Dear Coach, please stop killing my creativity and let my fly solo first!
We are born creative geniuses, so were you, dear coach, when you arrived in this world. The bad news is, before we even became 9-10 years old and start reading and writing more fluently our creative nature is going down! We experience this at home, then at school and we hoping that our football environment will be different. Unfortunately, it isn’t! Perhaps is worth to show you the ways to nurture creativity instead of killing it! Here they are:
Please don’t limit my choices during training sessions or match days
How often have you put rules that limited our choices and therefore affect our decision-making process? Rules such as: play two-touch only; you have to make 5 passes before you can score; you can’t dribble on your own half; don’t cross the half-way line during the match day; Now imagine, how do I feel if I can’t really have fun because of these rules. Moreover, I can’t be bothered to try, because I can’t and my natural curiosity are already gone. Please remember one day, that may be me wearing an England shirt, but the only thing I will follow is rules, which I am sure you do not want.
Practice makes perfect and getting things right-slogans that you repeat and do far too often
Nobody is perfect, even the most successful people. During training, you are giving us more freedom which we love and appreciate. Why then you change that when comes to match days, actually shall I say youth tournaments? Then, perhaps under pressure from parents you demand getting things right, almost perfect when we both know, that does not exist. How about let us create our great ideas into match situations, explore our curiosity and opportunity to take risks and learn from it. You not only see what we really capable of doing, but you will also learn much more about us.
Constant observation and supervision in almost anything we do means we will rarely be original and surprise you
This only leads to predictable actions and behaviour on the pitch, yet you still required from us to adapt to ever-changing game scenarios. Well, we won’t able to do that because we have to behave like a robot rather than little human beings with very creative brains!
We wish your sessions became less structured and your game plan less organized
For you established game plan is key in which you think we will open any door! You expected that we will follow, executed with effectiveness and consistency. Well, we won’t because we are just kids, in case you forgot about it. Are you going mad, when we do things that aren’t in your game plan? Why you became surprised when we fail to react to opponent unpredictable play? Maybe the only plan they have is to have fun and see what is possible.
Let me conclude with this: “ The most valuable asset a nation has is the creativity of its children”- Alan Plater
