Soccer IQ

[Unregistered]

US kids should have the ball at their feet much more. Pickup, futsal, coaching u-littles, recess, organized games + practices. or just juggling and shooting against the garage door or in the basement all help improve touch and skills.

Organized games are not the time to try new, unproven stuff. A huge skill is knowing when and how to utilize various moves and styles of play. For example, playing out the back when the team is unable to do so, or in the waning minutes of a close match even if the team is capable, is not intelligent soccer.

The earlier comment about a coach encouraging decent play in "meaningless" youth games needs context. What makes sense in a U10 game may not at U15. Top clubs and coaches know the difference

[Unregistered]

At what age should the mental part begin to click?

My 12year old is a very good player, has excellent foot skills, powerful leg, fast, athletic, physical, aggressive, avg. size for age, decent weak foot, etc. Recently moved up to U14 and the larger 11v11 field and most teammates and opponents are at least a year older.

Should I be concerned if he has had a difficult time adjusting or is it likely that it's just the natural progression. It seems that he was having trouble with making the right decisions. When to pass, when to dribble?

Not overly concerned, just wondering if anyone has been through similar.

[Unregistered]

At what age should the mental part begin to click?

My 12year old is a very good player, has excellent foot skills, powerful leg, fast, athletic, physical, aggressive, avg. size for age, decent weak foot, etc. Recently moved up to U14 and the larger 11v11 field and most teammates and opponents are at least a year older.

Should I be concerned if he has had a difficult time adjusting or is it likely that it's just the natural progression. It seems that he was having trouble with making the right decisions. When to pass, when to dribble?

Not overly concerned, just wondering if anyone has been through similar.

He would have been better off playing at his own age and focus on combining his technical skill with developing his tactical awareness. Work on furthering is first touch and transitions. Sometime you have to take off your proud father's hat and put on your thinking hat. Bigger is not always better.

[Unregistered]

He would have been better off playing at his own age and focus on combining his technical skill with developing his tactical awareness. Work on furthering is first touch and transitions. Sometime you have to take off your proud father's hat and put on your thinking hat. Bigger is not always better.

Disagree. We are far too concerned about age groups. It has become a crutch or excuse when teams or players struggle.
He/she should play at whatever level they can compete.
We do not hold back students who excel above their grade, why would we do that at soccer?
Please do not play the safety card.

[Unregistered]

Is it better to have a kid with good soccer IQ but loses possession of the ball 95% of the time due to not being fast and aggressive enough? Meaning they are a good passer and knows where to be on the field. Or a very athletic player who is learning soccer IQ? Can a kid ever learn soccer IQ or is it one of those things you are just born with? I always thought that's what coaching is for, to teach players those things, but you cant teach athleticism.

[Unregistered]

Is it better to have a kid with good soccer IQ but loses possession of the ball 95% of the time due to not being fast and aggressive enough? Meaning they are a good passer and knows where to be on the field. Or a very athletic player who is learning soccer IQ? Can a kid ever learn soccer IQ or is it one of those things you are just born with? I always thought that's what coaching is for, to teach players those things, but you cant teach athleticism.

Based on your description, I would argue that his soccer IQ is maybe not as high as it might first appear. Ability to be in the right place at the right time aside, to me, a big part of demonstrating IQ is the ability to read the opponent's skill sets, abilities, tendencies and style of play. If a kid is losing the ball 95% of the time, that either means he is unable to read these things, or is capable of reading them, but willfully ignores them because of an overinflated sense of his own abilities / unwillingness to recognize his own limitations. That type of player can be very frustrating to others on the team, and can easily become a divisive force if they are not consistently corrected and held accountable by both the the coach and their teammates.

I don't care how skilled you are. If you are losing the ball all the time, that means you aren't reading the game and can't recognize that a faster speed of play is needed in order for your team to have a hope of maintaining possession. Unless they show a willingness to respond to coaching, give me an athlete who will listen to coaching over a kid like that.

[Unregistered]

Disagree. We are far too concerned about age groups. It has become a crutch or excuse when teams or players struggle.
He/she should play at whatever level they can compete.
We do not hold back students who excel above their grade, why would we do that at soccer?
Please do not play the safety card.

By the description of the player..yes..he is in over his head.

[Unregistered]

At what age should the mental part begin to click?

My 12year old is a very good player, has excellent foot skills, powerful leg, fast, athletic, physical, aggressive, avg. size for age, decent weak foot, etc. Recently moved up to U14 and the larger 11v11 field and most teammates and opponents are at least a year older.

Should I be concerned if he has had a difficult time adjusting or is it likely that it's just the natural progression. It seems that he was having trouble with making the right decisions. When to pass, when to dribble?

Not overly concerned, just wondering if anyone has been through similar.

What made him successful on his last team? Was it primarily an athletic advantage, skill advantage, or an advantage in soccer intelligence? If his success was due to athleticism and opportunities that came from that, then he should expect to struggle when that advantage goes away. If his "thing" was that he anticipated plays well and could process the information of the game faster than his peers, then he should catch up pretty quickly as long as he has the skill to play at faster pace.

Moving a superior athlete up to the level where he's forced to play smarter and develop the skills to handle the pace can either make the kid a much better player or crush him completely. I think it's almost that binary. My recommendation is to have him watch lots of soccer and work like crazy on his technical ability as he tries to catch up.

[Unregistered]

Is it better to have a kid with good soccer IQ but loses possession of the ball 95% of the time due to not being fast and aggressive enough? Meaning they are a good passer and knows where to be on the field. Or a very athletic player who is learning soccer IQ? Can a kid ever learn soccer IQ or is it one of those things you are just born with? I always thought that's what coaching is for, to teach players those things, but you cant teach athleticism.

