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Fall LUYSA Newsletter
Fall 2010
Message from the President
Betty Boucas
The business of Langley United - it's kids
Sponsors and donors can help LUYSA build a successful club for kids
Founded in 1987, over the years Langley United has helped thousands of children grow into fine teenagers and young adults. During that time, the involvement by businesses and community groups with Langley United has been extremely helpful to building a kids soccer club we all can be proud of. Beginning now and continuing in the years ahead, we'll be looking to expand the involvement of business with Langley United as sponsors and charitable donors.
How your business can help:
If your business or organization you work for can get involved in helping us, that would be great news.
Here are some ways your company could get involved:
- Provide sponsorship funding or donations. Many companies and business organizations have charitable giving, donation and sponsorship programs. Consider a planned monthly giving rather than an annual lump-sum amount. If you think you can help Langley United, let's talk. In one recent example, local electrical contractor MacEwan Electric of Langley won a World Cup contest run by electrical distributor Jescan. The prize: a $1000 donation to a local soccer association - and the MacEwans selected Langley United! Thank you Steve and Erin MacEwan of MacEwan Electric for thinking of LUYSA.
- Provide goods and services LUYSA already purchases, but at your cost. Help us extend our budget and enhance programs by keeping our costs down. Example, for the Kick-off event barbecue in August, a food service company provided the food at their cost. A big help.
- Provide goods and services we need at no cost. It's a contribution and it allows us to conserve our cash for other programs. We've already had companies step forward to offer their services no-charge towards a proposed Clubhouse at Willoughby Park.
You can also earmark your funds for specific programs like scholarships, awards or coaching. While our main focus is expanding our coaching and program delivery to our players and teams, if you want your sponsorship dollars earmarked for a specific team or program, let's talk and see how we can get that done.
There are many ways business can help us continue our work with Langley youth. We've been doing it successfully since 1987. With the help of your business, we can make a bigger difference with our kids. Your kids.
Contact any board member or email sponsorship@luysa.com to discuss how your business can support Langley United's work with kids.
Thank you.
Betty Boucas
President
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Mark your calenders - Attention: all U6 to U12 coaches
LUYSA Grassroots Coaches Clinic
BCSA Coaches Handbook for U6 to U12 players
Friday, December 3, 2010 6:30pm to 9:30 pm
Rotary Field House, McLeod Athletic Park
Instructor: Mark Parker
Cost: Free. Pre-registration is required.
Aimed at: New, novice and experienced grassroots coaches
BC Soccer is pleased to introduce the Coaches Handbook for 6 to 12 year old players. For the first time, BCSA has designed an 8-week training program for Under 6 - Under 9's and a 16-week training program for Under 10 - Under 12 year old players. This provides a complete and easy-to-follow training curriculum for LUYSA small-sided coaches and will assist our coaches in standardizing their training sessions within the Club. This session will introduce the handbook to guide new and novice as well as experienced coaches. LUYSA would like our grassroots coaches to make every effort to attend this session because if you're going to be coaching in our Club this handbook will definitely make you a more effective grassroots coach for the kids.
Note: this clinic involves both classroom and on-field activity and participants should wear training gear for the outside.
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Academy - U10 to U18 Teams
Alert: academy programs are filling up fast!
A reminder to all that academy programs have been extended to be available for any U10-18 LUYSA team that requests them. As we've always done with academy, these sessions are user pay. In this program, our highly experienced staff coaches will either come to your practice field or, if a turf field is available, invite you to a turf session and run a series of practices for the team while you (the coach/assistant) assist in the practice. This is a great way to vary your practice routine to keep the kids interested and available to learn.
Cost: $35 per player for eight sessions (based on 14-player minimum participation; exception for U11 and U12). Payment due at first practice.
Registration: Send an email to coaching@luysa.com to schedule a session. |
Parker visits Bolton FC in prep for U12 UK tour next March
Langley United's U12 team player development trip to Bolton Wanderers Football Club of the English Premier League next March is getting closer. As part of the Club's preparation Mark Parker recently took time out from his FA International Coaching License program in the UK to visit and inspect Bolton's facilities for the 11-day tour.
