your pride, which will give them the joy they should feel.

Second, make going to soccer fun. Before a game, make it an event by blasting game song as you pull into the parking lot. Let your kids spray their hair with team colors or put on some face paint. Bring signs to the field cheering the kids on the team. Establish points for doing certain things well during practice, which can include listening and following instructions, not just soccer skills. After a certain number of points they can be redeemed for an ice cream or a fancy sports drink. If your child feels he or she is missing out on a favorite TV show to attend practice, maybe recording the show will help. If your child becomes reluctant to play or practice, make sure he or she goes to the scheduled event, but don't force them to participate. Let them warm up to joining in, but make sure they understand that they have a commitment to fulfill, so they have to at least show up.

Third, do fun things together as a team. Arrange a barbecue after a practice, have a parent-child soccer game, attend a local high school, college, or pro soccer game, arrange for the kids to be ball boys/girls or even to scrimmage on the field during half-time, hold a parents' practice where the kids watch the parents get coached, and do a team news email that let's everyone know what's going on and mentions each player with some tidbit. In youth soccer, teams can range from groups of close friends to a blend of far-reaching players. Finding ways to keep camaraderie alive will also keep fun alive. When kids feel included in the family which is their team, they find themselves enjoying the experience more. The same goes for the parents, so be sure to get all the parents involved as well.

Finally, don't pass up an opportunity to have fun. If it's raining, turn the umbrella upside down and see how full you can get it. If it's cold out, have a foot stomping, hand clapping fest. If it's a blow-out game, then cheer for things other than the goals your team isn't making. If the field is a mud bowl, then have a cleanest/dirtiest uniform contest after the game or the practice. Attitude is everything. The older your kids get, the more fun will elude you. So set the bar high and keep aiming for it. Fun will see you through the tough times, the low moments, and the set-backs. I love watching professional players during a hard fought contest and see the joy on their faces no matter the score. Sure they are working to pull a victory out of the moment. Sure they hate getting penalties or missing a goal. But they can't disguise it when they feel that rush of joy at a great pass, an amazing shot, a breath-taking save, or a well-placed tackle. That joy began when they first touched the soccer ball. We can help our kids find the same fun, and in so doing, we'll get to share in the joy.

Debt ceiling debates, taxes, entitlement programs, and campaign promises can't hold a candle to the politics parents experience in youth sports. From tryouts to playing time, to position on the team, parents witness the power of politics. We all have our war stories – the time our son didn't make the all-star team, the year our daughter sat on the bench, the season our son's team got demoted a level. We know how painful it is to experience the sting of a political action against our child or our child's team. I hear it on the sidelines all the time, "I'm okay with Ben not making the 'A' team because his skills aren't good enough, but I'm not okay with him not making the team because of politics."

           

Where does this insidious cloud arise? How do we get from having fun learning a new sport, to cut-throat decisions that impact our families with frustration and sadness? More importantly, how do we eliminate as much of the politics as possible? We need to look at three factors: coaches, club policies, and league decisions. There are solutions out there to improve the situation, but we first have to understand what creates them.

           

Youth sports could not exist without volunteer coaches. They provide the opportunity for thousands of youngsters to participate in and learn about a wide variety of sports with minimal initial expense. Most youth players can be part of a team for an entire season for $100 to $200 and sometimes even less. Many of these volunteer coaches are former players, but just as many can be helpful parents with little experience in the sport but lots of enthusiasm. Both types bring much needed support, management, and dedication to the players. Volunteer coaches are the bedrock upon which youth sports are built. In the early years of most youth sports, and in particular in youth soccer, coaches don't make decisions about who makes a team, playing time, and assigned position. Teams are usually randomly formed or built from a group of friends who register together. Playing time is mandated to be equal for all players, and in most leagues coaches are directed to rotate players through all of the possible positions. So the elements that breed politics aren't there. But trouble brews once some of these restrictions are either lifted or loosened for coaches. Now, volunteer coaches have power to make decisions that will affect kids' futures. That power translates to families as political.

