| Watching Soccer to Elevate Game Awareness |
By Roni Mansur
It’s a Sunday afternoon, and the Central Square bar in Cambridge, Mass., is packed to the rafters. An hour before the game begins, a line about 40 people long is waiting to get in. These fans aren’t here to watch the New England Patriots, the Boston Red Sox or the Boston Celtics – they are here for the finals of soccer’s European Championship between Germany and Spain.
So can this be true? Have Americans finally started watching soccer now? What impact will this have on soccer in this country?
Not so fast. A few days ago, this same bar was barely half full for the semifinals of the same tournament. During the group stages, it would have been a treat if there were more than five people watching a game. I would know, as I had the luxury of taking three weeks off from work to watch all the games.
But we are seemingly heading in the right direction, albeit slowly.
Of the 13 players in the U-12 girls travel team I coach, only four watched the finals. Two of them watched a few other games, but most of the other girls were not interested, even though I had provided them with a TV schedule and tried to entice them by offering a prize of a new soccer ball for the player who filled out a tournament bracket and had the most correct results.
I imagine this scenario is similar for most youth soccer teams around the nation. Of the 31 top-level games showcased at the European Championships, only about 10 to 20 percent of our youth players watched a maximum of maybe three or four games. This leads to the inevitable question:
“Do our young soccer players watch enough soccer to elevate us to the next level as a soccer-playing nation?”
The American Soccer Player
Most of our young soccer players are suburban youth who start playing as early as age 4 or 5. Most typically play on local in-town or travel teams. The better players move on and play for clubs, high schools and colleges. Our top youth players play a lot of soccer, as often as six times a week in structured settings of practice or games. However, our youth players spend little, if any, time watching top-level soccer. This developmental path leads to certain generic strengths and weaknesses in our player development.
In general, the strengths of the American soccer players are that they are athletic and technically sound and they have a terrific work ethic and team mentality. Brian McBride is the quintessential American player. His bloodied face during the 2006 World Cup conveys the image that most outsiders have of the typical American player – tough, strong and willing to play his heart out for the team.
On the flip side, two criticisms that often are leveled at most American players are that they lack creativity and tactical or game awareness. These development opportunities can be traced to two root causes. The first is the absence of “street soccer” in the United States. Recently, discussions at various levels of U.S. youth soccer have examined how promoting and incorporating the “street soccer” concept into our coaching philosophy can help address some of these deficiencies.
The other root cause is that most American soccer players and coaches do not watch enough soccer. This puts American players and coaches at a disadvantage compared with their counterparts around the world. They lack an understanding of the subtleties of the game and the tactical and creative edge that competitors from the top soccer-playing nations develop.
Why is watching soccer important?
Coaches have a limited time to teach the game – two to three hours a week of practice for a youth travel team, and a maximum of 10 hours a week for top youth players. Soccer players take their game to the next level by practicing on their own, by playing soccer with their friends outside the team environment and by watching the game.
Top players of any sport spend a lot of time during their formative years following a team or other top players. LeBron James and Kobe Bryant grew up watching Michael Jordan, who in turn watched Larry Bird, Magic Johnson and Dominique Wilkins. Tom Brady grew up idolizing Joe Montana. Steven Gerrard, the current Liverpool captain, was an avid Liverpool fan who grew up watching the team play at Anfield whenever he could. He watched not only Liverpool stars such as Dalglish, Rush and Barnes, but also players from rival clubs such as Bryan Robson of archrival Manchester United. He watched old videos of all-time greats – Maradona, Pelé and Cryuff – and classic games like the 1986 World Cup final between Argentina and West Germany. All these experiences helped mold Gerrard into a world-class player.
Watching soccer regularly – especially having an idol or following a team – serves to inspire a young athlete to work harder in order to improve. This leads to more touches on the ball, whether in the backyard or with friends on a side street. In addition, these young players try to mimic, and eventually master the skills and techniques of their idols. Who better to demonstrate these skills and techniques than the best players in the world? Few coaches can demonstrate these skills and techniques as well as the top players. For example, Cristiano Ronaldo has taken Figo’s stepovers and cuts to a new level by executing them at a phenomenal speed and adding other subtle touches to beat defenders almost at will.
Watching their idols play also helps young players understand the mental aspect of the game. They can learn how to concentrate and keep focus throughout a game and how to keep their cool after being brought down by a bad tackle; they can maintain focus after making a mistake. (Unfortunately, some of the leading soccer players don’t control their emotions well or contrive to cheat and deceive by diving. These actions serve as a bad example for younger players, but that is a topic for another discussion.)
