Feeling Part of the Team by Nigel Reed

Maintaining Team Spirit is often a big challenge for any coach, particularly of junior players who have not reached the maturity and don't have an understanding of the importance of the team. One thing that is vitally important is to make everyone feel as though they are contributing. Sometime this is not as easy as it sounds, because you will find the lesser skilled players feeling that they are not contributing because of their lack of ability. This puts added pressure on these players because they will feel the frustration that is felt by the more experienced and better players.

It is so important to get the team to function as a unit and there is no doubt that if you can instill a good team spirit between your players, the team will function much better as whole.

One method that I use and continually utilise is to take a good player aside and explain the importance of team spirit and his role as an experienced player in developing team spirit. So I ask the player "What is the outcome you want for the team?". More often than not the answer is along the lines of "I want the team to play to its best and to win more games than we lose"

With the outcome in mind it is far easier to explain to the experienced player the importance of their role as a mentor to the lesser skilled players and with their help, they will have a far greater impact on the team than just their individual performance,

If a senior player in the team takes on a mentoring role, the inexperienced players generally respond well and start to feel more involved as a team player.

Being a mentor for lesser experienced players basically comes down to leading by example and showing encouragement to players that are struggling. When a player makes a mistake, a reaction of abuse or negativity from other players rarely helps the confidence or demeanor of the offending player, where as simple words like, "Come on Johnny, don't worry we all make mistakes lets just try harder not to make any" will help the player through to wanting to play better and as a consequence probably will.

Also it is up the experienced players to ensure that other players adopt this kind of attitude and ensure that everyone feels part of the team and want the team to succeed.

Here is a gem that for you to send to your players as food for thought

Zvzn though my typzwritzr is an old modzl, it works vzry wzll - zxczpt for onz key. You would hardly think that with all thz othzr kzys functioning propzrly onz would hardly bz noticzd, but thz onz kzy out of whack szzms to ruin thz wholz zffort.

You may say to yourszlf, 'Wzll, I'm only onz playzr. No onz will noticz if I don't do my bzst'. But it dozs makz a diffzrzncz bzcausz to bz zffzctivz a tzam nzzds activz participation by zvzry onz to thz bzst of thzir ability.

So thz nzxt timz you think you arz not important rzmzmbzr my old typzwritzr.

You arz a kzy playzr...

Nigel Reed is a qualified soccer coach and has had great success using the Coerver Soccer Coaching system combined with motivational and team organization
See his review of Coerver by Clicking Here
http://TheSoccerHelper.com

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