The Rush Way is the embodiment of all that is Rush Soccer; the rules and manner in which Rush members hold themselves and how they expect other Rush members toconduct themselves. This is not inherent in all people, but can be learned. The Rush Way encourages passion, leadership, respect and,above all, quality. All whorepresent the Rush are representing the Rush brand and tens of thousands of people throughout the country. The Rush stands for excellence, passion, desire, commitment and respect.
The Rush Way represents our culture, our values and our tradition. It defines who we are, and who we want to be. That is why we embrace it and seek to apply in all our clubs. Every detail, no matter how small, makes a difference. In the end, every culture is built up under a set of small details which it stands for and were it is defined.
Acknowledgement:
When a coach addresses a player during training or competition, it is important the player acknowledges. Communication is two-way.
Throughout the game, tensions, confusion, and many emotions arise, and it’s there, more than nowhere, were we have to stand together. To build that connection, we have to practice it every day, and in all scenarios. By acknowledging each other’s, we strengthen in bond and in communication.
Greeting:
Players are expected to greet the Staff with a handshake for all staff local, national and international. The Rush staff across the country expect their players to shake their coaches hand each time they meet. Why?…respect, build social skills, break down barriers, learn culturally accepted behavior, the list goes on.
It is not what happens, but how we deal with it. Somethings escape our control and let us with little space for choice. It might happen that someday you will be late for practice. But values come first. So first you greet the staff, and then rejoin the team
This is the Rush. This is the Rush Way.
This article was written by Pablo Toledo, Rush Soccer’s Sporting Project Director.
We have spoken about this before, clubs almost always declare that their goal is to develop players. Now, in my experience, that doesn’t normally make it far from beautiful words and sentences full of coaching education cliches. Maybe I’m pessimistic and/or overcritical. Moreover, I think most of the time clubs and coaches can’t even express in pragmatic terms and actions how a club would specifically behave and operate in certain areas if that is the true objective pursued (I must be pessimistic…).
We, the Rush, do know, and that’s a statement we can stand behind. Our Rush Way Player First, Team Second philosophy is one of those areas that specifically guides the way we operate towards prioritizing in player development. Read below:
PLAYER FIRST, TEAM SECOND
Similar to the European youth club structure, Rush encourages the player to be first before his or her individual team. For example, we encourage:
This enables players to be comfortable playing on teams that are in line with their ability regardless of age but based on performance in training and game days. Players are encouraged to train with higher level teams to accelerate their development.
– “But Pablo, don’t take away my best player, we are fighting for the league”.
– I don’t care.
Have you ever self reflected on how you and your club would operate in the following areas if the objective and the priority is truly to develop players? I think you’ll find the following graph interesting. Enjoy.
This article was written by Pablo Toledo, Rush Soccer’s Sporting Project Director.
I’ll start with an honest comment: I totally made the following two mistakes when I started coaching.
I was starting my coaching career and I had decided after studying and hearing from more experienced professionals that I wanted to give equal playing time, so suddenly I found myself coaching games in which I was spending most of my time trying to fight the clock and make it as balanced as possible for all of my players.
I had also studied and was supportive of the idea that a developing player should not specialize positionally too early, so as my team was under the generally referenced age of 13 to start the specialization process, I was playing, within the game, many of my players in different positions.
You can imagine how chaotic and complicated it can be to try to coach a game in which you’re trying to accomplish both things simultaneously: Give equal playing time to all, and allow players to experience multiple positions. It was a mess and I had so much going on that my coaching was almost completely based on administering these two factors.
It didn’t take me long to fix the second one and say: “Ok, I do want these players to experience different positions, but that doesn’t mean they have to all do it within the same game. Let’s spread that out”, so suddenly Danny that year was playing some games as a mid and some others as a defender, and here and there as a forward. Good, we got that one sorted out.
Now for the always debated topic of playing time. I re-stated my resolution that I still support to this day: Give equal playing time. Just because Danny is a bit better today than Johnny, that doesn’t give him an automatic pass to have more developmental opportunities. What if Johnny is just a late developer? Does he deserve to get less opportunities to develop his potential just because of that? The answer is no, so the problem to solve is how we can give equal playing time without going into the craziness of my early days. The Rush Way 80-20 gave me the answer. Read it below from the Rush Way Philosophy.
Playing Time
Playing time for any individual is completely at the coach’s discretion. Rush encourages that playing time at all levels should be equal throughout the season. At the younger developmental ages, players should be exposed to as much of the game as possible. Limiting team roster size will aid in increased playing time for all players.
