Thoughts on Sand Soccer?

My players have put together teams of friends from other teams and have a great time. They have won multiple tournaments and its a great day for the parents too. Study the rules well and use them to your advantage!
 
If you are looking for something fun for the kids, this is the tournament for them.
No development and not fun for parents when you are in the sun all day two days in a row.

Personally, I hated it and will never have my kids do it again. I would do futsal any day over beach soccer.
 
As a surfer, I didn't hate sand soccer. I would not recommend a sand soccer before a normal soccer tournament that matters (as much as any of this matter) like Surf Cup. My DD was not injured, but did get blisters that bothered her for a few weeks. She did have a 50/50 ball collision with a player from the A team and that player was injured.
 
Fun when they were little, got to u13 kids got hurt and it got dangerous. Things got physical because boys are boys and no real refs just u16/17 kids who didn't care. Punches were thrown. Would rather play futsal
 
I hate sand soccer, sand hurts your feet if your not wearing the "sand socks", etc, and I don't see if helping the players game at all.

Only thing I enjoyed, was a day at the beach where you can potluck with the team and bond.

Futsal is much better, and helps the players make quicker decisions.
 
Fun for sure but sooooo many injuries. Walking by the medical tent was an eye opener. We made it through two times unfazed but won't go back due to how many kids were injured and the injuries were considerable. broken toes, sliced feet etc...

Talk to a trainer who works those events and you won't ever do it.

Kids had fun but sadly, with all the time and money we put into soccer, sitting out the next 6 weeks isn't worth it.
 
I also don't let my kid ride her bike anymore. I dont want to ruin all of the years of soccer practice.
And if she goes to the mall, she has to wear a helmet and knee pads.
 
timbuck said:
I also don't let my kid ride her bike anymore. I dont want to ruin all of the years of soccer practice.
And if she goes to the mall, she has to wear a helmet and knee pads.
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The odds of her being hurt in sand soccer are much higher than while riding a bike or going to the mall. We did the one in Oceanside a few years back and our team ended up with a broken ankle, broken toe, and some nasty bruising. The injuries ruined the experience.
 
When you introduce the tournament aspect and trying to win against other teams it creates the injuries. We used to do beach training a few times every summer as a change of pace and it was fun. Just your team having fun, training, small sided games with a picnic and body surfing afterwards. Go have fun at the beach it doesn't take a tournament to do that.
 
chargerfan said:
The odds of her being hurt in sand soccer are much higher than while riding a bike or going to the mall. We did the one in Oceanside a few years back and our team ended up with a broken ankle, broken toe, and some nasty bruising. The injuries ruined the experience.
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Are they any higher than playing in a "regular" soccer tournament?
 
timbuck said:
I also don't let my kid ride her bike anymore. I dont want to ruin all of the years of soccer practice.
And if she goes to the mall, she has to wear a helmet and knee pads.
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Don't forget hoverboards, playing ball in the house, tree climbing and fidget spinners (they could fly off and put an eye out.)

My kids have played the beach tournament for over 3 years, including about 6 practices at the beach prior to. Never had any serious injuries. Players had much worse injuries on the pitch over those seasons. Nothing compared to the injury tents at State Cup.
 
timbuck said:
Are they any higher than playing in a "regular" soccer tournament?
Click to expand...

I know this is just antecdotal, but we have never had our team suffer so many injuries in one weekend. We had 3+ out for a couple of weeks. Parents and girls decided it wasn't worth it, so we never did it again. It was a combination of playing in sand and refs letting it turn into a full on brawl.
 
chargerfan said:
I know this is just antecdotal, but we have never had our team suffer so many injuries in one weekend. We had 3+ out for a couple of weeks. Parents and girls decided it wasn't worth it, so we never did it again. It was a combination of playing in sand and refs letting it turn into a full on brawl.
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I will say that a good ref does make a difference. My younger daughter had a ref that was calling every little infraction. With the 07 group, nothing seemed all that dangerous. We whined a little from the sidelines.
My older daughter's games on Saturday had a ref that let a lot of stuff go. No injuries, but our keeper took a beating.
On Sunday, the older team got the tight ref. It helped our team out to play a cleaner game.
 
About 5-6 years ago I was refereeing beach soccer in Oceanside. They had the referee tent right next to the trainer's tent. There was a constant flow of players with leg injuries. I saw everything from dislocated toes, fractured toes, feet, and legs, tons of knee injuries, hip injuries. There were four ambulance calls to our trainer tent. To top it off, I fractured one of my toes when I hit a rock that was under the sand. I would not allow my DD to play sand soccer and would recommend to friends that they do not allow their kids to play sand soccer. The problem is that most youth club player try to play like they are on grass.
 
pewpew said:
My daughter is a GK. She wears her dirt bike goggles for sand tournaments. Huge help. Refs never have a problem with it.
A few minor injuries. Nothing to keep anyone from training the next week. Bring plenty of sunscreen. Girls have a blast.
Biggest problem now is that in between games when they want to jump in the waves. Too many Great Whites out there. :eek:
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Good to know about the goggles. My daughter is the gk and this is her first sand tournament.
 
Fun, but avoid the host team (CDA Slammers) if you can. They game the rules and are absolutely nasty when the ref isn't looking--almost as if their coaches are telling them to take cheap shots when the ref isn't looking, which is all the time with one ref on the sand.

At one point, this got out of hand and one of their players kicked a goalie in the head AFTER the play was over and the ref turned his back, and there was no question that it was done on purpose.
Split his head open and sent him to urgent care.
And no, wasn't my team. They were just a dirty bunch playing nothing that resembled soccer, and seemingly encouraged to do so by their coach: in all of their games.

They apparently REALLY REALLY want to win sand soccer at any cost.
 
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