Volunteer coaches often coach their own children, so conflicts of interest crop up continually further aggravating the impression of political bias. Even more frustrating can be that these same coaches hold positions of power in the clubs or league organizations that govern their behavior. Therefore these coaches can wield a great deal of power when it comes to our children. No matter how much expertise a coach may have, it's hard to overcome an impression of bias in parents' eyes when they feel it's directed towards their children. Just as each of us wants the best for our children and their future, coaches have the same desires. But they have more latitude to make things happen. So, no matter what their motivation, parents will read political intentions in their decisions.

           

Once kids make the move from playing recreational sports to playing select sports, issues of politics will arise. Now decisions that outsiders make affect our children directly. Parents who enjoyed a friendly and significant relationship with their club may find themselves and their kids pushed out. They feel betrayed by a club that they supported through many volunteer efforts, and sometimes, ironically, as volunteer coaches. But clubs feel the need to nurture winning teams rather than relationships because clubs need money to survive. Players won't flock to losing clubs, especially high paying players, so clubs need a winning reputation to draw members in. Their decisions can seem ruthless for a family that has been with a club for years, part of that club family, and comfortable in their routine. There is definitely a loss of innocence, and parents see politics behind their pain.

           

Even leagues can make political decisions that negatively impact our children. Some leagues will firmly limit the number of teams that can play in each division so that teams that have the same records end up in different levels. Since the factors to separate those teams go beyond win-loss records and competitors, they may seem fickle and therefore politically motivated. When leagues have board members whose children play on teams that appear to receive favored treatment, accusations of politics are sure to follow. When all-star leagues have coaches from teams that field more than the average number of players, then parents will cry foul, and whispers of politics will flood the sidelines. 

           

As youth players grow and improve, the distance between strong players and capable players will widen. As the rules and regulations on playing time and playing position relax, some players will benefit and some will suffer. Therefore, it's not always politics, but certain behaviors by authorities that can lend a political air to even the most innocent decision. One way to avoid personal involvement in important team decisions would be to hire professional coaches after a certain age level. But this diminishes the powerful and significant role volunteer coaches can play in a sport. Even volunteer coaches can be "professional" in terms of teaching the sport, behaving with integrity, and promoting good sportsmanship. Coaches should be licensed which will assure a minimum level of knowledge and skill. U.S. Youth Soccer Association offers a National Youth License and most state associations require that coaches be licensed through U.S. Youth Soccer, U.S. Soccer Federation, and the National Soccer Coaches Association. Additionally clubs may limit volunteer coaches from coaching their own children especially once rules that demand equality in play and position are relaxed.

           

Parents need to be aware that despite lectures about loyalty and willing acceptance of hours of volunteer work, clubs will drop a player if another one they perceive as a better player comes along. Clubs have restrictions on them for recruiting. So, you can watch and be diligent that your club is not violating those restrictions since that can negatively impact your child. Sometimes a player is recruited whose family has the means to pay the club dues and fees, but they get those waived by club in return for agreeing to play. That can really sting, especially if your family is struggling to pay the dues and if the "scholarship" player hops out of a late-model Cadillac when he comes to practice. There is little you can do to protect yourself from these situations except to understand that they happen and you have little recourse when they do. Additionally, when playing against clubs that play fast and loose with the rules, your team may be the victim. For example most youth teams up to age 12 are not to be "select" teams with handpicked players. But clubs looking to develop stronger teams at the older ages will begin that development early with younger players. Parents can quickly see the handwriting on the wall and gravitate towards those clubs with the hopes of giving their kids a jump-start on the process. It's a situation brewing with political overtones. Loopholes in the rules and passive enforcement allow these situations to continue, not to mention that many soccer authorities will argue; creating ""super"" teams allows the best development of top players. 

           

The best solution to keep politics at a minimum is to insure that those who have the power to make decisions don't have any conflicts of interest. Parents should not be deciding if their child, a relative's child, a child's friend, or a neighbor's child are worthy of being on a team. Parents and clubs should insist upon a clean process. So, even if a parent is coaching his or her child, another coach should be brought in to help with the try out process. If a parent serves on a board for a club or a league, that parent has to stay out of any decision that directly impacts his or her child, club, relative, neighbor or friend. As a parent you need to insist on this type of integrity in the try out process and in the coaching process. If you are sure that playing time issues and positions are decided in a political way, then you should probably look for another team for your child for the next season.

