At my patience limit with our BU12 coach

My 11 year old made the leap this year from select to premier/RCL. He is playing on the B team for his new club and wants nothing more than to make the A team next year. His new coach holds a national B license and has a ton of experience across age groups. At first I was excited about the development he could bring to the boys. However, after watching him all summer, losing nearly every game in every tournament, and seeing no improvement, I'm very concerned.

This year, my son decided that soccer is his thing, and he wants to focus 100% on it. He's giving up basketball (which he loves), because he wants to be a high performer on the pitch. He works hard, does the extra skill work, and brings a super positive attitude to his teammates. He's mature enough to know that at this age, winning and losing is not nearly as important as improving as a player.

I feel like his coach is letting him and the entire team down.

Some parents call his approach "hands-off". I call it lazy. He runs the same practices over and over. He'll setup a scrimmage or drill, tell the boys what to do, and provide absolutely no instruction during play. He's constantly scrolling his phone DURING practice in front of the boys. He shows up right at practice time and rarely is early. He's also coaching 3 other club teams and a high school team. He just flat out looks and acts like he doesn't care. My son notices and I'm sure the other boys do too.

In our first league game last week, we gave up 3 goals in the first 15 minutes. The coach sat on the bench the entire time, arms folded, legs crossed, like he didn't have a concern in the world.

I don't want to be "that parent", but it turns out that I'm not the only parent seeing this. As someone who played in college and has coached select teams for years, I cannot understand this behavior. None of us know what to do. I don't want to jeopardize anything for my son. He continues to put his head down and work his tail off, and I don't want to ruin his playing time or his reputation in this club because of my complaining and issues with the coach. I feel like his work ethic is being wasted because he's not learning anything new. I'm sure the other parents feel this way too.

If I could wave a magic wand, he would quit and I would take over as the head coach. But that is not likely to happen.

I feel like we've all heard it or said it before: I'm paying a lot of money for this, and it feels like a total...

Top replies, most upvoted first

• (+17) I’m a college coach that has coach multiple teams. That particular point of having multiple teams is on the club and if you are going to blame the club for having a coach with multiple teams then you are going to have to blame club soccer (which in most cases is 100% fair) The part that’s on the coach is having the phone out at practice. That’s BS and would end immediately if I was your club director. For you, I’m not sure exactly what is going to help. I can hear the frustration through the keyboard. If you really don’t like the teamisuggest the old standby “controlling what you can control”...
• (+15) Different parents want different things. In modern youth coaching pedagogy, a coach who steps back, avoids constantly barking instructions during play, and sits quietly on the bench is letting the game be the teacher. That is developmentally ideal for your son’s age. Avoiding over-coaching, or performance coaching, allow kids to build their own perception to decision to action cycles and on-field communication. The trouble with this is it doesn’t look like coaching in the classical sense, and some parents simply know better that lines, lectures and drills are what works because that’s how they were...
• (+12) Kind of sounds like he has too much on his plate. Coaching 5 teams isn't really viable for one person I don't think. There just isn't enough time to do things properly. Edit: I have seen this happen year after year to younger coaches that are good. Because they are good, the club wants them everywhere, but somehow fail to see that the more teams he handles, the less impact he can have. For instances I know a gk coach who just this past season had 9 different agegroups under him. I know the person very well and he is very good. But if some age groups get him for like once a month or something...
• (+10) This might be a situation where it's appropriate to ask the club director if your current coach has the "resources" to properly manage all the teams he's in charge of. It could lead to a shift in responsibilities for other coaches in the club who may have more time for your team.
• (+9) I agree with this during the game. We had a parent upset with my son's coach (A Level) because he isn't up yelling instructions during the game. He doesn't think that's productive and I believe him. However he's coaching during training. If there's a small scrimmage he's providing direction, correcting mistakes, giving the players different ideas they could have tried. Scrolling your phone during training is hard to defend.
• (+8) What does modern coaching philosophy have to say about being on your phone for the entirety of practice?
• (+6) As a parent and a Coach, it's so hard for me to judge these posts because i have seen the lazy bad coaching and the bad parents that only complain about coaches. But coaches here are some things you should take away from this post that are just not good looks. -Being on your phone, i don't care if you are using it as a stopwatch (get a watch) or if your session plan is on it (Put it in a book or on a note card). It's a terrible look and if parents aren't happy with your coaching they will default to "look coach isn't paying attention"; they will not assume good intent -Be Early, 10 to 15...