What are the Basics?

What are the “basics” in soccer? I hear a lot of parents and coaches refer to the basics of soccer as a player’s positioning, ability to take throw-ins, understanding set pieces, and off-sides. These are not the basics to soccer. These are good things for players to know, but they are not the basics or as important as many other areas of the game. It is our culture of thinking that we need to know all the rules before we are able to play the game, but soccer is very different than most games, especially for young kids. Soccer, in sometimes its best form, is played with very little structure, rules, positioning, officiating, or actual fields with set boundaries. The game can be played without these "basics," and it is played without them all over the world, every day by many future stars.

So what are the basics… the basics are the areas that help your child become masters of the soccer ball. The basics help your child command what the ball does in reaction to contact with their body. In any direction and at any time, the basics give your child the ability to do whatever he or she wants when playing the game. These are the basics and the most critical areas of the game for your child to learn when they start playing.

Through playing the game, the players will learn the other aspects and rules, but those areas should not be given more, or the same amount of attention, as the real basics and fundamentals of the game. If an entire practice is dedicated to improving the players’ abilities to do throw-ins or work on set pieces, then the coaching staff lost a day of practice to help their players learn the basics. I am not saying a coach should not teach these areas of the game, but all of them can be incorporated into skill and game activities to give players opportunities to learn them without them distracting or taking away from focusing on the real key developmental areas of the game.

What are the real basics of the game? In short, they are the ability to dribble, control, and strike/pass the ball. If your child struggles dribbling the ball under control or cannot receive a ball coming to them on the ground or from the air, the player’s understanding of how to play right back is a very distant second in the list of priorities of what the player needs to learn.

A strong understanding of the game, without the tools to play the game, makes a player a very educated fan of the game. Like a fan, the player will spend more of their time watching the game rather than actually playing the game when they get older. When basics are taught from a young age, and the basics are continuously reinforced each day at training, the players will have the ability to apply their knowledge of the game as they get older. They will have the tools to execute what they know to do on the field when the ball comes to them.

If you need another sport example, what are the basics of playing quarterback in football? Are the basics the ability to read different coverage? Is it to be able to recognize a blitz and change the play at the line of scrimmage? Now, I am not a “football guy” but I would have to assume that the basics for a quarterback are proper foot work and throwing technique. Why? It seems a quarterback’s ability to read coverage would not help him much if he could not throw the ball to his intended target accurately and with speed.

This is the same for soccer. A player may know exactly where the ball should be played, but without the ability to play the ball there accurately and with good pace, the “knowing” to do it does not help much when the ABILITY to do it has not been learned. You see this all the time with coaches of older teams. The players know they should change the point of attack, but they lack the skills to do so effectively. The players cannot strike a ball accurately with pace across the field to a teammate and the teammate’s first touch is not clean enough to keep possession. Add any type of pressure, and an already fragile ability breaks down quickly and the players will struggle to execute.

Ironically, coaches of younger teams, become frustrated because they are trying to teach the “basics” of a complex tactical system of play and the kids are not getting it. While they spend hours doing walk throughs about where players should stand on the field and who passes to who, the players are not spending that precious time learning the actual basics. When the players get older, they will cognitively have the ability to understand the complex nature of how the game should be played, but they will not be able to actually play it. It’s a vicious cycle of frustration for everyone!

When you use the term "basics" in regards to youth soccer, you should be referring to the ability to dribble, control, and strike the ball. These are the basics, and these need to be learned first alongside the rules of the game. When coaches spend their time trying to make young kids play the game in a way that resembles what it looks like when adults play it, the game tends to look better cosmetically, but the kids are really only following instructions, and they do not have a true understanding of what is actually happening. It is like a teacher teaching to a test. Memorize these things and repeat them when I tell you to. That is not learning (or teaching).

Finally, there are very few absolutes in soccer. There are very few “never do this” or “always do that” on the field. Unlike other sports that coaches have more control of the game and can tell players exactly what they should do, soccer is very fluid and extremely situational with a ton of variables constantly changing. The “right” answer is different in every situation, for every player, for each system of play, and for each game. For example, coaches like to tell players, “Never play it in front of your goal?” This is not true in all situations and a strict rule like this limits a player’s ability to make decisions based on the situation. It is cliché now to say the game is the best teacher, but it can be with the coaches’ guidance. As players gain experience playing the game, they use all the information from their successes and failures to figure out what works and what does not for them. They become independent thinkers who can make choices during the game.This happens over time and coaches have to help facilitate the process and be patient enough to let it happen.

Instead of focusing on the wrong basics and trying to make the game more appealing for adults to watch, focus on the basics that will give the kids the tools to play the game for the rest of their lives. When you focus on the true basics of the game with youth players, it is much easier for them to learn everything else needed as they grow and be able to utilize that knowledge when they play.