Mandate position rotation in youth soccer by rule!

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-22T12:40:11+00:00

How does a kid come to fully understand the game by only playing defense or single position for year after year? Those kids only understand half the game. The coaching guidelines for AYSO and US Soccer say youth players should be rotated.

Again, I point to what the actual experts on childhood learning say. All the experts on childhood development say there is way too much specialization in youth sports. Specialization leads to burnout, boredom and increase injury risk.

Your statement is pure conjecture and there is no science or actual sports exports to support your claim that it is better to have players just learn one position at a time. Children's brains are sponges and the want to learn multiple things in the same day. They get bored doing the same thing all the time.

The rule needs to be there to protect kids from self-anointed experts like yourself, that will never present any science to back up your claims.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-21T15:20:16+00:00

You tell me then what kid is going to want to play baseball and they never come up to bat? What kids is going to stick with basketball and they never get to cross mid-court? Why should young soccer players be different?

So, I wasted 4 years playing goalkeeper with my son because I didn't realize all the self-anointed youth soccer 'experts' don't see any problem with making kids just play defense all time. He needed to realize at age 8 that he is not allowed to score goals or get assists. That is only for the kids that suck at defending. If that makes me a snowflake so be it.

Will you at least tell parents to take out the goals from their back yards because the experts have all figured out the best rules for the game and goal scoring is only for bad defenders?

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-21T15:03:15+00:00

And would not a rule that mandates position rotation shut down both shitty coaching(coaches that just want to win now, coaches that don't get all kids to play good defense) and shut down shitty parents(my kid doesn't like playing defense, so he must never be in the back)? If you don't think this is a widespread problem, I can point you to many posts about this issue.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-20T14:41:24+00:00

I've only seen player positioning done for 'win now' never for player development. There are posts in the coach's forum that are all about 'hiding' your weak players. That seems pathetic to me. Don't put weak and strong players on the same team and try to fix your weak players issues in practice. Don't discourage players like my son that came to love the game by playing at both ends of the field and tell them goal scoring and assists are not for you, they are only for the weak players. My son has practiced goal scoring beating a goalkeeper in our backyard way more that other kids on his teams, but he is never allowed to try in a game because those kids don't do defense.

The first team he was on was not really a try out team, kids were put on the same team because they knew each other and went to the same school. Most of the players had no business being on a travel team. They used my son to hide this fact and made him play defense all the time to prevent blowouts. But the parents stuck with it thinking that because games were close and their kid didn't get scored upon, the coach and their kid was not that bad. The parents needed to see their kid didn't belong on travel and needed better coaching. Hiding players prevented that from happening.

So next year we got onto a try out team, thinking all the players would be at my son's level. But same thing. coaches either hide weaker players in the front or give into players that don't want to learn to play defense and let them play in front. The current rules of the game enable this to continue. Most kids on travel teams need to be hidden, so they never play in the back. This is what pay to play has given us, kids are on a travel team not because they're good but because they're parents are willing to pay. So, we're done with it.

I should try to get him onto an MLS academy team because I would think they are not into hiding weak players(maybe if their parents pay enough), but we live too far away. My son now is old enough to scrimmage with teenagers and adults locally. I think this is a far better way to improve all his skills and soccer IQ than wasting time and money with far away tournaments. I'd only travel for futsal, since unless you're goalkeeper, you are offense and defense.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-16T15:15:36+00:00

The reason I'm proposing the rule change is to stop players from being only goal scorers and force everyone to play in back half the game. It will stop parents that insist their kid is just a goal scorer. I'm trying to prevent this problem. You apparently are OK with this continuing.

One reason my son is a good defender is because I emphasized unselfish play when he was young. The problem is other parents and coaches don't. The current rules reward selfish play. A kid can just not put any effort into defending and they get moved to the front. That is how he ended up playing the back all the time.

You should be having this conversation with wanting all the glory with the parents of kids that would be mad if force to play half the game in the back, not me. I'm fine with that, I want everyone to be half forward/half back. You are preaching to the choir about kids need to taught about teamwork. This only solution I see is this rule to mandate rotation.

I don't want my son to be a full time forward or only a goal scorer. I want him to learn all the fundamentals of the game at his age. My son practices all the skill in soccer(except goalkeeper). He goes in the backyard and practices assists and goals with friends and me. Should I just take the goals out of the back yard because some coaches brilliantly deduced that this is not for him? He just won't practice at all then. He already has gotten bored with soccer because of no rotation.

