Coaches Blog: Coach Seamus

There is an old Irish proverb which says – “NÍL AON TINTEÁN MAR DO THINTEÁN FÉIN”- which translates into – “THERE’S NO FIRESIDE LIKE YOUR OWN.” 

Not too many people use fires to heat their homes anymore but the proverb is all the more true today. These challenging times are all about family and community.  For our soccer community here in San Diego and for our families, these times are all about how we treat each other, how we respect and support each other, and how we get through this and become stronger as individuals, family members, and members of both the local and global soccer community.  SDSC is here and committed to our players’ welfare, both physically and mentally.

We are now into our 7th week of social distancing. 

As we enter into May, it is important for our players to remember to stay focused and get into (or maintain) a daily routine. My recommendation is that every day our players set aside 90 minutes, devoted entirely to ball mastery and exercise. There are numerous drills and exercises you can access on the Rise Elite Soccer App or the SDSC website that will keep you busy. Maintaining a level of fitness will help relieve stress and will also be very important when our players return to the field. Players...plug in the ear phones and take that thirty minute jog. So roll up your sleeves and get busy. Trust me!! You will feel better.

Our talented coaches are Zooming, sending training videos, providing homework assignments and checking in with our players on a weekly basis. We need parents to encourage our players to participate if they are having difficulty motivating in this temporary format of SDSC. We are still a soccer club and your children are still soccer players even if we are not having traditional training at the fields. 

All our teams and coaches should be working collaboratively to share successful tools and positive demonstrations of our players taking advantage of this focused time towards their own personal challenges. Let’s continue to showcase how special the SDSC community is and to push each other to develop in non-traditional environments.

There is a real opportunity for all of our players to rewrite their athletic stories. Nearly all of the soccer super stars in the world (Pele, George Best, and Maradona to name a few) achieved greatness by working on the streets and in the backyards of their small towns, as we know from John Napier’s story last week. I look forward to the next installment!

Stay safe and good luck with your new routine. Maybe you can up your game a little? Below is a video for all to see and hopefully the inspiration will flow.

Thanks,

Coach Seamus