Parker was able to visit the Reebok Stadium where Wanderers play their home games and tour firsthand the De Vere hotel where Langley United will be staying during their tour. He took in the Bolton team training ground at the Bolton Arena, which is connected by an overhead walkway to the nearby Reebok Stadium. He was taken on tour to view the Wanderers' first-team training ground and met Owen Coyle, the first team's coach. Parker also paid a visit to the Bolton Academy training facility which he reports looks very similar to our Willoughby Community Park fields.
"Bolton is a first-class organization and everything is well organized. The training facility is amazing, with all the high-tech equipment, the players' dining room and lounge," says Mark Parker. "This spring player development tour is shaping up to be a fantastic soccer educational experience for the boys." |
What Parents Need to Know About Team Tours
LUYSA's policy on Club soccer team trips - whether international to the UK, Europe or South America, or to California, Washington State and tournaments in B.C. - is that they provide excellent educational opportunities for the boys and they are to be actively encouraged whenever possible. The boys learn about soccer of course but importantly about how to travel and learn from other cultures. Parents need to know that these types of trips are open to every age group. The main driving force is a few parents deciding to take the lead in organizing a trip. There are two kinds of trips: player development (such as the Bolton tour) or tournament-based such as the Gothia Cup tour in the summer of 2009. To discuss the possibilities, parents should contact Mark Parker or club president Betty Boucas, who was the lead organizer on the Gothia Cup tour to Sweden in 2009. |
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Youth development within a professional club structure
Mark Parker - Technical Director LUYSA
 I thought I would take the opportunity to write in this issue of the newsletter some information and aspects I encountered during my recent visit to the Aston Villa Football Club of the English Premier League in regards to youth development.
I will start off by explaining how a 9-year-old boy gets the opportunity to play on an Aston Villa youth team. A parent of the child cannot phone the club and request a trial or the dreaded North American word - a "tryout." Aston Villa employs no fewer that 40 fulltime scouts who take care of scouting missions for the 8 to 12 year olds age groups. These scouts attend school games and community club matches. If they come across a player whom they feel has the ability and talent meeting the requirement of the club, they will make contact with the parents and make an offer to the player of training with the Aston Villa academy for a period of six weeks. In other words it is a six-week evaluation. The player's technical ability, his commitment and dedication to self improvement, his suitability from a mental and emotional point-of-view and how he interacts with the coaches and players - all these are evaluated over time.
It is specifically stated to the parents and player the period of time is for six weeks no more,
no less and no guarantees. If after the six-week period the academy director, academy manager and age group coach decide the player has the ability that the club is seeking, they will then offer him a 24-month contract. If any of these decide the player is not to the standard they are looking for, there is no offer made. Players can only be recruited who live within 60 minutes' drive to the training centre.
Once the agreement is in place, the player becomes the property of the club (from a football point-of-view) and there is no financial obligation to the family. So now that this has been done, what are the expectations? He trains three times per week (Monday, Wednesday, and Friday) with a game on Sunday. No games are played on Saturdays, as the expectation is that the youth players attend the Aston Villa first team games in the English Premier League. I might add at this point they only take 12 players at each age group. Players who do not meet the standard play for their schools or local community club teams.
The young academy training consists of loads and loads of repetition. Aston Villa looks for players that have the ability to pass quickly and retain the ball in tight situations. They mandate that the ball must travel at speed from player to player and possession must be maintained, unforced errors have no place in the academy. The 9-year-old age group training sessions that I was fortunate enough to witness were of a very high standard from a technical point-of-view, coaches were demanding yet this was done in a very friendly manner and the players responded well to instruction.
The training curriculum that the players are put through consists of technical, tactical, body weight training, SAQ (strength, agility and quickness) and theoretical. Players receive feedback on a regular basis in the form of a daily diary. The player's daily activities have to be recorded which includes the number of hours slept, nutritional consumption, how they feel they did at training and during games and their mental state. The diary gets handed into the coach at the end of the week and is checked over and handed back with the coach's comments as to how he thought the player did and suggestions of improvement. There is a tight relationship between the club and each player's school. If there is a drop in school standards there is a possibility that he would be released if there were no improvement.