           

We will never wipe out the cloud of politics in youth sports. We get to enjoy a few years free of that stain and then we have to face the reality of how sports get promoted in America. But we can try to keep the innocence and joy of the sport alive for as long as possible. Don't make your opinions about political behavior known to your children. Talk to them about what they could improve upon to get on that all-important team, increase their playing time, or win the coveted position. After all, politics or not, each child must learn not to rely on sour grapes and the scapegoat of politics if they want to improve and get ahead in youth sports, school, jobs, or life. Use the opportunity to teach those life lessons and leave the politics to the politicians.

           

Every non-profit has been feeling the pinch in this economy. Trying to just break even gets trickier, so groups depend heavily on fundraisers to supplement fees. This past summer I have had neighborhood kids at my door selling something for their team, church, and/or school. I've bought frozen cookie dough, geraniums, smell-n-write pencils, wrapping paper, chocolates, cookies, and seeds, none of which I need. But I'll buy because my own children were once out there trying to raise money for their soccer team, and I was grateful for neighbors, friends, and family who bought what they didn't need. 

 

Most fund raisers require the kids to go door to door, collect orders, return weeks later to deliver the orders, and collect the money. The items are usually overpriced with a huge amount of the money collected going to the manufacturer. But I've also found some good fundraisers meaning they fulfill three important criteria. First, whatever is being traded for money gives something of useful value or fun to the purchaser. Second, the non-profit gets 90 – 100% from what they sell. Third, the fundraising requires minimal/easy effort on the part of the non-profit. I really like the type of product that can be distributed immediately upon payment. Even better, I like the type of fundraiser that doesn't require any product. So here are my suggestions in no particular order.

 

1.      Concession Stand – Professional and college sports venues offer non-profit organizations the opportunity to man the concession stands taking home a percentage of the stand's proceeds. You have to get on their lists and usually only adults can work since many of the stands serve alcohol. But if your club does a great job and shows up consistently with responsible workers then the club can count on several regular working dates.

-        Pros – minimal investment by your organization other than gathering workers and putting in a strong effort when on duty.

-        Cons – could be difficult to get enough dates and usually only adults can work.

 

2.     Gift Wrapping – During the holidays many malls, department stores, bookstores, and boutiques offer free gift wrapping for their patrons. They contract with non-profit organizations to provide the actual gift wrapping and allow them to solicit donations for the service.

-        Pros – no investment by your organizations other than perhaps printing flyers to encourage people to shop and wrap when you're on duty.

-        Cons – seasonal work and you have to arrange your dates well in advance.

 

3.      Penny (coin) collection – Select a day for your volunteers to set up tables outside of various locations such as groceries, big box stores, and malls. Have large containers available for people to drop in pennies. Anyone making a paper bill donation could receive some inexpensive item such as a lollipop, penny candy, or sticker. Advertise that your organization will be collecting pennies ahead of time so that hopefully people who have penny stashes at home will bring them to drop off.

-        Pros – minimal cost for the organization for flyers and penny candy.

-        Cons – need some good coordination with stores so that you can have permission for multiple sites. This is a hit or miss fundraising event. If you advertise the week before and have flyers up at the participating stores you could collect hundreds of dollars.

 

4.     Discount card – This you coordinate with a service which provides the cards. They will canvas local businesses, get them to agree to discounts and freebies, and print off the cards. They will usually give a discount to your organization for upfront payment for the cards or they will accept payment later at a higher rate. Overall the cost is usually reasonable, and most aggressive organizations can sell enough cards to keep the cost in the 10% of profit range. 

-        Pros – you can give your contributors their card immediately and profits can be fairly high. A strong seller since the product is like a credit card, it fits in people's wallets, and the discounts last for a year.

-        Cons – there is a cost risk and you do have to do door-to-door sales.

