Maybe coaches DON’T need a new practice plan for every practice

I’ve got a healthy skepticism of coaches who imply they’d be able to develop the next Messi while few other coaches could handle it. This quote puts it best:

But there’s no doubt Brian Kleiban, the subject of RSD podcast guest Mike Woitalla’s latest Q-and-A, has a lot of good things to say about coaching. And here’s one:

In my opinion, less is more. Figure out your core exercises to teach the basic fundamentals and team style of play. Work them over and over and over again. Demand perfection and execution in training. Once it becomes clear on consistent basis that they have mastered it individually and collectively, you can add layers of complexity. Until then, stick to the same things. Most coaches just jump around, all over the place with new content to fool everyone that they can run different sessions each and every day. The players never improve in any facets of their games this way.

Note that this runs directly counter to what we’re all told in the USSF license sequence. We’re supposed to plan out a curriculum, like we’re science teachers or something. Teach a new topic each time, reinforcing it with every step from warmups to scrimmage.

And for most coaches, that’s a royal (and wholly unnecessary) pain. For one thing, coaches end up spending half the practice explaining a bunch of new drills. For another — when was the last time you mastered something in 15 minutes?