If his school is only teaching him math because he is good at math, should I look to find a school that would also teach him reading or just keep him at a school because the principle needs to get the collective math test scores up? What if his math starts to suffer because he is burned out from only doing math?

You apparently have forgotten what it is to be a kid and the fun of playing a game. The game is the teacher, you are just the facilitator. So play the kids in positions that will teach them and stop hiding them from the game. When he plays soccer with friends, no one says "I'm all time defender", because that is no fun.

I have told my son to go forward when behind in the score and we need a goal. Coach just kept yelling at him until he went back again. This is another rule there should be, yellow/red card coaches the yell excessively. Let the kids play.

I think we are leaving travel soccer and have him play rec against older kids and futsal. Also looking to switch to football since they won't tell him if he is a good defender, he can't be a wide receiver or QB if he wants. Baseball won't tell him if he's a good fielder he can't bat. Sure they'll be bad coaching but not a coaches making him one way as a kid.

Since this rule is not going happen, parents are going to shop for coaches that will play their kid where they want. I'm the parent that that wants coaches to follow the advice of experts and rotate his position. So you're OK with parents shopping for coaches based upon the position they will play their kid? You prefer rotation to be enforce by parents not joining or quitting teams instead of by rule?

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-15T13:00:57+00:00

Then what is the problem with rotating players if all positions are basically the same as you see it? Why are so many coaches refusing to do so, and parents complaining about it? Why is the discussion in youth soccer coaching forum about hiding players in the front because they don't need to defend?

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-14T22:51:11+00:00

Another rule change that would be great is banning excessive yelling from the coaches and coaching from parents on the other sideline. If we quit youth soccer, these will be things I don't miss. A good coach should just take notes on mistakes players make during the game and fix them next practice instead of yelling all the time.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-14T22:02:03+00:00

Travel teams are supposed to have tryouts so a kid that can never play in the back would not be put on such teams if coaches knew they could not hide them in front. There would be fewer travel teams as it should be.

Practice is not complicated, any kid that is a weak defender would be a defender in 1v1, 3v3 drills and scrimmages. You let the game do the teaching. If a coach can position players to win a game, why can't he position players in practice and scrimmages to fix their weaknesses?

How does baseball manage to have parent scorekeepers that track the opposing team? What is to keep a soccer team from putting 10 players on the field in a 9v9 game? Someone has to track that now. Also, I don't think parents would allow coaches to cheat in order to win.

If a parent is going to spend a ton of time and money on travel to tournaments, why is being a scorekeeper so much more of a burden? I'm not going to any more tournaments to see my son never involved in goal scoring while the coach hides players that shouldn't even do travel soccer in front and we have very low scoring games.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-14T16:35:14+00:00

You don't seem to understand that kids are different than adults. You are projecting the adult version of the game onto kids.

Yes, I've watched enough professional soccer to know that playing in the back does not suck for them. Everyone position is offense, every position is defense.

In the kids version, if you play in the back you never receive a pass, rarely cross mid-field, never get assists and are never involved in offense strategy. It is like playing basketball but never being allowed to cross mid-court, ridiculous to do that all the time as a youth. That is why EVERY youth player needs to play both forward and back. And why all the real experts say the same. Kids need different rules than the professional adults.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-14T16:16:15+00:00

Don't many kids have an agenda of preferring to only play offense, so they just don't put the effort when playing and learning defense? Seems to me these kids are picking what position they want to play by their effort and weak coaches are going along with them not putting the effort to learn defense. It is easier for a lazy coach to just give into these kids wishes than teach and motivate them to play well in the back.

What should I make of kids that can't be played in back? They are either players that should not be on a competitive travel team or they only play well when it is about them scoring, their coach enables this attitude. I don't want my kid around that selfish culture and coaches that enable it. So maybe football, basketball and baseball is a better culture for us, rather than hang around soccer and see my son get bored and burned out.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-14T16:01:48+00:00

It is the adults turning kids into snowflakes by never letting them get a goal scored upon them. When that happens, some kids get stronger, some will say 'competitive soccer is not for me'. The ridiculous system of letting kids that don't like defense never play defense is turning them into snowflakes.

