We are working on a page that will list some soccer camps across the country. We would like for people to comment on the camps that they have attended and give a short review of what they thought of the camp. Our idea is to create a list of the top camps and ID camps around the country.
Check back soon.
We are getting ready to start adding a ton of content to the site. Please check back real soon.
Thanks - Her Soccer World
We are making changes to the site. Stay tuned!!!!
2018 is going to bring great changes to Her Soccer World. I have had this website for about three years. Over time I have added a few videos and written a very inconsistent blog. The inconsistency is now over.
My goal has always been to have a site that celebrates women and girls soccer as an equal if not better version of the game. I understand that female soccer compared to the men's game is a little late to the party. That does not mean that the games and effort being put out on soccer fields across the world by females is any less intense or exciting.
I realize that it might seem strange that a man has started this website to promote the female game. My proudest accomplishment in my life is being the father of three beautiful daughters. All three of my daughters play soccer and love the game. I want them to have every opportunity to go as far as they want with this game. If they do not want to go past high school or if their dream is to play in college and beyond, I will be along side cheering them on.
This site will promote girl's and women soccer from the earliest days of recreational soccer to the professional ranks.
How are we going to do that? We are going to be there each other. We are going to create a community where the youngest cheer for the oldest and the oldest support and give back to the youngest.
Cool things to follow!!
This Thursday my daughters soccer team will be traveling to Frisco, TX. to watch the United States Women's National Team play against Russia. What is unusual about this game is that it is on a Thursday. That's right, a school night. The girls will get out of school early on Thursday and miss school on Friday because we will not have time to get back in time as Frisco is about five hours away from our home.
Yes, school is very important to me but I think to see the best soccer players that the United States has to offer is also an important learning experience. I think anytime you get the chance to see someone who is the best in their field, you should take it. These young girls need role models that they can look up to and see that it is possible to achieve anything as long as you put in the hard work. Most of the girls on my daughters team will not play past high school but I am not about to squash anybody's dream because I do not know the future.
USA! USA! USA! USA! USA! USA!
My oldest daughter wants a phone. My wife and I told her that she must wait until she was 13 before we would even begin to discuss this possibility. Her birthday is early in January. Soon after her birthday she proposed that if we gave her a phone, she would become a referee so she could earn money to pay for the monthly fees. There was no way we could tell her no so I agreed to sign her up for a local referee clinic.
I was all set to sign her up for the clinic and logged in to complete the application but when I logged in, the clinic had been cancelled. I looked at the other locations offering the clinics and found one about an hour and a half away. The clinic was from 8 - 5. What was I going to do all day in another town while she went to the clinic?
I decided that I would also sign up to be a referee. If I am going to be getting up early on Saturdays to take my daughter to referee at the local soccer complex, I might as well stay and do a bit of officiating myself. This of course horrified my three daughters. They did not want Dad to embarrass them out on the pitch where their friends might see me. I told them that they did not get a vote. I was now getting excited about the chance to wear yellow and stripes on Saturdays.
Last Saturday my daughter and I took the course and passed. It looks like we will get our first opportunities next week to see how we do as referees. I can't wait to see if being a referee will affect how my daughter sees the game and if it transfers to her own soccer game.
I will keep you posted on how it goes and I promise to let you know the first time I get yelled at by a parent or coach.
Check out this great TED video that discusses raising brave girls who will take on the world with bravery instead of striving for perfection.
I think this is a great talk that can easily be related to soccer. We should push girls to be brave on the soccer field. I believe that means different things for each player. Bravery for some might be just trying soccer for the first time. Others might need bravery to tryout for a select team if they are not sure they will make the team. Being brave does not mean being good. Bravery is putting yourself in situations where you might fail.
Let me know what you think of the video.
Happy New year. Hopefully 2017 will be another positive year for women's soccer. There will not be any World Cup or Olympics to bring national attention to this game we love. We will need to support women's soccer at all levels. Enjoy brisk Saturday mornings on the pitch at your local soccer association. Find a college soccer team to follow. Enjoy being a fan of one of the great professional teams across the country. Be loud, have fun, and support women's soccer in 2017.
Make sure you watch the Motivational videos. They will make you want to run through a wall!
While most soccer seasons from recreation to college are about mid season, the Women's professional league has one game left. The Championship game between the Washington Spirit and the Western New York Flash will take place on Sunday the 9th at 4:00pm.
I encourage everyone to try and watch this game. It would be awesome if you are in the Houston area this weekend and can actually go to the game. In order for this young league to keep growing, the crowd at the game needs to be huge as does the viewership around the country. These are the games when advertisers or sponsors decide if the NWSL is worthy of their dollars.
Here is some info about this weekend. There is a real quick video that does a great job of explaining the playoffs in under 60 seconds.
Request: I would like to find some really good instructional videos on heading the ball. I have two daughters who are getting to the age where heading the ball is going to be more of an option in games. I want them to be safe and use good form. If anybody has any they would like to share, I would love to see them. If they are really good, I will post them on the Training Video page.