 

5.      50/50 Raffle – This is an easy to sell fundraiser that you can do at tournaments, games, or along with another fundraiser such as a car wash or bake sale. All you need is a roll or rolls of raffle tickets which you can buy at most office supply stores. Sell the tickets for a set price such as one for 50 cents, three for a dollar, or an arm's length for five dollars. Your organization keeps 50% of the money and awards 50% to the raffle winner. Occasionally the winner will donate his or her winnings back to your organization.

-        Pros – a quick, easy way to make some money.

-        Cons – not a huge fundraiser, but if you do it several times during a season could be a big winner for your club.

 

6.      Windshield Wash – Here's an easy variation on the car wash. Arrange with a fast food restaurant in your area to set up a windshield wash service during a busy time at the restaurant drive-through line. Have a group of volunteers stand at the beginning of the drive-through and offer to wash the customer's windshields for free, giving them the option of making a donation. Then mark the cars that want their windshields washed with a post-a-note and have several crews working to wash them after they order their food and before they pay for their food. You can have two washers per vehicle, one on each side, working quickly to wet down, squeegee, and dry off the windshields. Crews should practice before coming on line so they can work efficiently and not slow down the drive through.  

-        Pros – less difficult and time-consuming than a full car wash, minimal expense, and you don't have to coax anyone off the street to agree to your service.

-        Cons – could end up with everyone accepting the service and not making a donation.

 

7.      Dollar Dive – Set up a table outside of businesses which have constant foot traffic. For a dollar donation, people can "dive" into a fish bowl and select a ticket or ping-pong ball whose number relates directly to prizes. Most prizes will be penny candy, but some will be money ($1, $5, $10, and grand prize $20), and perhaps things related to your club (t-shirts, scarves, etc.). Check for any local ordinances which prevent you from offering money as a prize. In a variation you could have a box filled with small prizes that you can buy at a party supply store and let kids "dive" in the box to get a prize.

-        Pros – minimal cost for the tickets and prizes. You could even ask people who can't work the tables to donate $10 to purchases the prizes. You can have dozens of tables set up at multiple locations on a single day, improving your fundraising possibility.

-        Cons – need to coordinate with the businesses to set up your tables outside of their doors and you will need to do some preparation work to create your prize number sheet. Need a number of volunteers.

 

Each of these fundraising ideas can be combined with one another or with a tournament you are holding to add extra money. Other than the gift-wrapping, these fundraising opportunities can be done any time of the year in just about any circumstance. With some creativity, you can probably tweak these ideas to make them work even better for your group. Most of these fundraisers will produce in the hundreds of dollars, and since they don't rely on Uncle Charlie needing more magazines, you can do them multiple times with the same clientele. In fact, some of these might actually get people excited about donating and looking forward to being separated from their money, since these possibilities are fun and painless.

I'd forgotten how much fun it is to watch a soccer game through the eyes of a novice viewer. Over the years, most of us have had this experience as we indoctrinate grandparents, aunts, uncles, neighbors, friends and any other person willing to share a weekend game or two with us. Soccer takes on a whole new meaning when explaining "off side" or "penalty kick" to the uninitiated. The boys have played long enough that we've managed to introduce nearly everyone we know and love to the game. Most of our family and friends knew that eventually they would have to participate in a sideline visit no matter how much their preconceived notions about soccer warned them away. Eventually, as the boys traveled more, the soccer came to their town so that they could no longer politely refuse to come to watch. I admit I behaved something like an itinerant preacher for soccer, praising the sport with a zeal they couldn't refuse. I managed a few converts over the years, but I didn't win them all. Nevertheless, I loved the thrill of giving someone the informational tools to begin to enjoy the sport.

 

So imagine my delight a few weeks ago when the bus driver who brought our team to Huntsville, Ala. for a tournament sat down next to me and said, "This is my first soccer game." Now I had double the reason to enjoy the game: I could watch my sons play while opening the door to the world of soccer for my new student. I quickly established our starting point. She had children, but they had never played. She truly had never seen a soccer game, not even snippets of the World Cup. She had heard of Pele, but no one else. She knew players couldn't use their hands except for the goal keeper, and she knew they tried to score in the opponent's net. She didn't know how many players were on the field, nothing about their positions or responsibilities (except for the goal keeper), and she didn't know how long a game ran. This was going to be fun!

