Separating strong and weaker kids at games

salmocab

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119172936#Comment_119172936

It doesn’t seem harsh it is harsh. Sports clubs should exist to give kids a sporting outlet not to give them winners medals.

Widdensushi

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119172936#Comment_119172936

The discussion here is about young players, u8, u10, the weaker u8 player can often be a strong u14 if they have the interest, if you don't encourage them, try to improve them they will quit or not improve, too much time on the sideline and they won't be there at u14 and up so you will never know, you have to give them games according to the rules and in most cases even if you end up with a few more players than the opposition they will let you play a couple of extra players to make it easier(u8 etc)

Uncle Pierre

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119172936#Comment_119172936

A bit harsh all right....to say the least!!!

We're talking under-8s and under-9s here. There won't even be a county final until under-13. And if you don't win an under-13 title, it's not the end of the world, so long as players are continuing to develop.

CornerForward10286

Usually up to u 11here u play blitzes. If u can field 2 teams mix and match, stronger and weaker on each team. Don’t put all your best players on one team

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119173079#Comment_119173079

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119173079#Comment_119173079

Glebee

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119174670#Comment_119174670

Have been involved in hurling coaching for around the last 8 years, from u7, u9 and u11. We always had two teams and always mixed the abilities for matches / blitzes despite other clubs and people from our club saying to pick a strong and weaker team. Just said no we were not mixing. Involved in u13 this year and the competative nature has definitely stepped up a notch. Its all about championship and the winning element is coming into it more. I find im guilty of it myself at times and have to take a step back and say these are still only kids from 5th and 6th class but its easy to get caught up in it. Dont have enough for two teams so the weaker lads are starting to suffer with game time in championship matches definitely and I can see them starting to drift if the interest is not there. Challenge games alright we would try to give everyone equal time and agree to play 3 x 20 minute thirds so we can give everyone a good run. Heard a good interview with Eddie Brennan last week about him hating playing hurling in national school and he hid his bag and hurl on teh way to school so he did not have to play. Only clicked with him around 16 of 17 I think.

Tombo2001

Perhaps people should specify which part of the country & also boys or girls because I know there can be differences in whats the 'recommended' approach.

For example, there is one major rule difference between boys and girls up to I think u11.

With the girls after a score, the referee throws the ball in in the middle rather than a puck our or kick out.

I remember with the boys at a young age, some poor young lad on a C team trying to take a puck out and not being able to, and then after three goes he is hitting it off the ground in the long grass, and the mentors on the other team telling their kids to put pressure on the puck outs, and its just goal after goal after goal until someone else goes in for a bit of punishment.

Myself, i've mentored both & in Dublin. AFAIK Dublin County Board recommends streaming from very early on.

Uncle Pierre

I'm involved with U9 boys myself, and am in Wexford. Recommended approach here is what we do ourselves - do different things with them in training all right, depending on ability, but mix them all together for matches.

I presume that thing with the girls re-starting in the middle is to avoid the sort of situation you're talking about with some of the boys. I've seen it happen all right, but to be honest, have never seen a mentor here so ruthless as to tell his players to push up and put pressure on the goalkeeper. It's usually more a case of "stand back and give him a chance". And if it's happening regularly, whoever's refereeing the game (at U9 level, it's always one of the coaches from one side or the other) will throw the odd one in around midfield anyway, without making a big deal about it, just to get the ball back up the field a bit.

Tombo2001

Interesting there could be such a fundamental difference in approach. We were at 8 years old (u9?) when parents were called in and a powerpoint was put up showing A team , B team and C team. From then on the kids trained and played with their own team, and its been that way since. Literally, a kid who has been on the C team since has not played or trained with a kid on the A team since, even though their training is on the same pitch at the same time - and they are teenagers now.

I wasnt mentoring at the time, got involved later. This is a boys team.

Narrative at the time was that this was on the recommendation of Dublin GAA and of course all the great benefits, especially for the weaker kids - my own view is that it was a **** storm.

Having said that, not many have left.

castletownman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119154015#Comment_119154015

And I find from (albeit limited) experience that it's the parents that don't have the interest outside of training that are the ones most likely to kick up a fuss if their kid isn't getting a fair crack at it, as they perceive it. As one prominent coach I know told me, a lot of these modern mammies treat underage training as an hour of free babysitting.

BrianBoru00

Mixing abilities is all well and good but the problem there is that the strong players dominate.