I will be the first to admit that I am way behind on the whole social media. In fact I am so far behind the curve that I cannot even see the curve.
I do realize that social media must be embraced in order to communicate and interact with people in this fast changing world. Just having a website will not allow me to grow Her Soccer World into what I know it can be.
I have taken my first steps into this crazy world of social media. Her Soccer World now has a twitter account: Her Soccer World@HerSoccerWorld . I am not even sure if that is how I am supposed to write the twitter address. Currently I have 8 followers. I know what you are saying. This guy is going to set the world on fire with his eight followers. Come join our merry band of soccer fans.
The next step is to try and figure out Facebook and Instagram.
I will keep you posted.
I am now a firm believer in the need for soccer players to have the ability to juggle a soccer ball. Do I believe that a soccer player needs to be able to juggle a ball 1,000 times without the ball hitting the ground? No, that just makes for some good You Tube or Facebook videos. I think a good goal should be around fifty for every player. Once you get to fifty, you have achieved good ball control.
When I coached my girls when they were little juggling to me was no more than a way to kill a little bit more time during practice. I wish I would have pushed all of the girls on my team to work harder at this skill. Ball control is so important as soccer players get older. If a soccer player has great ball control, the game will slow down for that player. By that I mean she will be confident in her ball skills to the point she will be able to gain the much needed extra seconds required to make a precise pass or move versus an okay pass or move.
Check out the new video on beginning juggling I added to the training videos. It is one of the best I have seen explaining the proper way to begin juggling.
Have a great day!
I would like to highly encourage everyone to go watch some women's college soccer this Fall. In order to grow the women's game we need to support it at all levels. There is some really good soccer being played on campuses across the country. The majority of the women playing soccer on the collegiate level know that they will never go pro. They play for a love of a game that many have played their entire lives.
If you live in a big city you might get to go see some powerhouse teams like North Carolina or Stanford. If you live in a small town you might get the joy of watching a team like Angelo State University or Adams State University. The smaller schools with limited budgets really need our support. Angelo State University is in my home town. The women's soccer team is so fun to watch and the girls on the team love to give back to the local community. At these smaller schools the budget is not very big for the women's soccer program. Uniforms must be purchased by the players as there is not enough money for even that basic need, yet they still play.
Go out support your local college team. College soccer is great to watch. If you are still playing, go get some tips. If you are past your playing days, just go enjoy the game.
Here are the sites for the women's soccer programs that I mentioned above:
http://www.goheels.com/SportSelect.dbml?SPID=12982
http://www.gostanford.com/index.aspx?path=wsoc
http://www.angelosports.com/index.aspx?path=soc
http://www.asugrizzlies.com/index.aspx?path=wsoc
Go kick a soccer ball around today!
I am back from my sabbatical. Does that make it seem more official? Actually I let the business of life keep me from the site. I am going to try real hard to update this site 4-5 times a week. That might be in the form of post on the The Daily Pitch or in new videos added to the video pages.
I am assuming that everybody is in the thick of the soccer season. I have three girls in soccer right now. Two are playing select and one is still in rec. soccer.
I have found a new site this year to track the rankings of my girl's select teams: http://home.gotsoccer.com/rankings.aspx . Every team in US select or club soccer is ranked by state, region, and nation. I know that these probably do not mean much but it is fun to track the teams as well as look at the rankings of upcoming opponents. It is based on a points system that I have not quite figured out yet. When I find out exactly how points are awarded I will let you know.
Check out this goal by Christian Press: https://youtu.be/dEUX5fxcNtM . This is a great example of a shot on goal for all those girls who are forced to play on the left side but hate taking the left footed shot. Use this move and you can still shoot with the trusted right foot.
Enjoy your day!
What is one of the best ways we can support women's soccer? How about watching women's soccer. I along with millions of other Americans love watching the USWNT play their various matches. For the most part these games are televised on major networks like ESPN and FS1. It is great that we can find the games on these channels.
The NWSL games, now that is a different story. These games are not that easy to find. If you live in the cities that are home to the NWSL teams, I hope you get to watch as many live games as possible. For the rest of us, it takes a bit more work to find a game. The best place I have found to watch the games is on You Tube. You Tube shows all of the games live. For right now, that is the best option we have. If the NWSL can show a major network good viewership for its games, we might get to watch all of the games on a major network.
I love the women's game so I will search out the games to watch. In order for the women's game to grow there needs to be an avenue for a potential future fan can just happen upon a game and get hooked. Nobody will just happen upon a You Tube live broadcast of a NWSL game.
Grab your phone, tablet, computer, or smart TV and watch some NWSL soccer. You are going to like what you see.
Try this game:
Friday June 17: WNY Flash vs. Portland Thorns 6:00Central Standard Time
There are always great conversations among parents at soccer practice. Sometimes I just like to listen to the conversations around me. I do not consider it eavesdropping as they must know that anybody around them is capable of hearing what they are saying.