No, They need to have both to compete.
Many kids make smart quarterbacks or point guards, but don't have enough game.
But soccer is a bit different where if the kid has smarts, he can find space to maybe, just maybe, gather enough time to play the ball efficiently, but it's grasping at straws here.

[Unregistered]

Is it better to have a kid with good soccer IQ but loses possession of the ball 95% of the time due to not being fast and aggressive enough?

Framed as an either/or outcome, any player that has a deficit in the technical, tactical, physical, and emotional pillars of the game is a development failure, whether that's a function of the player, coach or parent or some combination of the three is an open question.

[Unregistered]

At what age should the mental part begin to click?

My 12year old is a very good player, has excellent foot skills, powerful leg, fast, athletic, physical, aggressive, avg. size for age, decent weak foot, etc. Recently moved up to U14 and the larger 11v11 field and most teammates and opponents are at least a year older.

Should I be concerned if he has had a difficult time adjusting or is it likely that it's just the natural progression. It seems that he was having trouble with making the right decisions. When to pass, when to dribble?

Not overly concerned, just wondering if anyone has been through similar.

This seems to be a tough transition for some kids at this age, but they'll adjust in time. My U13 player, who was U11 last year and was bumped up the extra age group due to the birth year change, really struggled moving to 11v11 and a larger field this fall. The extra year of play that almost all of his teammates had under their belts and the maturity that comes along with it seemed fairly pronounced, especially regarding soccer IQ. My kid seemed a little lost out there with so much space, plus the extra players, wasn't quite sure where to play the ball the few times it came to him, and ended up contributing very little to the team.

He's now playing with the same team indoors, smaller fields and fewer players, and he looks like a completely different player. He seems to know his role, has great movement on and off the ball, and has had much more time on the ball. With this has come a gain in confidence, which was at an all time low at the end of fall season, and his teammates are now passing the ball to him.

To me this shows that he just really wasn't ready for the jump to 11v11 and definitely needed at least another season playing 9v9 in order to progress his soccer IQ to a higher level for a smoother transition to 11v11. Hopefully, he'll progress enough over the winter that he'll be more prepared for the bigger field come spring, and that his confidence will transition from indoor to outdoor, as well.

As someone else mentioned, this is the problem with specified age groupings, rather than grouping by how far along players are on the development path (within a reasonable size range, my kid could easily pass as a U12 player). Everyone is aware that kids develop at different rates, yet they are not being grouped that way. Could be a huge reason some of the kids lagging a bit in development, or who had a later introduction to the sport, end up quitting.

[Unregistered]

He would have been better off playing at his own age and focus on combining his technical skill with developing his tactical awareness. Work on furthering is first touch and transitions. Sometime you have to take off your proud father's hat and put on your thinking hat. Bigger is not always better.

There was no choice. He qualifies to play U12 based on his age, but not his school grade, there is no U13 division. The only option is U14.

[Unregistered]

This seems to be a tough transition for some kids at this age, but they'll adjust in time. My U13 player, who was U11 last year and was bumped up the extra age group due to the birth year change, really struggled moving to 11v11 and a larger field this fall. The extra year of play that almost all of his teammates had under their belts and the maturity that comes along with it seemed fairly pronounced, especially regarding soccer IQ. My kid seemed a little lost out there with so much space, plus the extra players, wasn't quite sure where to play the ball the few times it came to him, and ended up contributing very little to the team.

He's now playing with the same team indoors, smaller fields and fewer players, and he looks like a completely different player. He seems to know his role, has great movement on and off the ball, and has had much more time on the ball. With this has come a gain in confidence, which was at an all time low at the end of fall season, and his teammates are now passing the ball to him.

To me this shows that he just really wasn't ready for the jump to 11v11 and definitely needed at least another season playing 9v9 in order to progress his soccer IQ to a higher level for a smoother transition to 11v11. Hopefully, he'll progress enough over the winter that he'll be more prepared for the bigger field come spring, and that his confidence will transition from indoor to outdoor, as well.

As someone else mentioned, this is the problem with specified age groupings, rather than grouping by how far along players are on the development path (within a reasonable size range, my kid could easily pass as a U12 player). Everyone is aware that kids develop at different rates, yet they are not being grouped that way. Could be a huge reason some of the kids lagging a bit in development, or who had a later introduction to the sport, end up quitting.

Spot on, and I know some girls who were forced to quit due to the age change. They just didn't have enough time at 9v9, and missed the cut-off by days. Jump to 11v11 put them out of their league, literally, and they couldn't keep up.

I advocated a one year 'buffer' for those in that age group so they could address this issue.

[Unregistered]

There was no choice. He qualifies to play U12 based on his age, but not his school grade, there is no U13 division. The only option is U14.

Excuses?

[Unregistered]

Is it better to have a kid with good soccer IQ but loses possession of the ball 95% of the time due to not being fast and aggressive enough? Meaning they are a good passer and knows where to be on the field. Or a very athletic player who is learning soccer IQ? Can a kid ever learn soccer IQ or is it one of those things you are just born with? I always thought that's what coaching is for, to teach players those things, but you cant teach athleticism.

Soccer IQ changes as the field size and numbers, opponents and play styles change. Thus soccer IQ is absolutely learned. Players learn it at different rates and achieve various levels of it limited by their ability to process all the moving parts on the field and their own abilities.

Athleticism and fitness can be improved with training, but will be upper bound by genetics.

As to your question of which is netter, I think you have it wrong. I know plenty of athletic soccer players who are fast, but whose skill and soccer IQ are terrible and cause turnovers all the time (even on top premiership teams). I also know players who aren't as athletic, but never turn over the ball because they had to develop skill and vision to compensate for being slower than opponents. Then again, I also know slow players who don't have skill or vision. They'll be lucky to play high school soccer...