           

I need to stop for a moment in my story to point out two very significant benefits of teaching someone about the game. First, you need to really understand the rules and the nuances of soccer in order to explain them to someone else. I thank youth soccer for providing me with a strong base upon which to build my knowledge. Although I had lived in Europe and had been initially introduced to soccer in my teens, I didn't really care much about rules until my own children started playing. I was blind to the intricacies of soccer until I had the chance to slowly develop an understanding by watching youth games. Just as my kids grew up learning soccer, so did I. Second, you get the opportunity to invest yourself in the game beyond hassling the referees or pushing your child. Taking the time to see the game through the eyes of a neophyte affords you the chance to step back from deep involvement in the game and re-experience your own first introduction to soccer.

 

With an apprentice sitting next to me anxious to absorb all my nuggets of wisdom, the ball skittered over the goal line and the keeper set up for a goal kick. "Why's he doing that?" So I got to explain the two actions that can happen depending on which team sends it over the end line. She caught on pretty quick to the difference between a goal kick and a corner kick. Throw-ins were a cinch. Fouls were trickier because, well because they are occasionally subjective and therefore obviously wrong, so explaining them required some restraint not to editorialize. I left that to my fellow fans. I did get to explain about cards when she couldn't understand why some fouls were just fouls and some were carded. Again, I did my best to explain why one offense was treated more egregiously than others. Some were easier, especially when they were called against our opponents. When a player received a red card, she wondered why his foul was worse than any other foul. Since the card was given to one of our players, I actually had the same question. But I had to find the reason and make it plausible. "Our player took down the opposing player from behind without going for the ball. That was considered dangerous play and in the eyes of the referee warranted a red card. It was also an attempt to prevent the player from scoring a goal which is considered a tactical foul. Thank goodness it happened outside the box." I had to explain then about fouls in the box and PKs which was actually a good teachable moment and took my mind off of being upset about the red card.

 

Suddenly an opposing player went down while we were making a run to the goal. He crumpled, rolling on the field in agony, yet play continued. My student rose to her feet in deep concern and wondered aloud why no one was doing anything. I had to explain the tactic of injury. I assured her that the player was just fine, and collapsed in the hopes of slowing down or stopping our team's rush to the goal. Sure enough, when this fallen comrade was completely ignored, he leapt to his feet and rejoined his team's defense. Welcome to soccer! "How does the referee know when an injury is real or fake?" I felt like Master Po with my "Grasshopper" or Yoda with Luke Skywalker ("much to learn you still have. . . .") "Years of experience,"" I responded. The words were barely out of my lips when Robbie went down, and I jumped up. "What happened?" I had forgotten to add that mothers also know when it's real or fake. Robbie's injury let me explain the substitution rule because he went out and no one came in for him. "If they sub for him then he is out for the rest of the game. So they are going to see if he can come back in." She looked confused, "But if he's injured, then wouldn't an uninjured player be better?" That did sound reasonable. How to explain without sounding vain about my child? I opted for the "it's early in the game and the coach doesn't want to start subbing too soon." I don't think she bought it since again having nine players on the field while waiting for a possibly injured player to step back in didn't seem logical. She was learning, as we all have, that soccer often defies logical explanation.

 

My pupil also noticed in the waning minutes of the game that our team seemed to have more players up top. So I got to explain about 4-4-2, 3-4-3, and other formations that coaches choose. We had been using a 4-5-1 formation, so when we went to 3-4-3 the bus driver noticed the difference. And for once my reasoning seemed logical. We were behind and needed to score, so we put in three forwards and four midfielders to push for some goals. We lost the game, but the driver announced that she'd had a good time. So had I.

