Scatman wrote:What does it mean when a kid of seven is "on the books" at a football club?
When I was groing up, I never knew anyone ever get a sniff at big clubs.
My seven year old son loads quite a few kids that are "on the books" at one club or another. I've seen them play, they're not great.
What exactly does being "on the books" mean? Is it just a case of the clubs mopping up pretty much every kid that can kick a football or is there more to it than that?
twosips wrote:Your wife's best mate is 15? :/
Ted Hughes wrote:(They were coached to appeal for everything though. I asked the lad that myself & he confirmed it, & he's a rag ). .
Goaters 103 wrote:Ted Hughes wrote:(They were coached to appeal for everything though. I asked the lad that myself & he confirmed it, & he's a rag ). .
Very true.
In my younger days I played at a fairly decent representative level; we were actively encouraged to work on the linesman/ref and appeal for everything strongly and confidently, regardless of whether you thought it was your ball or not.
Other gems taught to us included when defending a corner, step on the toes of the opponent in an emergency or pull back by the shorts rather than the shirt, as these are rarely seen by officials. I think the one useful piece of coaching we got was to our keeper during pen shoot-outs, who was advised to stand still for every penalty, as in any shoot-out, at least 2 of the 5 go right down the middle. You watch most shoot-outs and that's still generally the case, but I digress.
Agree with Ted on the kids who were pushed forward. Case in point was Nicky Summerbee. I played with/against him many times and he was at best average for our age group. I could name 50 odd players alone who were far superior in natural ability and talent at ages 10-18 when I encountered him, so god knows how he eventually made it. Fair play to him for using the advantages he had, but Nicky wasn't even close to the sort of player you'd have thought could make it, even in his late teens.
john68 wrote:Whilst from the clubs' point of view, I see the necessity of this childrens' "meat market", I have never been totally happy with the recruitment methods of many clubs.
Too often, families and kids are sold a dream, built up at a tender age...and then unceremoniously dumped when they are unwanted.
I hope our new campus is a little more caring about our child workers.
Hazy2 wrote:john68 wrote:Whilst from the clubs' point of view, I see the necessity of this childrens' "meat market", I have never been totally happy with the recruitment methods of many clubs.
Too often, families and kids are sold a dream, built up at a tender age...and then unceremoniously dumped when they are unwanted.
I hope our new campus is a little more caring about our child workers.
Attend a County Cup Game in youth football. 2 things you will see, The standard will be poor bar one or two kids, who have been released back.And the big winter coats from Blackburn, Rochdale, Oldham, Everton still have a big network of scouts clubs looking for the scraps, we do not want or have had and turned away. On the other side the FA say they want small sided games on small pitches. no winning or losing ! Manchester FA and Cheshire and every other local FA are fighting to keep grass roots football alive, it is crazy.
Pro clubs are fishing at every decent game on a Sunday from toddlers to under 16's, Most Youth teams at the lower clubs are made up of Kids CITY have had.
Football is eating itself at youth level, SKY BT Lap it up. Eccles Sunday league one the oldest and best run with great patrons behind it. Go summer football next season, No winter football ?
Ted Hughes wrote:Hazy2 wrote:john68 wrote:Whilst from the clubs' point of view, I see the necessity of this childrens' "meat market", I have never been totally happy with the recruitment methods of many clubs.
Too often, families and kids are sold a dream, built up at a tender age...and then unceremoniously dumped when they are unwanted.
I hope our new campus is a little more caring about our child workers.
Attend a County Cup Game in youth football. 2 things you will see, The standard will be poor bar one or two kids, who have been released back.And the big winter coats from Blackburn, Rochdale, Oldham, Everton still have a big network of scouts clubs looking for the scraps, we do not want or have had and turned away. On the other side the FA say they want small sided games on small pitches. no winning or losing ! Manchester FA and Cheshire and every other local FA are fighting to keep grass roots football alive, it is crazy.
Pro clubs are fishing at every decent game on a Sunday from toddlers to under 16's, Most Youth teams at the lower clubs are made up of Kids CITY have had.
Football is eating itself at youth level, SKY BT Lap it up. Eccles Sunday league one the oldest and best run with great patrons behind it. Go summer football next season, No winter football ?
I don't agree with the 'no winning & losing' idea but I fully agree with the idea of kids playing on small pitches.
DoomMerchant wrote:Ted Hughes wrote:Hazy2 wrote:john68 wrote:Whilst from the clubs' point of view, I see the necessity of this childrens' "meat market", I have never been totally happy with the recruitment methods of many clubs.
Too often, families and kids are sold a dream, built up at a tender age...and then unceremoniously dumped when they are unwanted.
I hope our new campus is a little more caring about our child workers.
Attend a County Cup Game in youth football. 2 things you will see, The standard will be poor bar one or two kids, who have been released back.And the big winter coats from Blackburn, Rochdale, Oldham, Everton still have a big network of scouts clubs looking for the scraps, we do not want or have had and turned away. On the other side the FA say they want small sided games on small pitches. no winning or losing ! Manchester FA and Cheshire and every other local FA are fighting to keep grass roots football alive, it is crazy.