They can be far far ahead physically at u7 and even introducing a "no play" rule doesn't impact hugely it ll still be generally 2 of the 6 outfield players getting 50% of the ball time. The goalie getting about 25% due to lockouts. Another player getting 15% leaving the other three with 10% of ball time.

Now I rotate all players in all positions so the weakest players will get opportunities with lockouts at least but if you keep restricting the best players so much then it's them that become annoyed and your spoiling their enjoyment of the sport which isn't fair either.

During training we don't stream for most drills but for games we take out the weaker kids for 3 or 4 a side games with the more experienced coaches and do a lot of "in game" coaching.

We ll also swap in two of the strongest in that group over the the other one or two games depending on numbers on the day.

It's easy to say the kids want to play and the coaches are too interested in winning.its go games, no score is kept but THEY keep the score. Their competitive instinct is developing at that stage.

Now our attitude is to praise effort and improvement, Focusing on good plays by players in games and never discuss the score but they re still ' I scored 2-2' or " we hammered them" to each other .

Approximately 30 kids at the moment and I m hoping we have 15 who play at some level well into adulthood. Another five who play the odd game hoping that the rest who don't are still members and supporters of the club and retain an interest.

As they grow up they'll have access to different sports / past times so we are going to loose some , that's always the case. But the key will be that they can always recall their time here fondly.

AntrimGlens

This is a very good thread and I see the outworkings and reality of it in my own club at present which gives us a dilemma as this is the first time we've had the numbers to enter two teams into competitions.

I have been involved in coaching hurling for u11s and u9s for a good few years now and have done Foundation and Level 1 &2. Whilst we all are in some form of agreement of streaming, mixing teams etc is beneficial I don't know if the way blitzes are structured help but don't know what the alternative format is, or perhaps this is only my own county's way of arranging them.

So on Sundays we have U9 blitz, usually about 12-18 teams entered. Our own club enter two teams, some other clubs enter three and a lot would enter one team. Email comes through from the county hurling officer on a Friday asking how many teams each club is entering and what division you are entering them into. We have had 6 blitzes to date and there's usually 5/6 teams in Div 1, 6/8 in Div 2 and maybe 5/6 in Div 3.

Until last weekend we entered a team into Div 2 & Div 3. Our teams were mixed with two of the four strongest lads on each team and the remainder randomly allocated to each team with maybe the two weakest in the Div 3 team. We would generally win 2/3 of the six matches in Div 2 and maybe 4/5 of the 6 matches in Div 3.

Last week we decided to enter one team in Div 1 and one into Div 3 and make it a strong team and a weaker team to allow the four stronger lads to play together and come up against a bit more competition and work harder for the ball and for the weaker team to also not be reliant on the two strongest lads winning ball and doing all the work every week. Having not previously watched the Div 1 standard I expected our lads to get quite a few tough matches, but they ended up winning 4/6 and the Div 3 lads got badly beaten in 6/6.

To me this demonstrates that the stronger players in Div 3 teams ended up doing all the work and scoring and the weaker lads are happy to allow this to happen, despite "encouragement" from the sideline. Should we then remove the stronger players from the Div 3 team and let them work it out themselves or will that just discourage them if they keep getting beaten.

There are at least 3 of the lads that are statemented so we recognise that they are there for fun and enjoyment and prefer chatting about Fortnite in the middle of a game rather than any structured hurling which can often be frustrating for the lads that are there to hurl and have a desire to win.

Do all counties have different tiers or divisions in their blitzes or do they just put three different pools of six teams out and discourage having a strong, middle and weak division?

Macy0161

Happened in my club, but they didn't even do it on this years performances but on the perceptions the coaches had coming in, when a number of the players had been playing other sports over the winter and had genuinely improved*. The result is 4 or 5 have given up completely, and a number of others are prioritising the other sports and activities, so the GAA/ LGFA have lost these girls just at the time the work needs to be put in to keep them playing. The Team is now struggling for numbers, certainly for two teams, so it has achieved nothing.

*I actually think this is the bigger issue - they didn't have to name teams yet. So I think there's more issue with not giving a fair chance rather than the split. Handled incredibly poorly.

Flinty997

Each set of players is different. (I assume)

One of mine got moved down B to C and it was the making of them. Lots more time on the ball, and not stuck constantly in defense (or goals) on the higher team. Now moved back to the B team and is a strong player there now.

They also had one season were they were in a div too high for them and they got hammered every game, both in score and physically. Players constantly getting injured. To the point of having to stop games. Some of the opponents players seemed tool old (big) or too good for for the div they were in. They toughed it out, but it wasn't a good experience.