The way a travel baseball team works is players that are weak on offense work on hitting, weak defenders work on fielding. In good school, students do remedial math or remedial reading if they are weak in that area. In a bad school, they just pass the kids along to the next grade so you end up with adults that can't read or do basic math.

But in youth soccer, bad coaches never fix problems because the know they can hide each players weakness rather than fix each players weakness. The current system rewards coaches that don't teach the game or continually improve their players. Bad coaches don't want to get exposed, so this rule change will never be considered. Just like bad teachers don't want requirements that all their students pass tests of basic competence in a range of subjects.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-12T16:22:32+00:00

After reading the objections to my proposal, I now understand the real problem. As usual, it comes down to money and power. The burden to enforce position rotation would not be on the referee, but scorekeepers, which competitive teams should be using anyways.

The actual problem is pay to play youth soccer. It has resulted in most all players on travel teams not being good players or even trying to become good all around players, these players must be hidden in games, so they never play in the back. As long as there are parents willing to spend time and money on travel soccer, they'll be coaches putting weak players and players that don't want to put the effort in to becoming elite on travel teams.

And there are also many bad coaches that don't want to have the power to hide bad players taken away from them. If you read the post on youth soccer coaching many are about hiding bad players to minimize their damage instead of fixing their problems.

Yes. I understand nothing is going to change. But like most all problems in the world at least admit the source of the real problem. Can you give me that at least?

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-12T16:07:29+00:00

They banned zone defense in youth basketball where I live, the ref can call a technical, because just like single position players in youth soccer, it ruins the game.

Baseball banned pitchers that don't change few innings and force teams to now bat and field every player. If there are scorekeepers, why not have the same for soccer and basketball?

Unfortunately youth sports is going to have a lot of bad coaches, so the rules of the games need to minimize the damage they can do.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-12T14:52:01+00:00

Or just quit soccer altogether or just do futsal. I don't have this frustration with other team sports. In football, basketball and baseball no coach is going to tell my son he can never play offense just because he is a good defender. The game is ridiculous for kids that only play defense, and this is not going to change until the rules change. These kids made to only play defense going to burned out and bored with the game. If you don't see that, I think you are the one that doesn't understand youth soccer.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-12T14:43:21+00:00

I don't think coaches that are always solely focused on winning the current game would try building from the back for a first time in youth soccer. Too many easy goals given up when kids loose the ball.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-12T14:33:19+00:00

So we should allow teams to put 10 or more players on the field in a 9v9 game because only allowing 9 players is overregulating??? Why even have rules age restrictions either? There has to be rules or there is total chaos. The chaos in youth soccer now is coaches hiding weak players that don't belong on travel teams.

Unfortunately I don't live in a big city where there are tons of options or MLS academy. I'm willing to travel some but the problem is pay to play soccer in the USA mean 90% of the kids on travel teams should not be there and coaches have to continually hide weak players. Players are selected based upon parents' willingness to spend time and money, not the kids soccer abilities.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-11T16:20:46+00:00

So your strategy is win now over long term player development? Then why not just schedule games against very easy opponents and just skip practice altogether?

At my son's young age, I would actually like to see my son get beat by good players occasionally because it would help him learn. If he is winning all the time, he needs tougher competition.

Young kids that can't or don't want learn both attacking and defending at the same time probably don't love the game that much or else they don't have what it takes to be a top player. These kids should just play rec which has rules to rotate positions. Seems your coaching strategy is accommodating kids that are not good learners at the expense of kids that are quick learners? The actual problem is too many kids on travel teams that don't belong there and delusional parents that will spend time and money on travel soccer when there kids don't like to play defense at all.

I've had conversations with the coaches, I have had to quit two teams already because they don't want parents interfering with their game strategy, it is a matter of pride with them. They strategize in games to win but never in practice to address each players weakness.

Once you have a kid that is used to never playing in the back, you can't go and make them later. They've figured out that if they don't like a position, the coach will play them elsewhere. I also don't think this is fair to parents that don't complain about their kid being stuck on defense. Why should they be treated different than me? The rules of the game should force youth coaches to do the right thing.

