Your First Practice Your first practice sets the tone for your upcoming season, and it is important to create a proper first impression. Often in a new coach's rush to get players out on the field, you might forget something as basic as introducing yourself and your assistants. Take a little extra time to prepare for this session, and be ready when the players arrive.
Establish Rules and Set Priorities In general, the players and parents will know your specific team rules and policies because you've explained them during a pre-season meeting. If this is the case, simply provide a quick review to remind your players and any parents who stay what is expected. For logistical reasons, many coaches prefer to hold their organizational meeting in conjunction with their first practice session. If you do this, remember two things: Meeting before the practice can leave young players bored and restless. Meeting after the practice could lead to problems with parents rushing off early without really listening.
Getting to Know Your Players Learn Everyone's Name. At the recreational level, it is common for coaches to know only a few of their players by name or face. The same is true for the players who will tend to cluster near the teammates they know and ignore the ones they don't know. Your goal is to get everyone to learn everyone's name as quickly as possible.
At the youngest age levels, you might want to bring stick-on name tags for players and coaches. Some teams have even made inexpensive scrimmage/practice shirts using plain cotton T's and fabric markers to draw on a name and number. At the very least, keep a 3x5 "cheat sheet" listing the player's name and 2-3 identifiers (e.g. Caitlin C./long blonde ponytail and orange shorts). Repeat the names as often as possible throughout the practice, and have your players do the same, switching partners and teammates for various activities. Repeat this process as necessary through the next several practices.
What to Watch For As you learn your players' names, you will also learn a little bit about their personalities, skill level, and knowledge of the game. Younger players (U-12 and below) should not be locked into set positions, so it's not as important to find out where they prefer to play. Please realize this is a frequent area of disagreement among coaches, and players vary considerably. For every shy pumpkin who freaks at the slightest change, there's a ferocious feline ready to take on any challenge. Adjust to your young players' needs to maximize their individual success.
With older teams, you might find certain players have definite preferences and strongly resist being put into unfamiliar positions. Recognizing these preferences early can help you plan ahead, whether you want to keep the player in a favorite position or help the player adjust to a new position.
You also need to make an early assessment of your team's overall abilities and each player's individual skill level. This will help you plan practices that are most effective at developing skills and an understanding of the game. The reality of most recreational teams is that you will find a wide range of interest, ability, and experience. You will need to challenge the talented while reaching out to the newbies as well. There are a number of ways to address mismatches without causing problems during practice.
Recruit Helpers If you were unable to get volunteers to serve as assistants during your pre-season meeting, it's not too late. Parents of young players tend to stay at the practice field, and you should quickly round up 2-3 helpers from the crowd. These parents can tend to minor injuries, watch over discipline problems, help retrieve balls, or serve as assistant coaches. Problems can occur when your assistants don't share your philosophy or focus only on their own child. If you're not sure you have the right folks for the job, wait a few practices before officially naming your assistants.
Effective Ways to Handle Subs If you have a lot of players on your roster, it can be a nightmare to organize who is going in when. In addition, you can be constantly interrupted with questions about "when do I go in, coach?", which will distract your attention from the game. With all of these distractions, you can forget to put a player in - or lose track of the time to sub. This is a sure-fire way to get lots of players and parents upset with you.
What works? One of the easiest ways to handle subs is to get a dry-erase board (about $10 at your local Walmart or equivalent) and a wind-up kitchen timer. Put all of your positions (G, SW, RD, CD, etc.) on the board, in the formation that you intend to use. Then, divide the game into sub-in periods. Your league automatically may divide the game into quarters - and only allow subs at quarters (except for injury). As players get older, subs usually can be made during throw-ins in your favor, or on goal kicks or kickoffs.
For teams that are playing 11v11, it works well to divide the game into 6 sub-in periods (players may tend to call them "quarters" anyway, so you may have 6 "quarters"). This means that you have 66 available time slots. Divide this by the number of players on your roster, and you will find out the number of periods that each player can play (assuming equal playing time). With 18 on your roster, you would end up with everyone playing 3 time slots - and 12 players getting to play 4 (18x3=54 +12 = 66). You know that, at any given time, you will need to have 7 folks sitting out, right?
Next, put the names of the players - and the period in which they will be playing - by each position shown on the board. Then, at the bottom, put down who is out for each (this acts as a check on your positioning - as you will be short if you have somebody in 2 spots at once, etc.). Generally, you will want to have your strongest players in at the start and end of each half, so this likely will play a large factor in your list of ins/outs. The list of ins/outs serves as a good balance to double-check that you don't have one player in two slots at the same time. It also serves as a good check to make sure that you have not shorted anyone on intended playing time. Even players as young as U-9s can be trained to use this system. It has lots of benefits, as they can see at a glance that others have to sit out (or get rotated into positions that they don't always like). In addition, because they know where they will be playing next, they can get warmed up and ready to play - and can watch the area where they will be playing to size up the opposition.
If you have unlimited subs, you will need to set your wind-up timer for about 1 minute less than full time for the quarter (to allow for problems in getting subs in), then put the timer on the bench where the players can see it. With 7 on the bench, somebody is going to be telling you/them when it is 2 minutes or so until time - and getting everyone ready. The list of ins/outs makes it easy to call off your players who are subbing out - and to count noses to see if you have 7 on the bench.
You will want to adopt a rule to get a player who is replacing somebody who is staying on the field - but moving to a new slot - to remember to look for where that guy is going so that he can tell him when he replaces him. In addition, you will want to try to always have a reasonably good player on the bench during any sub-in period (so that you can make a rapid substitution in a critical slot if you have an injury). This list of available players can prove to be very handy, as players have been known to awaken at 7:00 a.m. with a high fever when your team has an 8:00 a.m. game. It becomes pretty easy to change the board at the last minute by dividing up the available extra slots among those in the "bench pool".
Many coaches put their lineups on regular notebook paper and keep them in a 3-ring binder and this can prove to be a useful resource for times when the coach has some personal crisis, and needs to grab a quick line-up at the last minute. It also can be useful to go back and look at lineups which worked, and those which didn't, to see which players seem to work best together and to spot areas where a particular player may need more development. Even if you choose not to publicize your lineup in advance, for fear of hurting feelings if you need to make mid-game adjustments, this method of filling slots is still useful - and the windup timer is lots easier to set (and keep track of) than a watch.