As part of the academy, there are three full-time physiotherapists who work solely with the youth players. In addition, each age group also has a fitness coach who is responsible for the players' fitness and strength training component. There is a club doctor that the players have to see if they are sick, they may not see any other medical doctor in practice.
So how far are LUYSA behind in the youth development compared to Aston Villa? At the 9-year-old age groups I feel we have a ways to go. Our U10's train once a week, that is our biggest concern. These lads are coached by lawyers, bankers, and insurance agents who volunteer their precious time to assist in the development of players. I will add here that I have the utmost respect for the people who do this. However, we have to look at getting professional coaches appointed at these age groups. The peripheral add-ons' in the form of fitness coaches, physiotherapists, club doctors, etc. - we will not have in the near future so we have to work around that. What we do have control of is the demand of quality training sessions that includes the quantity. Bumping our 9 year old training sessions to three times a week is definitely something that we will be looking at. Starting this past season we implemented a program that sees three of our U11 teams and two of our U12 teams meeting the same volume of training that equals that of Aston Villa and under the guidance of professional coaches.
Our LUYSA board under the guidance of president Betty Boucas, 1st vice president Dave Kasper and director of coaching Neil Messmer, have taken the initiative of professionalizing the coaching staff in certain age groups. We now need to dig deeper down the age groups and provide these players with similar opportunities for development.
I look forward to seeing us grow as a club, in terms of membership and quality on the field.
Yours truly
Mark Parker
LUYSA Technical Director |
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Grassroots Photos: is this your son?
 
All above photos: Photo Credit to Janis Roxburgh of JRoxy Photography. jroxy@shaw.ca
More photos are located here.
Parents, please take a look on the online album and see. We'll take names for our records and maybe we'll use this photo on our registration poster for next season (with your permission).
Send in your great photos and we'll see about publishing them in a future newsletter.
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If two heads are better than one...
Langley United's Matt Buehler (left with eyes closed) and Montana Reisler (ducking)
clearly expect the worst in a collision with an opposition player. Photo: Lorne Reisler.
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Bizarro takes on soccer-crazed parents
Cartoon reprinted by permission of the cartoonist.
Please do not reuse anywhere else. |
Langley United requires a director of officials
LUYSA has an immediate opening for its volunteer director of officials overseeing and mentoring all referees in the Langley United system. The director of officials is a voting member of the Club's board of directors and is charged with overseeing the scheduling and assignment of referees at our games, ranging from the grassroots up to U18 metro. We need someone who is or has been a referee and is willing to be a strong supporter and advocate for referees, especially our younger ones who are just starting out.
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Christmas in the City
9th Annual Sale at Soccer City
You are invited to attend the 9th Annual 'Christmas in the City' sale at Soccer City!
The sale starts 10am Saturday, November 20th at both Soccer City locations in Langley and Abbotsford. Everything is on SALE! For more details, click here
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View from the grassroots sidelines By Scott Moye, director of grassroots, LUYSA
The Soccer Gods are Against Me...
A regular column on the ups and downs of a dad, coach and director.
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Scott Moye and his band of U9 brothers.
Photo credit: Janis Roxburgh of JRoxy Photography. jroxy@shaw.ca |
When I sat down to write this newsletter's "View from the Sidelines" after a nice summer break, I was a little short on material as the season had just started and I have been in recovery-mode after the hectic previous month of evaluations, coaches meetings, board meetings, and nearly 1600 emails.... So suffice to say, the brain has been a little frazzled. Luckily, the field is where I find relaxation. Something about the smell of the fresh cut grass, the sounds of the ball bouncing around, the kids
laughing and giggling away, and the rhythm that goes along with a successful training session... So it's there that I came across my inspiration for this newsletter's article.....
At my last U9 training session, we'd been working on constant movement without the ball; Getting away from pressure, creating width and depth, etc. The kids have been grasping it and had been doing it instinctively during games and drills, so I'd been really proud of them and maybe just a little bit proud of myself too!
Near the end of practice, with the sun going down, and energies waning... we setup to practice positioning for corner kicks, and instructing them on where to be, where to move to. It seemed simple enough, after all, I was the coach of some pretty smart kids and I had clearly earned my stripes as a coach! I had gotten them this far!
