Lambchop
GOLD
When full puberty happens, by age 16 or 17, short, average or tall, it's a different ball game.
Size VS Skill, when do you see a difference.
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When full puberty happens, by age 16 or 17, short, average or tall, it's a different ball game.
Nothing wrong with speed.
Too many team rely on it and play kick and chase with the speedster at the young age. This does a disservice to the rest of the kids of playing soccer. When you get older the speed across the playing field evens out.
DBs and CBs can be just as fast if not faster than strikers.
Too many team rely on it and play kick and chase with the speedster at the young age. This does a disservice to the rest of the kids of playing soccer. When you get older the speed across the playing field evens out.
DBs and CBs can be just as fast if not faster than strikers.
Your last statement is very true.
Speed is always good.
No way. As the kids get older the best players start separating even further from the pack. If that kind of separation didn’t happen, you wouldn’t have elite players.
And any striker that can’t outrun CBs needs to find a new position.
If you’re playing good soccer, you don’t need to rely on speed. I don’t know what level you’re watching but speedy Katie or johnie blasting 4-5 goals in an 8-0 game doesn’t happen at the games I watch.
Many of the teams attempt to play good soccer. There is build up and goals are made very much with what you see on the professional levels.
Also some of the better strikers globally and at the highest level of club (DA, Ecnl) are skilled and don’t rely on speed either.
Raggamufin
BRONZE
Speed is part of the game
This is the evaluation for my son , who just got an offer from a top D1 school.
Speed - Great speed overall, in particular when running into space. Will be an important asset going forward
Surfref
PREMIER
When I talk about speed I am not talking about kickball soccer. I am talking about players that have speed when they have the ball at their feet, are fast and accurate with their passes and with speed off the ball.
Who are the 3 top consensus offensive players? C Ronaldo, Messi, Neymar. They are fast as hell in addition to being incredibly skilled.
Barcelona spent €140 million on Ousmane Dembele. Have you ever seen that kid run? His legs are a blur. PSG spent gobs of money on Mbappe. That kid is ridiculously fast. I suppose Man U spending hundreds of millions of pounds on Pogba and Anthony Martial had nothing to do with their insane speed.
When the worlds top clubs and talent scouts are betting the GDP of small countries on players with different play styles and skill sets but are all possessed with blazing speed, I have to believe speed is pretty damn important, and that posters on this board who think speed is not critical to an offensive player are probably the parent of one of those “good” slow players.
Lambchop
GOLD
As will be ball skill, soccer IQ, work ethic, and athleticism. It is all important.
This is a good one. I’ve think there are two approx ages where size is an issue. U little as the beast kid can bully and kick the ball with more force and score from further out as no keepers can stop the shot that hit the top of the net.
Then it’s an issue again at U14-u16 as some have stated with early puberty Vs late.
Another point is the team they are on and style of play. If the team knocks the ball around good and are skilled players size is less important BUT quickness and speed must be with the smaller player.
Teams that play direct physical style typically need a big strong fast player to be successful
Then it’s an issue again at U14-u16 as some have stated with early puberty Vs late.
Another point is the team they are on and style of play. If the team knocks the ball around good and are skilled players size is less important BUT quickness and speed must be with the smaller player.
Teams that play direct physical style typically need a big strong fast player to be successful
Lambchop, just because the players who have it all — great skill, incredible speed, high soccer IQ — are rare, that’s why everyone is looking for those type of players. And I’m telling you, coaches get excited about raw speed more than any other characteristic.
Because you can coach skill, you can coach soccer IQ, but you can’t coach speed. The guys who are burners and can last 90 mins. are rare, and they are the lucky winners of the genetic lottery that everyone is trying to find.
There are tons of free stylists all over Europe, S. America and even Asia whose ball mastery and ball skills are as good as, if not better, than Messi and Neymar. But none of them can run like Neymar, and certainly they can’t do the type of things he can running at top speed like he does.
I’m going to use my son as an example. He has fantastic skills, but there are a lot of academy players with comparable skills or even better, but there are very, very few that have his combo of speed and strength. He is not playing academy but he has open offers from 3 academy teams to join whenever he wants. I always ask the academy coaches, “Why do you even want this fool, he makes so many stupid mental mistakes. And half the time he’s just grabassing in practice.” They all say, “I can fix stupid, I can’t coach his speed or physicality.”
smellycleats
SILVER ELITE
Nah.
No matter how hard he works or how smart he plays, a donkey is still a donkey, and a smart slow player will always be a major defensive liability, never win through balls and lose out on most 50-50 balls. There’s a very limited number of smart slow players you can have on a team before your team is utter shit defensively.
I’ve seen plenty of kids work hard and hit the upper level of their talent and fail to progress, no matter how hard they try. I’ve seen all these kids take speed training and the slow players get a little faster, but I have never seen a slow player become fast. I’ve asked speed trainers if they have ever turned a slow kid into a fast kid, and the answer is never. And then I’ve seen truly talented players who have good basic ball mastery decide OK I’m gonna turn it on and they start killing everyone, especially in the girls game.
Sports is not like other activities, the physical talent is so important. A guy who thinks 5% faster, it’s not a big deal in an office job, getting your paperwork done a little bit later doesn’t matter. But a guy whose 5% faster will get to every 50-50 ball first, a guy whose 5% stronger will win every 50-50 challenge, the guy who jumps 5% higher than everyone else will put his head on a 50-50 air ball first.
And the mental aspect of sports is not like learning superstring theory, or quantum gauge theories, or dualities in anti-de Siter spaces. Anyone with slightly above average IQ can learn or figure out what they need to.
The fact is that most kids in academy are good soccer players and decent athletes, but very, very few of them are great athletes. The few that are great athletes and have skills IMO really stand out and honestly, the rest of the players in academy league are there to support those few diamonds in the rough.
soccer_dad
BRONZE
"Sports is not like other activities, the physical talent is so important. A guy who thinks 5% faster, it’s not a big deal in an office job, getting your paperwork done a little bit later doesn’t matter. But a guy whose 5% faster will get to every 50-50 ball first, a guy whose 5% stronger will win every 50-50 challenge, the guy who jumps 5% higher than everyone else will put his head on a 50-50 air ball first."
You don't think a guy whose brain functions 5% faster will win every 50-50 challenge? You don't think a guy whose brain functions 20% faster will create mismatches to their advantages before the other team realize them?
You don't think a guy whose brain functions 5% faster will win every 50-50 challenge? You don't think a guy whose brain functions 20% faster will create mismatches to their advantages before the other team realize them?
No. How hard is it to recognize a loose ball? I’m a lot smarter than my dog (I think), but he will win every game of fetch.
And what’s the mismatch everyone is looking for? Attacking the slowest defender.