Providing world class youth soccer programs that enrich children's lives.

AYSO REGION 741- PASO ROBLES, CA

Coaches

As an all-volunteer organization, AYSO depends entirely on parent and other adult volunteers to act as coaches and referees. We are always looking for people who are interested in coaching kids in soccer!

Many of our first-year coaches in the younger divisions (6U – 8U and even 10U) have never coached or necessarily even played soccer before but yet have a very successful year. For those of you who are considering coaching your child but do not feel comfortable with your knowledge of the game, we offer plenty of on-line and live classes and support to make your experience a success.

Game Day Fields

Field Setup

Teams scheduled for the first game of the day are required to assemble the goals and place corner posts. The goals and corner posts are generally located in a storage closet at the snack bar of Barney Schwartz Park. Field setup should be completed so that games can begin on the scheduled time. Coaches should ask for volunteers from the team to perform this responsibility. Goals must be secured to the ground with stakes and safe for game play. Coaches and Referees need to walk the play area to ensure there are no objects that would cause injury to players during the game.

Field Tear Down

Teams scheduled for the last game of the day are required to disassemble the goals, remove corner posts, and Kids Zone signs. The goals, stakes, and corner posts must be placed in the container. Coaches should ask for volunteers from the team to perform this responsibility. Please ensure that no stakes/nails are left out on the field.

Player Ratings

Player Ratings for 8U- 14U divisions must be turned in in order to receive your team photos! Please fill out the Player Rating form and bring with you to Saturday games!
Download Player Rating Sheet

Communication

Join the 2023 Paso Robles Coaches Corner on the BAND App!

You can plan scrimmages, negotiate practice time changes, discuss field issues, and work collaboratively with the coach admin on all things AYSO!

How to Register as a Volunteer Coach

How to Register as a Volunteer Coach

Log into your AYSO account at www.pasoroblessoccer.com. If the account is under your spouse they will need to add you as a registered user.

»Click on "Volunteer" in left hand column
»Click on "Find Volunteer Roles" button on the upper right
»Select 'Head Coach" and complete the form.

Once completed you will need to access and complete your Safesport Training

Login to your Sports Connect account where you registered as a volunteer.
Click on the volunteer tab on the left-hand side of the screen
Click on SafeSport box
Click on Renew and Update
A screen will pop up where you will click on the “click HERE” link or copy and paste the URL into your browser to begin training

You will also receive an email invitation from TheAdvocates@SterlingVolunteers.com to complete a Background Check. Please complete this as soon as possible.

Training Requirements

Next you will need to complete the following Volunteer training requirements:

»Log into your AYSO account
»Click on "Volunteer" in the left hand column
»Click on "AYSOU" button on the upper right
»Click on "Training Library" on the left hand side
»Click on "Safe Haven" View Courses
•You will need to enroll and complete AYSO Safe Haven Course, CDC Concussion Awareness and Simons Heart Sudden Cardiac Arrest
»Return to "Training Library"
»Click on "Coaching" View Courses
»Enroll and complete the coaching session for your age division.

When you completed all of your training and the Sterling Background Check, please contact Stephanie at [email protected] so we can send you to the final step of getting your fingerprints done.

Coaches Tips

Exemplify Being Effort-Focused Over Outcome-Focused
Teach your team that you care more about effort than outcome. This creates a safe space for them to learn and grow. While winning is important and should be part of the goal, it's not everything and the only thing. Emphasize skill-building and teamwork, influence confidence positively, and praise effort.

Identify Your Why
Why do you coach? What's your coaching philosophy? What matters most to you? If your answer to any of these is only winning and only about you, you might be in coaching for the wrong reasons. Knowing your why can help guide how you coach, what you say, and what you stand for.

Communicate
Communicate with other coaches, with parents when necessary, and with your players. Be open and honest. Do your best to create a safe, respectful space for players to come to you to talk about sport or other topics. Equally as important as your communication with others is your communication with yourself. If you notice your self-talk is more negative, work on countering it with something more positive. Your players will pick up on your communication, even with yourself, so be sure to use language that facilities you in your coaching role.

Prepare
Coaching is a performance too, and throughout the course of a training or match, coaches are faced with several decisions. Preview potential scenarios, personnel, choices, decisions, and options ahead of time, so when you face them in the moment, you’re prepared, calm and focused.

Give Your Players A Voice
Allow for your players to have some autonomy and say in their experience. Doing so contributes to players feeling like they matter, and can facilitate motivation, confidence and fun. Maybe let them choose a fun drill or game at the end of practice, or include their input in the upcoming game plan, or their perspective during halftime adjustments.