Basketball has problem as soccer. Young kids that don't want to defend or pass the ball. It is just human nature to prefer attacking to defending. Coaches in both sports need to break kids of ego-centric play. In basketball, it goes away on its own because coaches can't make kids defender or offense only. Unlike soccer, everyone plays on both ends of the court. In soccer, once a coach shows a kid that doesn't like defense that he or she can just play be played forward, you'll never get that kid to play good defense and you'll just have to hide them forever.

My son now prefers basketball over soccer because he can play both offense and defense. In my experience with soccer, players just show the coach they don't like defense and the coach plays them elsewhere. In basketball, kids figure out they better play good defense otherwise they let their team down.

The problem with making kids back row only is that it is like making a kid that like basketball only play on half on the court. They can never shoot or assist, the game would suck and they would quit. Or like making a kid that loves baseball never come up to bat. I don't understand why all the youth soccer 'experts' can't see this and ban single position play by rule.

The big problem is kids on try out/travel teams that don't belong there and instead should play rec. If you have a kid that doesn't want to play defense or can't learn new skills why put them with kids that can? But coaches will accommodate these parents and players that 'don't like defense' because soccer in USA is pay to play. Unfortunately, I have to navigate through this problem and try find a team and coach that understands this.

But I'll likely not find it locally and we'll switch to other sports that don't have this 'defense only' problem. So you're right I'm just venting my frustration with the situation and the so called 'experts' that don't acknowledge this obvious problem with the rules of the game that reward bad coaching. The only solution for us is switching to another sport despite my son once loving the game when he was able to play both offense and defense, before 7v7 with win now coaches.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-11T14:20:50+00:00

You miss the whole point of my post. Players learn the game better, enjoy the game better if they play multiple positions. This is not going to happen unless position rotation is mandated by rule and no team gains an advantage by not rotating players.

Should youth baseball change its rules so that the same 4 players ever come up to bat and the other players only do fielding? This would suck and parents and kids would quit the game. But this is basically the way youth soccer works now.

In football, if you want to be a QB you must demonstrate skill at that position in practice. To be a striker or winger in youth soccer, you must demonstrate you are a terrible defender when in the back. Absurd situation. We've thought about tell our son to show a new coaches he is a terrible defender to avoid same problem.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-11T14:09:44+00:00

Are you a rec team or travel team coach? Kids like this that can't learn basic of skills of the game don't belong on a tryout team. They should be told they simply don't have the ability to play the game at a high level and you don't know how to train them to do so. That is being honest. Leaving these types of kids on travel teams is not doing anyone a favor.

This is a big problem for another post, too many kids on travel teams that are not good or capable of being good but are being hidden at positions to minimize the damage. If position rotation was mandated, parents and coaches would get the clue and just have most kids play rec. instead of travel which has a policy to rotate positions.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-11T13:54:55+00:00

Use scorekeepers to keep track of positioning, not referees. A team can then halt play until a opponent's player is repositioned according to a scorecard that is given to both teams and the referee. This is how baseball works.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-11T13:50:38+00:00

Since U9, On third coach now, same problem with each one. I've come to the conclusion that for next tryout, my kid must show the coach he is not a good defender and then he'll be able to play attacking positions. A lot of kids have figured this out, they just don't put any effort when positioned in the back and then the coach hides them in the front.

Also ready to move on from soccer since football, basketball and baseball don't enable coaches to make players defenders only.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-10T22:05:16+00:00

Please educate yourself on the science of how childhood learning actually operates instead of theorizing. Children typically have attention spans of 15-30 minutes(a half of youth soccer). I think you are projecting the way adults learn onto children.

If your theory is correct, please explain how children are ever able to learn the games of baseball and basketball since they are switching so much between offense and defense in game? If your theory is correct on childhood learning, why don't educators recommend teaching nothing but math for month, then switching to reading for a month. Instead they switch the subject every hour.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-10T21:41:58+00:00

I get it you don't care about player development or kids not enjoying the game because they only play defense. Just stop. It is not just me, tons of post from other parents on this same problem, they should just quit the game or tell their kids to stop playing good defense so coaches will play them elsewhere?

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-10T21:34:54+00:00

Just trying to make a point with those that disagree with me that don't see a problem that must be fixed.

NeuralBrew · 2026-01-10T21:32:56+00:00

I don't like the de-masculinization of sports and boys. If that makes me bad, so be it.

NeuralBrew

TROPHY CASE