Pro clubs are fishing at every decent game on a Sunday from toddlers to under 16's, Most Youth teams at the lower clubs are made up of Kids CITY have had.
Football is eating itself at youth level, SKY BT Lap it up. Eccles Sunday league one the oldest and best run with great patrons behind it. Go summer football next season, No winter football ?
I don't agree with the 'no winning & losing' idea but I fully agree with the idea of kids playing on small pitches.
What size does say a U-9 side play on? In the US we play 6v6 and a pitch about maybe 55x40 but with a goal area that's fucking massive due to it not being really differently proportioned.
Goals are like 6.5 ft high which means you get a team that can smash it into the top of the net and the little keeper can never hope to do anything but get an errant hand to it as it smashes in.
Sadly in the US we favor winning over actually knowing how to play the game and it is the ruin of youth soccer as you say.
Cheers
Ted Hughes wrote:DoomMerchant wrote:Ted Hughes wrote:Hazy2 wrote:john68 wrote:Whilst from the clubs' point of view, I see the necessity of this childrens' "meat market", I have never been totally happy with the recruitment methods of many clubs.
Too often, families and kids are sold a dream, built up at a tender age...and then unceremoniously dumped when they are unwanted.
I hope our new campus is a little more caring about our child workers.
Attend a County Cup Game in youth football. 2 things you will see, The standard will be poor bar one or two kids, who have been released back.And the big winter coats from Blackburn, Rochdale, Oldham, Everton still have a big network of scouts clubs looking for the scraps, we do not want or have had and turned away. On the other side the FA say they want small sided games on small pitches. no winning or losing ! Manchester FA and Cheshire and every other local FA are fighting to keep grass roots football alive, it is crazy.
Pro clubs are fishing at every decent game on a Sunday from toddlers to under 16's, Most Youth teams at the lower clubs are made up of Kids CITY have had.
Football is eating itself at youth level, SKY BT Lap it up. Eccles Sunday league one the oldest and best run with great patrons behind it. Go summer football next season, No winter football ?
I don't agree with the 'no winning & losing' idea but I fully agree with the idea of kids playing on small pitches.
What size does say a U-9 side play on? In the US we play 6v6 and a pitch about maybe 55x40 but with a goal area that's fucking massive due to it not being really differently proportioned.
Goals are like 6.5 ft high which means you get a team that can smash it into the top of the net and the little keeper can never hope to do anything but get an errant hand to it as it smashes in.
Sadly in the US we favor winning over actually knowing how to play the game and it is the ruin of youth soccer as you say.
Cheers
Similar size pitch here but with small goals & a size 3? Ball I think.
They actually asked kids what they like/dislike about playing football, & the general idea was they enjoyed playing football, the game itself, playing with their mates etc, not competing for trophies or having people shout at them.
Hazy2 wrote:john68 wrote:Whilst from the clubs' point of view, I see the necessity of this childrens' "meat market", I have never been totally happy with the recruitment methods of many clubs.
Too often, families and kids are sold a dream, built up at a tender age...and then unceremoniously dumped when they are unwanted.
I hope our new campus is a little more caring about our child workers.
Attend a County Cup Game in youth football. 2 things you will see, The standard will be poor bar one or two kids, who have been released back.And the big winter coats from Blackburn, Rochdale, Oldham, Everton still have a big network of scouts clubs looking for the scraps, we do not want or have had and turned away. On the other side the FA say they want small sided games on small pitches. no winning or losing ! Manchester FA and Cheshire and every other local FA are fighting to keep grass roots football alive, it is crazy.
Pro clubs are fishing at every decent game on a Sunday from toddlers to under 16's, Most Youth teams at the lower clubs are made up of Kids CITY have had.
Football is eating itself at youth level, SKY BT Lap it up. Eccles Sunday league one the oldest and best run with great patrons behind it. Go summer football next season, No winter football ?
DoomMerchant wrote:
Its a pretty shouty affair here. Dipshits living vicariously through their kids in the most annoying ways. Some of the women are even worse. Nothing as bad as baseball dads but it's challenging.
The academy my son is at teaches the game itself but we are struggling to attract the best kids because though we pass the ball almost always better than any team we play we have you get kids and little end product so we get beaten by older kids quite handily and it has parents quitting in droves which is a shame. The parents have no idea how good these coaches actually are and get seduced by other local clubs selling the FUD of how shite we were at the last tournament typically were our 8 year olds lost to 10 year olds who look like they shave every other day.
Football at a youth level in the US is only interested in athletes and giant sized cunts. The coaching is also abhorrent. I might as well be out there for most of these "club" sides that coat an arm and a leg and travel around with like 5 teams at each age group flaunting their team politics and affiliations with Nike or some MLS club. It's crap.
Cheers
Dameerto wrote:I'm in my mid forties now and most of my memories of playing football for the school team at an early age (IE before ten) were of parents shouting sometimes aggressively. If that shit stops (or has stopped) then it can only be a good thing.
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