 

Parents should take every opportunity to educate themselves about soccer, which includes helping one another out. If your child stays with the game, you'll need to be able to keep up with the complexity that grows at each level. Roughness of play increases, so we have to temper our upset when our little ones get knocked down. Defenses improve, so we have to accept that we won't be seeing those long runs down the field by our darling player. Speed of play increases, so we have to adjust how we watch play unfold. The field gets larger, the goals do too, the substitutions get tighter, the travel increases, things are always in flux, and so we have to get smarter and adjust. Youth soccer gives us the opportunity to all be neophytes and to all become experts. While I would never discount the joy of watching our children play, I also would encourage parents to talk to one another in order to learn the game. The more I understand the more I love the sport. I partially exercise that enthusiasm by sharing what I know with others and engaging in conversation about the game whenever I can. I'm certain my sons would cringe hearing some of what comes out of my mouth, but I'm also certain they'd be pleasantly impressed with how much their mom knows. I can't coach the game, I certainly can't play the game, but I can engage a fellow traveler so we can educate one another about our journeys.  How else do you get those insights that make the trip special?

They sit there, the behemoths of the soccer field, tempting anyone who has energy and imagination to take a few chin-ups from the cross bar. They look as solid and stable as Stonehenge. What could go wrong? Plenty actually. Movable goals are responsible for over 120 emergency room visits a year, thousands of minor injuries, and, sadly, since 1979, 36 deaths. Very few soccer clubs use permanently anchored goals since these do not allow for resizing and reconfiguring fields to get the maximum use from the minimum area. Moving goals allows the overworked areas in the goal mouth to rest and rejuvenate. But with the ease and convenience of movable goals comes some neglect. Anchoring the goals makes them less flexible since pulling up the anchors can be a chore. Some clubs opt for sand bagging the back base of the goal, but this doesn't offer as much stability as the auger and stake anchors that manufacturers recommend and more and more states are requiring by law or by commerce act.

This last week, "Zach's Law" was signed by Governor Pat Quinn of Illinois requiring proper anchoring of all movable goals. Presently there are close to half a million movable goals in use in the United States. Although the ratio of deaths to goals is small, most of the deaths involve children between 9 and 11, a tragedy that can be easily prevented. Illinois' Law joins California, Arkansas (Jonathan's Law), New York, and Wisconsin in implementing acts that enforce proper anchoring and have the power to levy fines when not. Movable goals weigh between 150 and 500 lbs. and fall for a variety of reasons. Some tip because they are placed on uneven or too soft a surface, some tip because of the temptation of performing a chin-up on the cross bar, some tip because of wind gusts, and some tip from being knocked during a game. No matter the cause, the bones and skulls of children are no match for that amount of weight toppling from that height.

           

In 1995 the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission adopted and published guidelines for movable goals. (http://www.odsl.org/docs/home/goal%20safety.pdf) The guidelines are comprehensive and the same guidelines incorporated by states into their laws. They are also the same guidelines endorsed by U.S. Youth Soccer Association. Unfortunately the USCPSC has no enforcement capabilities, so these guidelines must be adopted and followed by the organizations they affect in order to be effective. Since so few states have given these guidelines legal teeth, I encourage you to print off the guidelines and provide them to your soccer club, school district, church, and youth organizations, anywhere there might be goals. Educate both parents and children about goal safety including not to use goals as a climbing wall or a chin bar. The guidelines include a warning sign that organizations can print off, duplicate, laminate and attach to the goals. When goals are to be moved only adults should do the job. Kids naturally want to pitch in, but the danger of a tip over makes this a task best left to grown-ups. 

           

In addition you can lobby your state legislature to adopt a law that gives power to the safety guidelines. In this age of partisan squabbling, this is an issue that all politicians should be able to get behind. There is minimal financial impact on the organizations affected other than to purchase sufficient and proper anchoring, unless they violate the law, in which case fines can go from $1,000 to $10,000 depending on the type of offense. Truth be told, we shouldn't need a law or fines to make sure that the equipment our kids use is safe for them. In most cases, educating organizations about the dangers of movable goals and the ways to prevent these dangers should be sufficient. But a law does get the attention of anyone affected by the law, so in the end it can speed along the process of making products safer and stronger. And for the few stubborn souls who don't think anchoring is necessary, it provides the means to compel compliance.

