Winning is good but never everything. Youth soccer players are individuals who are constantly developing, want to having fun, be successful, participate within a positive and harmonious environment to enable them to be happy and successful.
For a player to be successful they must develop their personal soccer skills, team skills and other skills associated with the game and life, such as respect for officials, coaches, opponents and parents, because without this the chances of success are substantially reduced. It is also very important for individual players to be successful within their play, which means they must have teammates and opponents at a similar skill level to themselves. Play against or with other players who are substantially less skilled and the game quickly becomes boring or frustrating, play against players who are substantially more developed then the game quickly becomes demotivating and frustrating with the players quickly becoming inclined to want to give up the sport.
Soccer is a fantastic game for youth, where they have freedom to make decisions and mistakes, there are not many other sports that enable this level of personal decision making during the game and success.
Over recent years the Leadership of Soccer Coaching in the USA has encouraged a model that is focused onto creating an environment for learning that is appropriate for the different growth and development stages for children to young adults using the fundamentals above as its foundation. This environment is called the Academy Model. Lee Mt Vernon Soccer Club is a promoter of the Academy model along with some of the best clubs in the USA.
Why the Academy model? - In an established academy there is a roster of players with sufficient numbers to be able to field at least 3 teams on Game days. One team is fielded to compete at a level where the other players are some of the best players in the country. They have developed to a very high level of skills in all areas. Not many players really enjoy playing at this level, because it is very fast, mistakes are punished very quickly and it is very physical. Even though most parents would like their children to have all these skills and play at this level, it is unrealistic. Putting them into this environment or expecting them to have the skills to play in this environment before they are ready will do more harm than good, it may even do so much harm the player loses their confidence and decides to try another sport. But there is great news, with an academy model with teams fielded at 3 development levels a player can be assessed and placed for game day at their correct level of skill, speed and competitiveness.
When they are then at the right level they will develop fastest, and have the most fun. As a player develops or has a specific area to work on or offer leadership to other players, they can be moved into a higher pressure game condition or even lower so they can hone their skills to mastery with lower pressure so that when placed in a higher pressure the skill is second nature and able to be executed in a high pressure game environment. By training together within the academy the players have the benefit of a greater ratio of trainers and coaches with some of the coaches bringing specialist skills to the Academy for those who need greater development in a particular area. For example First Touch and Goal Keeping are two very important skills needed for long term success in the game. LMVSC has a first touch and Goal Keeping Academy because of this.
The other benefit of an academy is value for money. This is because there is one budget that covers all training, soccer kit, tournament and Academy event fees, this budget is divided equally amongst the players, so the Academy offers more depth in services to the players than other models.