I was crossing the ball in from the corner; they bring it down, with off-numbers and try and score. The offence group was just standing there. Not moving AT ALL. I demonstrated moving around, sprinting and changing pace and direction. JUST like I saw them do on YouTube (where ALL good coaches figure out how to do stuff!). I explained EXACTLY what to do in the simplest terms I could.
Tried again.
Nothing.
Just standing there. So I demoed again, repeated to them exactly what to do.
Tried again.
Nothing.
Little statues.
With goofy grins on their faces, and cleats on their feet.
With my blood pressure rising, figuratively banging my head against wall, I was starting to think.....
"am I speaking Swahili.... Why can't I get them to MOVE?".......
Finally, I laid down the law. I wasn't going to fire the ball back into play until they started moving around into space and getting open.
This is apparently NOT the best way to instill a sense of urgency in 8 year olds.....
We stood there for SIX MINUTES and 23 SECONDS. Blankly staring at each other in a test of wills and my swiftly disappearing confidence as soccer coach....
The parents were watching this and practically killing themselves laughing. Some had tears in their eyes.
FINALLY, Josh and Alexander clued in and started yelling at their teammates to start moving. They finally did, and I eventually sent a GORGEOUS high curling cross into the box.... A thing of Beauty..... If Peter Crouch played for LUYSA, he'd eat it for lunch....
It ricocheted off the crossbar and smacked our keeper in the nose and he collapsed in a heap of tears and a bloody nose.....
I ended practice there and then walked home with my tail between my legs. And when I walked into the house, my wife, in all her wisdom, able to read me like a book, takes one look at my face and says....
"who'd ya hit with the ball this time?"
So, to all you rookie coaches out there this season, don't sweat it. Even after more than 20 years in the game as a player, fan, & coach.... The soccer gods will ALWAYS keep you humble.
Always have fun out there, and see you next issue from the sidelines!
Scott Moye Director of Grassroots Langley United Youth Soccer Association grassroots@luysa.com
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Langley United Youth Soccer Association
PO Box 26015
Langley, BC V3A 8J2
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Mark Parker achieves FA International Coaching License The Langley United Youth Soccer Association is pleased to announce that Mark Parker, the Club's technical head coach, has received his Football Association International Coaching license. Parker was in the United Kingdom recently attending this prestigious Football Association three-week residential course held for coaches who have reached the highest certification levels within their home country. "LUYSA's commitment is to ensure our coaches are certified at the highest level possible and this certification starts at the top in our technical coaching department," said LUYSA president Betty Boucas. "It's vital for the kids that all their coaches continually improve their coaching knowledge and experience. With Mark Parker's achievement, we now have one of the highest certified technical coaches in the country to guide our technical programs. Hats off to Mark on his professional achievement." The FA International Coaching License program is a three-week residential course in the United Kingdom providing candidates with the opportunity to develop their football knowledge and coaching competencies through a variety of related activities. The course content includes the following aspects: The learning and coaching process; match analysis; coaching demonstrations by senior members of the FA technical department; coaching practice; football fitness and football psychology; emergency aid and aspects of first aid; health and safety; growing up: youth players football; attitudes and ethics; laws of the game; visits to FA Premier League matches and visits to a premier club's youth academy. |
 Reminder
As we move indoors to the school gyms to practice, just a reminder to parents and coaches to respect the gym and the school employees who work to keep the gyms clean. Please replace all benches that you move around and take all your water bottles and other garbage home. Don't allow your players to go up on the stage and go into the school without permission. A reminder also to clean up on the fields after your games each weekend.
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Field cancellations - what parents need to know
Protecting our Langley soccer grass fields from being seriously damaged is the main rationale for parks and school officials closing the weekend fields during poor weather. It is also vital for maintaining the health and safety of the boys playing in sloppy conditions. Parents should know that even if the field has not yet been closed, it's the ref's job to make a decision on whether a field is playable at game time. As the health and safety of the boys is the main concern, their decision is final. To find out if your field has been closed for the weekend's home game, parents can check on the LUYSA website home page Friday afternoon or Saturday morning. Our Field Status Report is usually updated by Friday afternoon after we get the word from the parks and schools officials, who check the fields Friday morning and make decisions for each field. |
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