Finally, by watching the game, young soccer players can start processing and internalizing the subtleties of the game, such as how to break an offside trap with a through ball from midfield to a forward making a late penetrating run behind the defense. They can learn tactical nuances and build game awareness by learning how to play in different scenarios. When they are up 1-0 on a wet pitch or down 2-1 with 15 minutes left to play, they will know how to respond without having to depend on their coach for instructions or guidance.
The key point is that we must develop soccer players that can think critically about the game. As coaches, many of us can run practice sessions focused on specific tactics and game situations. But unless players can think critically and independently in the midst of a game, these sessions won’t be effective in terms of solidifying tactical understanding and building game awareness in young soccer players.
As a nation, Americans play soccer mostly with our feet and our hearts, but not with our brains. We need to develop soccer players who start engaging their soccer brains more. Watching more soccer can help fill this missing ingredient in the makeup of soccer players.
Current State and Gap Analysis
In the past 10 years, U.S. soccer has made great strides. The Men’s National Team has gained respectability around the world and is a strong second-tier team. We don’t have the same level of consistency and talent as the top European or South American countries, but the U.S. team is capable of upsetting a top opponent. The Women’s National Team remains one of the top teams, although nations such as Germany, Brazil, China and North Korea appear to have caught up.
Still, most of our youth players don’t watch soccer frequently and don’t follow a team. Chart A illustrates our “current state” and the “gap” with the other top men’s teams around the world.
The bottom axis (x-axis) depicts how much soccer is watched by the youth players in a particular country, ranging from players who are not interested in watching soccer (level 1) to avid fans (level 5).
The left side axis (y-axis) depicts the overall soccer playing ability of selected nations. Each nation was placed into one of three tiers (top, second and third) based on FIFA rankings.
There are two key takeaways. First: Players in most countries watch more soccer than our players, regardless of playing ability. Second: most players in the top-tier nations such as Brazil, England and Germany watch a lot of soccer. The implication of this second point is huge. As a nation, we have a solid structure in place to foster the development of soccer. However, until we address and overcome this issue of getting our players to watch more soccer, (and move up the chart as indicated by the dashed arrow) we will be unlikely to produce enough top-class players to compete consistently with the top-tier countries.
What are the challenges to getting American players to watch top-level soccer?
Soccer has grown in leaps and bounds in America, but it still is not considered a mainstream sport. It competes with at least four other major team sports – American football, basketball, baseball and ice hockey – in addition to other sports like lacrosse, track and field, tennis, field hockey and swimming. Furthermore, our youth’s attention and time is also taken by video games, television, the Internet and other interests such as music and theater (not to mention a packed scholastic schedule).
Finally, a sentiment remains prevalent among most Americans that soccer is too slow and boring. There aren’t enough goals. Even most of our college-level soccer players aren’t interested in watching more than highlights or goals.
How can we get youth players to watch more top-level soccer?
Existing conditions can be leveraged to persuade players to watch more top-level soccer. The first boom generation of soccer players – those that played high school and college soccer in the middle to late 1980s – have children who are of soccer playing age now. Those parents can promote soccer in their communities and encourage kids to watch soccer.
Technology also can play a role. Text messaging, the Internet and social networking websites (e.g. Facebook) can be effective viral marketing tools to reach out to and influence youth soccer players.
Looking to the future
At the youth level, interest and popularity of the game continues to grow, translating into marked increase in the number of youth soccer clubs, training camps and tournaments. The overall level of coaching has improved through the efforts of U.S. Soccer, NSCAA and the various youth soccer organizations. The youth structure is being refined continually, and the recent development of the academy league is a step in the right direction.
As we move forward with these initiatives, we also should try to increase the number of players who watch the game on a regular basis. This will help develop players who have that “edge” and instinctive “feel” for the game. It will enable us to develop players who read the game better, and as a result, make better decisions as individual players and as a team. It will take more of our soccer players to the next level.
Editor’s Note: Roni Mansur is a nationally licensed coach in the United States and has been coaching soccer at the youth level since 1999. A former collegiate player at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, he is the Coaching Director at Cambridge Youth Soccer, an organization with more than 800 players and 70 coaches, and coaches a U-12 girls travel team. In addition, he is a Manager in the Strategy and Operations practice at Deloitte Consulting LLP.. This article originally appeared in the March-April 2009 issue of Soccer Journal.
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