Let’s dive into today’s topic!
For a lot of coaches, building a winning team is difficult.
I’m going to be talking about how to build a winning culture within your team in three phases today. It’s not just about winning games during the season, but it’s what you do before, during and after all your training sessions and games.
#1: Learn from the past
Many players get really nervous before a game, and that is completely normal after a defeat the week before. There are some things you can do as the head coach of your soccer team to help your players to feel more confident, calm, and ready to go and win the next game.
Here are a few things I want you to do before each game with your soccer team:
Calm your players nerves – Help your players with their emotions and get them breathing calmly and in tune with their body before the game starts. You can do this in the warm up phase by implementing different types of breathing exercises.
Set the team intentions – Focus on a goal during the game that is attainable for the players you coach. For example: As the coach you may say to your team “In the first half I want you to go out and have 15 shots on goal”. When you set your team intentions that are not focused on the final result this will help to distract your team from the pressure of winning the game.
Get to the next game early – Get your team to the game early so you can run a complete warm up with them that will help them to calm their nerves and get extra touches before the game starts.
Introduce team building exercises into your warm up – It may even be a good idea to introduce some team building exercises before the game that incorporate competition among the team which helps to take pressure away from the game.
#2: Maintain and carefully evolve your team culture
Encourage your players to take risks – If you want your players to be creative on the field and you want them to develop their skills to win then you must understand that mistakes will happen. A culture of winning is built through coaching your athletes to be courageous and pushing them to play outside of their comfort zone and to take risks.
Play to your teams strengths – Many coaches at the youth level will ignore the strengths of their players and focus on playing a certain type of soccer that is similar to the professionals. Remember, you aren’t working with professionals, you’re working with a team of youth athletes. To build their confidence I want you to allow them to play in a way they can be successful by playing to their strengths.
Give each player personal attention – No matter whether the team wins or loses ALWAYS give each player the personal attention they deserve. Many coaches will pay attention during victories but ignore players during defeats. I want you to be consistent in both and put your athletes above the score line.
#3: Find great players to compliment you
Recruit like minded athletes – Many coaches will recruit certain players because of talent rather than because of attitude.These coaches may find that when they prioritize a players ability over attitude it may create team problems in the future. ALL successful teams are built by recruiting players who complement the coach and their ideas.
Focus on coachability above ability – I want you to set aside trying to always look for the perfect player and start focusing on players who are coachable athletes instead. A team of coachable like minded players will listen and implement your ideas far better on the field.
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Talk soon,
Coach Leonardo Capparelli
Leadership Skills Coach, Coaches Training Room
p.s… A little about me… I’m from Argentina but raised in the United Kingdom and have been coaching over 10 years now. I am the owner of The Football Domain Academy in London and have a range of qualifications from the English Football Association. My passion is helping and educating coaches on how to build winning team cultures.