Sunday I was watching my daughters in an academy scrimmage. There were two moms near me having a very interesting conversation. They were debating the age when it is too late to begin playing soccer. They were lamenting the fact the U10 girls team that their daughters' are on had received some new girls this season that had never played soccer. Their daughters had been playing since they were four. They were complaining that it was too late to learn the skills needed to play at a competitive level.
Is there an age that is too late to begin playing soccer and have the ability to become a good player? The ladies I was listening to thought it was possible with other sports but soccer required more time to develop the needed skills.
I would like to believe that they are wrong. I think it depends greatly on the coach. A good coach should be able to get a superb athlete up to speed an a fairly short time. The problem is that most kids starting at a later age do not have a great coach or are not a superb athlete.
Let me know what you think.
I recently found out that the NWSL league games are shown live on You Tube. It is definitely not as good as watching it on TV but it is nice to have some place to watch the games. Hopefully the women's game will be big enough to get a contract with a large sports network to carry the games. That is when the women's game will take the next step and the NWSL will gain some national prominence. Until that time occurs, I highly encourage you to support your favorite NWSL team and watch their games on You Tube.
Have you ever noticed the number of people that call out "HAND BALL" on the sidelines when a supposed offense has taken place. This is the one rule of soccer that seems to be the easiest to grasp by Americans who are still trying to figure out this game. My wife and I started laughing at my daughter's game this past Saturday at people's response to a perceived hand ball. They have no clue if it is possible to be offsides on a throw in but they get the hand ball. Next time you at are a game listen to the number of the people that will yell out "HAND BALL" to help out the referee. I think we should look at this as progress. Now we just need to make sure everybody knows that a goalie cannot pick up the ball if somebody on their own team passes it back to him or her.
I hope you have checked out the training videos part of this website. I try to find training videos that are either taught by women or feature girls as the participants in the videos. There really not that many videos that fall into those two categories as opposed to the number of videos geared towards men and boys.
I would like to see that changed. If you find any videos that you think would be helpful, please let me know. I will take a look at them and add them to our video gallery. They do not necessarily have to be training videos. They could be funny or motivational videos. Let's just make sure they are clean and appropriate for players of all ages.
Talk to you soon!
I have never been a big fan of protective headgear unless used by those who have already sustained some type of concussion or head injury. That was until today. One of my daughters was playing goalie in a scrimmage today for her academy team. She dove to block a shot and hit the side of her head on the ground when she landed. It hurt her bad enough to come off of the field. One saving grace was that they were playing on grass instead of turf. She was okay after a few minutes but it started a conversation with me and my wife tonight. My daughter only plays goalie every once in awhile. This is mainly due to the fact that she helps her team out more playing in the field instead of at goalie. However; when she does play goalie, she plays very aggressive and shows almost no fear when challenging for the ball. My wife and I have decided to get her some protective headgear for the times when she plays goalie. We might even have her wear it all of the time if it is comfortable.
Does anybody have any recommendations for headgear that they have purchased. There seems to be quite the variety available. We have seen the kind that looks like just a heavy duty sweatband al the way to the ones that look like a small helmet. I would love to hear from anybody who has an opinion good or bad on any of the available headgear options.
I would like to highly encourage any parent of a current or future soccer player to read the book by Dan Blank called Happy Feet. In this website we tend to stress the female side of the game of soccer but this is great reading whether your soccer player is a girl or boy.
Dan has written several books about the game of soccer and I recommend them all and plan to discuss them on later blogs. However, today I am going to focus on the first section of Happy Feet.
A copy of Happy Feet should be handed to every parent when they first sign up little Jonnie or Suzie for their first year of soccer. Dan does a great job in the first part of the book of explaining the game of soccer. He goes over the verbage used in soccer as well as the different styles of playing soccer. The most important part in this early section of the book is the area where he talks about the Rules of Soccer. How many of you have heard parents on the sideline with no clue about the rules of the game. One of the best ways we can help our children with their game is by knowing the rules of soccer. Knowing the rules of the game will also cut down on the number of misinformed comments directed at coaches and especially referees. Parents can make total fools of themselves on the sidelines when they do not know the rules of the game. Dan does an especially good job at explaining offside, playing the advantage, and hand balls. Knowing the rules makes the game so much more enjoyable to watch.
On a side note, I would like to encourage parents to take it a step farther and take a training class tobe a referee. Just help out with the younger age groups and you will do two things. You will get a better understanding of the rules and you will get a better understanding for what it is like to be a referee at the higher levels. You will find out that even in games with seven year olds it is not always the easiest thing to determine who touched the ball last before it went out of bounds.
In my next post I will talk about the second section of Dan's book where he talks about what coaches would like parents to know. Don't wait for the post. Go out to Amazon or your favorite bookstore and pick up a copy of Happy Feet. You will love this book.
