THIS year has been the first year since I was 16 years old that I have not been involved with a football team at senior level. It’s my first full break away from the game and I must admit I have not missed it too much at all.
It has given me an opportunity to go and watch my kids play more. It has also given me the chance to watch more football in general, especially underage games.
It is so satisfying to watch underage teams play because there is no blanket defence to be seen and you witness young players developing as footballers and it provides you with an insight of what the future potentially holds.
The other thing that I have noticed more about attending these underage games is the noise that some parents make from the sidelines.
Every single club has these parents watching from the sidelines and a lot of the time it can be very off-putting for their kid on the pitch. They don’t see it themselves and they don’t think that they are doing anything wrong, but they are doing more harm than good.
Put yourself in the boots of a young footballer trying to do their best on the field during a match, and all they hear is their parent constantly making unnecessary noise from the sideline. It could be arguing with a decision that the referee made or worse still, shouting instructions to their kid of what to do and what not to do. This is a dilemma that underage managers and coaches are faced with all the time: the expert parent who is telling their kid to do something different from what they have been instructed to do by management.
The same type of parent will often follow their own kid around the pitch as they switch sides and constantly be in their ear. What exactly is it they think they are achieving here?
Perhaps, they believe they are keeping their kid on their toes and helping them along their developmental pathway as a player but they aren’t.
If they really want to play a part and have a say, they should get involved in the underage coaching around their club and see how difficult a job all the underage coaches really do have.
From my own point of view, looking and listening to some of these expert parents, most of them have limited playing experience themselves, if any at all so what is it that makes them know it all?
We all want our kids to develop into good footballers, we would be wrong to think otherwise, but they can only do this properly by listening to the instructions of their coaches and by carrying what they do on the training field into games.
I’m certainly not suggesting that every coach is right in what they say, as we have all had coaches with limited knowledge, but I’m a believer in everyone having at least one valuable nugget of information that might indeed help a person along in their career.
Another message that often comes from the parents - and this is one that really gets under my skin - is encouraging all the players to pass the ball until their own kid gets their hands on it. This message then changes from pass, to go. Surely in a team sport, the message must be the same for all but obviously not?
Maybe they think their kid has developed that bit faster than others on the pitch and they want to see them do all the scoring, but this type of message sends out the wrong signal altogether.
Good coaches recognise how advanced a player is and they will always encourage the standout players to play with their head up and pass the ball when it’s on.
That’s what they are trained to do as most underage football is two-touch football and it also helps develop the other players in the team.
Parents I’ve noticed don’t think this way though, but they must realise the potential harm that they could be doing.
Killeavy have a policy on this type of behaviour, as I’m sure most clubs do, but implementing it is not always easy as our coaches are volunteers and don’t tend to enjoy the conversations with a parent about asking them to be less vocal from the sidelines.
This sometimes creates unnecessary tension and it takes away from the coaches’ main role. One thing is for sure, though, the know-it-all parent that makes all the racket from the sidelines doesn’t go unnoticed, and really gets under the skin of the coaches and other parents there to enjoy our games and positively encourage their players and children.