Reflect
After each coaching experience, reflect on your performance. What went well today? What would you do differently next time? What stood out? What can you learn? Being reflective builds self-awareness and facilitates growth. Just as we expect our players to practice, learn, and progress, we should be doing the same as coaches.

Before You Go Yelling At The Referee...

Before you yell at the referee, consider the most common reasons why you might disagree:

● Referee(s) are usually in a better position to see the action, the offside line, etc.
● Referee(s) usually know the Laws of the Game better than coaches and parents.
● Many judgments are “in the opinion of the referee”.
● You are entitled to a different opinion but Law 5 makes it abundantly clear that only the referee’s opinion matters - they make the final decision.

Finally, referees are only human, and volunteers. Even FIFA World Cup referees don’t see everything.
Referee(s) have enough to keep track of as it is, with 14 or 18 or 22 players on the field; they don’t need coaches and parents yelling at them too. If you’re driving on the freeway in heavy traffic, does it help if all the passengers are yelling at you?

Here are some of the most common ways in which parents and coaches often get it wrong:

Hey ref, how is that (not) offside?
When parents and coaches disagree with an offside (non-)call, they usually miss the timing and/or the angle.

Timing: offside involves two points in time: 1) when the ball is played by a teammate, and 2) when the offside player becomes involved in active play. The AR flags at time 2), but the player was in offside position at time 1). When the AR flags, there may be no player in offside position. This is particularly hard to spot on a through ball, when there is more time and distance between the ball being played and the player being involved

Angle: the AR is on the offside line, the only place from which to judge offside accurately. It’s hard: even the world’s best referees get the offside call wrong about 1 in 4 times. Ask yourself: do you know exactly where each player was when the ball was played?

Hey ref, handball!
Handling the ball is only a foul if it is deliberate, in the opinion of the referee. If the referee does not whistle, s/he has decided that the player had no time to move his/her hand out of the way, and that the hand was in a natural position. It does not matter whether the player gained advantage from the handling. Most cases of handballs are not fouls.

Hey ref, how is that (not) a foul?
Physical contact involving kicking, charging, tackling, etc., is a foul if, in the opinion of the referee, it was careless, reckless, or using excessive force. If a player gets the ball first, but then kicks the opponent in a careless manner, it’s still a foul. The referee will let play continue for contact that is trifling or doubtful. You may disagree with the referee, but Law 12 makes it clear that this is a judgment call, not an absolute standard.
Just because a player ends up on the ground doesn’t mean a foul was committed. If two players come charging at each other to get to the ball, and one or both go down, it’s not a foul if they were trying to play the ball and not each other, and were not careless or worse.

Hey ref, that’s our ball!
When the ball goes out of bounds, the referee and AR have to decide who last touched it. You may think an opponent touched it last, but maybe the ball was already out. Again, it’s a judgment call.
The ball has to completely cross the line to be out (or to be a goal). If the ball touches the ground outside the line but part of the ball is still above the line, it is still in play.

Hey ref, that’s a bad throw-in!
Law 15 does not require a throw-in to be elegant. It can be ugly, the ball can spin, the ball can drop in front of the player, as long as both feet touch the ground, on or behind the touchline, and the ball comes from behind the head and is released above the head. Moreover, minor violations are usually trifling, and many advanced referees will let play continue. It’s soccer, not a throw-in beauty contest.

Finally... How often has a referee changed a call because you yelled at him/her? Probably never. The only effect is that the players are now focusing more on the referee than on the game, everyone enjoys the game less, and less people volunteer to be referees in the first place.

Small-Sided Matches

U.S. Soccer has mandated, for its member associations, small-sided matches as part of the Player Development Initiatives. Match play shall be governed by the FIFA Laws of the Game as modified by AYSO (with permission), the AYSO National Rules & Regulations and the age appropriate AYSO Coach Manual.

Youth players need to practice in a match-like environment, which provides numerous opportunities to practice and repeat a skill; not one possible chance every few minutes (like full-sided play can often present). Therefore, the concentrated ebb and flow of small-sided matches create the optimal learning environment for young players to develop.

There are unlimited benefits of small-sided matches:
• Children learn more when the ratio of coach to player is reduced
• Maximize ball contact, involvement, and mistakes (markers for improvement)
• Increase scoring opportunities
• Maximize attacking and defending play
• Maximize transitions and decision-making situations
• Present more coaching opportunities (observation and analysis)
• Excitement and fun!

To cultivate the numerous benefits of small-sided matches and maximize Player Development, AYSO has carefully balanced the number of players on the field and the number of players on the roster by age group.

Check out more about small-sided matches HERE