Posts Tagged football players

5 Steps to Improve Your Football Coaching

Your football coaching skills can be improved in many of ways. Autobiographies of renowned players and managers, dedicated football coaching books, football magazines, and watching football on TV can be beneficial, but for a coach, they are not always convenient methods to explain techniques or tactics when the whole team is trying to watch the screen, or read a book.

Online training courses are designed to provide you with the football techniques and coaching skills you need in order to help your players to progress. Utilising video clips, and other tried and tested methods, you can follow the training programmes that other teams use, and gain more knowledge about soccer coaching. If you are serious about becoming a football coach, perhaps you will decide to embark on a nationally recognised football coaching qualification.

Your players will want to develop their technical skills which will involve them becoming more aware of the “right” run, or pass, or action, as well as improving techniques and getting fitter. Soccer drills can be used to simulate events and situations in a game.

Maybe as a coach you can learn about the sports science aspects of football, and impart your knowledge to your players. As technology and science have improved, the knowledge of the human body and how it works has increased. This means that new techniques, diets and training regimes that can help improve players’ performance can be implemented. Scientific analysis can help football players to improve their fitness and well being.

Physiotherapy and injury prevention are also important, and will help players to learn the advantages of being and staying fit, stretching before and after training, and generally looking after their bodies. Strength and resistance training can also be used to help improve speed and endurance.

As a football coach, you will need to be able to mange the different age groups and amend you coaching and expectations to meet the ability of each group. Expecting 5 year olds to be able to last 90 minutes on a full pitch is unrealistic, while 16-18 year olds need to be able to play for this long. Each age group will be concentrating on different techniques and aspects of the game.

As well as focusing on football, children shouldn’t neglect other aspects of their life for football at an early age. Forcing reluctant children to play football is unlikely to work, and they could end up resenting the game

The psychological aspects of the game shouldn’t be ignored either. What about players who have long term injuries, or who aren’t good enough? How do you help those who are going through a bad spell, such as a striker suffering a goal drought, or a goalkeeper lacking confidence? As a coach, you will need to be able to deal with the issues and the reactions from parents and siblings.

Those involved in modern football coaching can call upon a wealth of resources from physical training to mentoring, as well as traditional soccer coaching techniques. If you are involved in soccer coaching at any level, why not learn from the professionals?

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Football Scholarships – 5 Common Mistakes

There is a proven system that will help get you recruited to play college football. Season after season the high school athletes that sign scholarships made the right decisions that placed them above the competition. There is also a wrong way to go through this process and it is the main reason you see talented football players sitting at home in the fall after they graduate.

Here are 5 common mistakes football players make when getting recruited:

  1. Only wanting to play big-time DI football. Some athletes let their ego get in the way of evaluating their true talent. There is nothing wrong with wanting to play at a top level school but these athletes are very few, less than 1 in 100. If you are not one of these, don’t limit your choices and shut the door on other opportunities.
  2. Believing everything a college coach says. Football recruiting is a game. The competitive nature of  the sport makes for a live or die situation for coaches because their job often depends on it. They will string athletes along until a better player shows up right up until signing day. You as an athlete need to play the game on the coaches level and determine the true level of interest from a college coach.
  3. Getting a recruiting letter and thinking schools are interested. Thousands of letters are sent out by each college. These letters do not initially mean anything. What you choose to do with them from there is up to you. Some athletes will receive dozens of letters from a football program but never receive so much as a phone call from a coach. The process needs to be initiated by you to increase success.
  4. Not willing to play other positions. Coaches often look less at what position your currently play and look at you more as an athlete that can fit into their system of play. Too many athletes think they are only a receiver, not a defensive back, or only want to be a tight end and not an offensive tackle. You must be willing to play wherever and whenever to increase your opportunities.
  5. Giving up during the recruiting process. The recruiting season can be tedious, stressful and hard on your confidence. Those athletes who make it are not afraid to get turned down by colleges. They keep on searching and fighting for recognition from colleges even if they have not yet been rewarded with an offer.

You can play football in college and earn a scholarship. You have to be willing to do whatever it takes and take a no-holds-barred approach to your recruiting. You have worked too hard up to this point to let it slip away because of mistakes you make off the field towards recruiting.

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Football Scholarships in America – What You Should Be Doing Now to Get a Scholarship

There is no doubt that America loves football. Football scholarships in America are sought after by thousands of football players from around the country and even from foreign players hoping to make it to the United States. To make sure you give yourself an edge over your competition, here are a few things you should be doing.

1. Keep A Journal

Start keeping a record of all your accomplishments in football. You should write everything down as it happens. Believe it or not, you may simply forget about that night you ran for 150 yards when you are writing your athletic resume three years later. Football scholarships in America are very competitive, you need to track all the times you rose above your competition on the field.

2. Get Video Footage

If you have a great game, talk to your coaches about getting a copy of the game on film. Most likely a member of the coaching staff is responsible for game footage.

3. Get Evaluated

There are evaluation camps available in most parts of the country. Try to get to one and get evaluated. These evaluations are very nice to have when you start contacting college coaches.

4. Know Your Vitals

It’s important to know you key athletic measurements. What is your maximum bench press, squat, 40 yard dash, vertical jump, etc. It’s better to have these vitals before a coach actually asks you about them.

As I mentioned earlier, thousands of high school players are your direct competition for football scholarships in America. Once you the four items mentioned above accomplished, it’s time to start contacting college coaches. Most coaches don’t have huge recruiting budgets, so hearing from prospective players is a welcomed event for most college coaches.

Don’t let the football scholarships in America opportunity pass you by. Take control of your own recruiting process now and make it happen for you.

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