We've also brought up A players from the age below to make up the numbers on B teams. Starts off with those A player dominating, but eventually the B raised their game to the level of the junior A players. That might not have happened and the A players might have dominated all season. But you can't make players play better they have to have the hunger to do so.

With my kids there is a big gap between A and B teams players and matches regardless of age. B and C less so. But that might be just their teams.

Tombo2001

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119177524#Comment_119177524

Dont think its fair to single out the mammies but I would otherwise agree completely on this.

The quickest way to shut these parents up is to ask if they'd consider mentoring themselves.

The problem however - is that it works. Kids do get unfair advantages if their parents kick up. Its not right, but it happens.

Tombo2001

..

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119178031#Comment_119178031

I will say the coaches generally try to stay with their own kids which is understandable. But you will find all the strongest kids their parents are mentors. Which means there's more coaches/mentors for the A team than the other teams. Even when training and they are all on same field. Knocking someone back with the whole "will you do some mentoring yourself" is a bit unfair not everyone situation makes mentoring possible. I get it if someone is being a nag though.

Tombo2001

...

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119178069#Comment_119178069

I don't agree. I think that depends entirely on the group of players. if your A B and C are close in divisions the perhaps there's not much between them. But if one is Div1 and the other Div7 then thats a big gap.

Tombo2001

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119178108#Comment_119178108

We are talking about 8 year olds here. Divisions dont kick in until age 12 or 13. Different situation then. I have no issue with streaming then - but I think any younger than 11 or 12 its inappropriate.

Flinty997

Match time on the ball is all important.

If you spend your game stuck in a position never getting passed to, or the ball always going over your head, you will never improve.

If you move a dominate player off a team the rest of the team gets more ball time. Same if a weaker player moves down a grade.

Ash.J.Williams

Essentially players know they’re worthless by aged. 8 and can quit before they’re developed

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119178113#Comment_119178113

That's when we do our officially. But it starts earlier as they put similar abilities together before that.

I am a believer that a weaker player can be improved by being with stronger players. But its nuanced situation. A common trait of A players IMO is they are selfish on the ball, not passing. Which means a weaker player won't get get the ball as much.

Tombo2001

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119177737#Comment_119177737

I suppose on the face of it, you entered a strong team in the weakest division, so taking the stronger players out of the team wont help the situation if you were being beaten.

What you find (I think) is that the 'one team' clubs often enter into the lower or lowest division, however they are tough opponents as they will have a handful of kids that are as good as your very best players- and at that age, one really strong player can make a massive difference. If these teams are in Division 3 then they are tough to beat.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119178144#Comment_119178144

I think you have to focus the value of sport and fitness and enjoying the game. Not simply just winning.

You're associating the only value with winning. Its good to win. But 99% of people who do sport won't win.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119178162#Comment_119178162

Sometimes you get a club that has a tiny number of A players and the rest not great. When those player the team is unstoppable, when they don't play they are terrible. Hard to balance that.

I think some teams manipulated the grading matches along those lines. When you play them after grading matches its a different team.

I think for us, we were much stronger in our grading matches. Then we lost players to the A team, (and other sports) leaving our team a shadow of itself for the actual matches. That's also difficult to balance. We've also another sport collapse and players came back.

BrianBoru00

Did you read my post?

We don't stream in matches.

i'm not ignoring any of the problems with streaming or not streaming. We re striving for an impossible balance.

We don't split training based on abulity

The only streaming we do anywhere at the moment is to take the weakest/youngest 6-10 during the second half of training for games. In practice the u6s, with the strongest u6 s joining the u7s.

Depending on coach numbers we go as low as three a side outfield but normally six during training and restrict players to a particular zone (essentially forwards, mid field and backs) which alleviates for the most part the strong player dominating issue.

But again , no more than the kids, the range of coaching ability is mixed so if we re down the three more experienced coaches then the session plan is more likely to fall apart.

Tombo2001

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119178239#Comment_119178239

Thats fair enough, and I didnt read the post properly.

I suppose there two discussions at play here = one is about the merits or otherwise of streaming, and the other is how best to manage the fact that there are very strong and very weak players across any given pool. No issue with approach you take, seems sensible and fair.

Flinty997

When I played back many many years ago, playing with better players brought me up. But I see my own kids that being graded down really helped them massively. Which made me realise we are different people and different things might work better depending on the person and situation.

One of my other kids was losing interest in the game. But being graded seems to have sparked a competitive streak in them, started practicing etc. Just lit a fire in them. Wasn't expecting that.