           

The best thing you can do as a parent is to make sure your kids understand the power that goals possess. Make sure they don't use the goals as gym equipment. Don't be shy about telling children you see hanging or climbing on goals to get down. Even when anchored, the laws of physics still apply.   If enough weight is exerted on the top of the goal, it can tip on the fulcrum of the front posts. So educate your kids to respect goals, to use them as directed, and to let their friends know about the dangers. If we work on proper anchoring, proper respect for the equipment, and proper movement of the goals, we should be able to prevent not only deaths, but injuries as well. Zero goal accident deaths should be our target. It's an achievable objective we should all aspire to. It won't bring back 10 year old Zach Tran, Jonathan Nelson, or Hayden Ellias, but it honors their lives by protecting the futures of other 10 year olds, one of whom might be your own.

Road Trip! Two words that can inspire equal parts of joy and terror. Any soccer parent knows the inevitability of a road trip each soccer season and possibly even several times during a season. Before I even thought about soccer, I grew up taking road trips. Every summer we would pack into the family car and take off for six weeks traveling the highways and byways of America. There were seven of us. When I saw "National Lampoon's Vacation" I relived these family trips complete with boxy station wagon, picnics at rest stops, and hours of bickering. We rarely stayed in motels, opting instead for camping or staying with relatives. My dad created a super tent by sewing together two smaller tents. Every morning after breakfast we had the routine of rolling up the sleeping bags, disassembling the cots, sweeping out the tent and then folding it precisely so that it would fit into the canvas duffle bag from my dad's time in the Navy. My mother cooked for seven of us on a Coleman propane two burner stove and washed the dishes in bucket. Even if we did stay in a hotel we kids all slept in the same room – three in one bed and two in the other. As the only girl I found it less and less ideal as I entered my teen years!

 

But I do have the privilege of boasting that I have driven and stayed in every state in the continental United States. We visited tourist attractions, would-be tourist attractions, and questionable tourist attractions.

 

With this background, I comfortably fell into the routine of soccer road trips. Each one had its unique joys and its unique terrors. There's the trip where the truck in front of me fishtailed into the median strip during a snow storm. And there's the trip where Bryce and Bruce sat for four hours dead still on the Indiana freeway wondering if they would get to the tournament on time. Once following a tournament in Memphis, we took a small detour to go to Metropolis, Illinois, the "home" of Superman. We've had flat tires, wrong turns (even on a tour bus), and mechanical breakdowns. We have rescued players from cars stranded on our route and our boys have been rescued when we were stranded. I am increasingly grateful for my AAA membership which has saved us with a tow or brought us a spare tire or, back before GPS, provided us with Triptiks so we could navigate and learn where the chicken who played tic-tac-toe resided.

 

Packing the car for a soccer road trip didn't require any camping equipment, but as the quality and quantity of electronic devices increased we had to be sure we had the proper cables, plug-ins, movies, games, music, headphones, and controllers. I can tell you the location of Best Buys and Radio Shacks throughout the Midwest because invariably I would hear from the back seat, "You've got to be kidding," and know that we needed to find some accessory as quickly as possible or I would have to deal with petulant teenagers. My admonishment to "Look out the windows - that's what my brothers and I did" was met with eye rolls. The Alphabet or License Plate Games could not compete with "Weekend at Bernie's" or "Mario Kart." I had to be sure to have enough snacks, drinks and fruit. We needed blankets, pillows and books. Of course, we also needed soccer gear, which we double and triple checked was in their bags. But no matter how many lists we made and how often we checked, we couldn't do anything about Bryce leaving his gloves in the hotel room.

 

Hopefully the boys will remember the best times of these trips. Some towns we revisited over the years, but no trip was identical. We took teammates with us on some trips, drove straight through on other trips, and made a vacation of it on still other trips. The car we took on all these road trips still functions, although just barely. The check engine light remains lit for a non-essential part and we keep the car within the immediate tri-county area of Milwaukee so our mechanic is never far away from attending the patient.

