4v4 and the youth coaching.

prateik

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Dec 14, 2005
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I was listing to some podcast a few weeks back where Savage was talking about his son who is at United.
He said the kids, U9s were encouraged to keep the ball, not worry about the result and all that. That wasnt new. But he mentioned something about the 4v4 training system (4 a side) at which point another journalist said United have been doing that for around 10 years now at the youth level.
We wanted other English clubs to adopt it too but not too many were interested at that point and some have shown the willingness to change only recently.

I did google it and read a bit about it at that time.

Then I remembered that United DVD from around 8 years ago that had players like Lingard, Cole, Cleverley, Welbeck in it. Whether they make it at United or not is another matter, but all of them seem comfortable on the ball. They arent rushed into kicking it long all the time.

The academy sides of the last 2-3 years have been playing some really good football too.

Could all this be the result of something we have been working on for the last 10 years? Or am I reading too much into it?
 
I think your right and there is something to it that club started working towards 9 or 10 years ago.

Here is an article from last Novermber on Rene Meulensteen's work at the club;

http://www.manutd.com/en/News-And-F...ensteen-inside-united-interview.aspx?pageNo=1

It may relate to the training methods you mention and how only now are the first group of youngsters it was used on starting to make a breakthrough.
 
Ramshock said:
Its remarkably different from what the Barca kids are taught at that age. You would have to say their way is seems to be more effective right now.
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not necessarily. Barcelona have access to a far larger number of academy players (our hands being tied by FA rules) and can work with them for far longer than English clubs can. They also can 'loan' their players to their B team that plays at a good standard when they are ready and guarantee that they'll get treated properly- The closest we seem to have is our relationship with Hull. We also have a relationship with Royal Antwerp and FC Twente. Antwerp plays at a lower standard than is ideal, and Twente haven't shown that they will play our loanees often enough yet.

It's difficult to compare the success of our training methods to theirs without considering the structural advantage of the Spanish system over ours.
 
Drainy said:
not necessarily. Barcelona have access to a far larger number of academy players (our hands being tied by FA rules) and can work with them for far longer than English clubs can. They also can 'loan' their players to their B team that plays at a good standard when they are ready and guarantee that they'll get treated properly- The closest we seem to have is our relationship with Hull. We also have a relationship with Royal Antwerp and FC Twente. Antwerp plays at a lower standard than is ideal, and Twente haven't shown that they will play our loanees often enough yet.

It's difficult to compare the success of our training methods to theirs without considering the structural advantage of the Spanish system over ours.
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true
 
I think the key to so much of this is the coaching of the 6-12 year olds. All the fundamentals are set in place then with respect to technique. The most important coaches are in fact the coaches of those age groups and educating those coaches is so important. These are the dads etc who do everything for the love of it and if they can be continually encouraged/assisted and kept up to speed with all the right coaching methods the important youth coaches have a better chance of producing quality senior players.
 
prateik said:
A bit more about the 4v4 thing if anyone is interested.
http://www.soccercoachinginternational.com/newsletter/sci82/freearticlePDF.pdf
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Great read. I hope everybody who sees our youth results at u18s and younger and wonders why we don't always too do well reads this and understands the long term strategy behind it. While other club's players often more developed tactically or physically United spent extra time working on skills and train in 11v11 tactics later in the player's development.
 
All of this is very good, it is, however about using your ability to hold and use the ball. The problem is that there are so many young talented and gifted players that come along and push these hard working kids to the background.
Georgie Best is a prime example of a born gifted talent, it was a pity it was not just for football.
I remember years ago playing "manhole" football. That was using the street drains as goals. We never had coaches but it taught you awareness of your fellow team mates, keeping and shielding the ball, passing and shooting at the smallest of opportunities.
It seems today that the experts are now taking these forgotten methods and turning them into something revolutionary
There are many gifted kids throughout the country that are not just being found due to the restrictive rules of the FA whose only interest is to make as much money as possible, appoint the wrong people in charge of development and think they are gods gift to the game.
I was having a good day till I read this.!
 
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