The Importance of dropping back

Today's soccer lesson is called...the importance of dropping back.

Soccer is played on a large, rectangular area of grass.  There is no back court violation, like in basketball, nor is there a disadvantage in not playing the ball forward all the time.

In other words, passing back to your midfielders, back or keeper is perfectly fine, as long as they're ready.  In fact, it can be a great strategy to draw the other team forward and have them over pursue the ball, then make a long pass to your forwards up the field because there are less players to defend them.

This is how you play soccer:  with the entire team, using the entire field.  I like to say pitch, but I don't want to confuse anyone, so we'll stick with the word "field" for now.

And yet it drives some parents CRAZY to see the ball played back.  "What are you doing?"  "You're supposed to kick it that way!"  "You're just helping the othet team!"  These are actual things that I've heard rec, school AND club soccer parents yell at their kid who has calmly played the ball back when they got in trouble.

These parents want to CONSTANTLY see the ball played forward.  If that happens, the ball will invariably get stolen a lot more by the other team.

These are the same parents (usually) that want to see the keeper punt the ball every time, rather than have them roll it out to a back and build play from the back.  Dumb as a continuous strategy.

Your kids that play the ball back have been coached by a coach that knows what they're doing, and they've made the kids confident in their teammates to play the ball back.  So be quiet and let them play.  They know what they're doing.

Peace and soccer,

Eric