 

Soccer has tons of advantages, one of which is the road trip. Parents may not always want to hit the road because trips can be hours of boredom punctuated by bursts of fun. However, you can make sure the fun happens with some planning and a willingness to act spontaneously if a special moment arises. No matter how many trips you end up taking, cherish them, because I can guarantee that they will be part of important memories.

Even though most youth soccer players have a break from the sport for some of the summer, it doesn't mean that players can't be developing in other ways. Take some time this season to enjoy soccer matches on TV. You'll find yourself getting excited about certain teams and players. That enthusiasm can be a driving force to get you and your kids more invested in the sport and to help your kids improve their game through example. Use some of the best competition this summer to raise the bar both on playing and enjoying the game.

               

Now the entire process has been thrown into a tizzy requiring a replay of the games among the three teams contending for a spot in the finals.  Worse several dozen girls were thrown into an ugly situation.  The girls on the team who allowed the goal were put in the position of being asked to do something unethical by their coach, the girls on the "winning" team were put in the position of moving on to the finals knowing that it wasn't directly their skill that advanced them, and the girls on the other teams in contention to advance to the finals were denied the honest opportunity to advance.  Peripherally there are parents, officials, club board members, and state association staff who have been tainted by this action.  We can talk about other factors which have affected the outcomes of games such as bad refereeing or weather delays, but these factors come from within the agreed upon parameters of the game.   We need to accept, begrudgingly sometimes, that soccer games have variants which we can't control but can ultimately affect the outcome of a game.

               

We all know the heartbreak of having a goal called back because of a questionable offside call or a player receiving a second yellow card for flimsy reasons leaving her team a player short.  But these are part and parcel of a human game where subjectivity can be carefully managed but still affect the results of a game.  We tolerate mistakes of human nature because we recognize those mistakes can harm our results sometimes and then boost our results other times.  We don't like it when we lose because of a bad call or a small field, but we know that the next game may have factors that benefit our team.

               

Given the limitations of perfection in any game, at least we all know that the rules attempt to insure fairness.  Maximum ages of players are established and enforced rigorously with birth certificates and player passes, referees have to achieve a certain level of expertise to officiate, coaches must be licensed appropriately for the age level of their team, rules have been written and approved for play, equipment must adhere to standards, and all players must be registered with their club or have appropriate guest player certification.  State associations and governing agencies such as U.S. Youth Soccer Association carefully set forth rules and guidelines for play in youth soccer.  But beyond those official guidelines are the societal ethical guidelines we all understand exist.

               

We can recognize fairly easily when we are operating outside of the boundaries of ethics.  As much as the coach wanted to help his fellow club team, he absolutely knew that doing anything proactively would not be proper.  Asking his players to participate in this behavior put them in a terrible quandary:  Do they support their coach (and club) or do they stick by their own moral compass?  I observed a game once where the coach realized that his team would go through to the finals win or lose, but that the club's archrival team would not advance if his team's opponent won.  So he directed his players to score two own goals to assure the victory of his opponent and thereby seal the doom of his archrival.  I observed attempts to falsify age documents, to play kids who were not on the roster by having them use a rostered player's pass, and to engineer goal differentials.  Most of you have probably observed some improprieties in play, and some of you and/or your children may have been involved in some improprieties.  It's not a great position to be in.

               

As parents we need to reinforce that our kids shouldn't participate in an activity, even one directed by a respected adult, which is outside of the rules of the game.  We also need to reinforce that winning at any cost isn't the goal of soccer.  It's difficult when you can get so close you can taste victory and yet see it slip away.  And it's tempting to help that victory along with questionable assistance.  But we have to resist that urge as parents, coaches, and players.  You can't be truly triumphant when you know that a win was achieved outside of the rules everyone agrees to follow.  Our children need to learn that integrity is the real victory in life.  As a society we are programmed to be winners.  We want the best grades, the biggest house, to beat the car at the light, to get the best deal on a TV, and to send our kids to the top university.  We find it difficult to be content with our normal success and to accept losses along the way.  We attach our self-worth to winning, forgetting that wins don't insure satisfaction.  Living our lives with honor and enjoyment brings the real triumphs of contentment and pride.