At the older/higher levels there will be instances when playing time will vary from game to game, but if player placement has been completed correctly, then equal playing time throughout the year should be achieved. For instance, of your ten field players, this could mean you play eight of your starters and play two of your weaker players, 80/20 rule. This will provide a more balanced level of play. Especially in the youth division, starters should vary throughout the season.
Simple and effective solution. If one day, because the game was like this or like that, Suzie played more than Jenny, you don’t have to feel so bad about it, maybe next game Jenny plays more. Sometimes this happens naturally and you don’t even need to plan it so much.
At the younger ages, I think the 80-20 is also great to remove the “I’m a sub feeling”. As you constantly rotate the starting team, everybody feels important.
Tim Schulz, Rush Soccer’s President & CEO, and the founder of the club, talked to us about this during a podcast interview highlighting this same last point.
However, I do think that the 80-20 loses strength as the players enter the last couple of years at the club. U17+ to use an age group as a reference. Even if I truly think and frequently tell my players that to be a starter within my team doesn not necessarily mean I consider them better, because players are different and might offer diverse skill sets and there are so many reasons why a coach might pick this or that starting team, it is true that most of the times there is a certain tendency, or a certain preference for an eleven, and at this stage I don’t want to shy up from actually talking about starters and subs, and the reason for that is that we get close to the performance stages that they aspire to (whether it is college or professionalism), and this is how it will be then, so I care about preparing them to deal with adversity if they’re not in the first eleven. To be a good sub is actually something that you can learn and I know many high level coaches that look at this because they want to know if a player, in case they’re substitutes, will still contribute to the group or will become a cultural assassin (quoting Damien Hughes on his book ‘The Barcelona Way: Unlocking The DNA Of A Winning Culture’). In fact, when we spoke to Fernando ‘Bocha’ Batista, who at the time was Argentina’s U20 & U23 MNT Head Coach, he made a strong emphasis on this topic.
Beyond that aspect, I don’t want to be hypocritical. The players realize that there are teammates that I overall think are my first picks, so I don’t want to lie to them.
Lastly, this actually allows me to also coach the starters to be good starters, so I tell the group openly: If you’re in the first eleven, train hard to stay in it and know that I support you even if you have a couple bad games, don’t fear to be on the edge because you got up with the wrong foot today, and if you’re a sub, work even harder to prove me wrong and know that if you make it to the first 11, I’ll support you just like I did with the player that was starting before.
Maybe there’s a better way, but I think you stay honest, loyal, and fair to your players when you approach it like this.
In summary and to make it a simple rule of thumb, use the 80-20 until they reach U17 and from there move progressively to a more similar format to what they’ll experience at performance stages. This might be obvious, but basically we are saying: The closer you get to performance stages, the more we try to resemble the environment.
Reaching the final moments of a match can be a team’s relief… or its worst nightmare. Whether winning or losing by a goal, there are aspects of the game that are essential to face the last minutes and succeed.
As you know, it is part of the Rush curriculum to coach our players on adopting different behaviors when the game is coming to its end and the team is up a goal or down a goal.
The Rush Way considers it a virtue of its players to recognize and use the ‘moods of the game’ in their team’s favor. Adapting our game to the current score to either maximize our team chances to come back (when losing) or preventing the opponent from getting in rhythm (when winning) is a skill that can be learned.
Find the ‘Up A Goal, Down A Goal’ Guide with Coaching Points on The Rush Coaching Manual, where you can also check the following activity, with specific tactics and strategies that your team can apply when either up or down a goal and reaching the final 10 minutes of the game:
ORGANIZATION & DESCRIPTION
First segment is open 11v11 game, at 10 min. Team A is down a goal to Team B. The next 10 min. constitute the end of a game. After 10 min. teams reverse roles. These 10 min. also constitute the end of a game. Coach over play and stop if necessary. After those initial 20 minutes, make a water break and discuss.
The following two 10 minute halves mimic the same of the first stage, with Team A starting down a goal, and then in the second half up a goal, but now the coach is on sidelines and there’s limited coaching. Add referee if possible. After this 20 minutes, we make another short water break and we discuss with the teams.
The last 20 minutes of the session are played normal, with a referee. Coaching is purely on the flow and limited. As the teams score and time passes by, encourage players to readjust as a team depending on their situation.
Find Coaching Points, Additional Notes and the Full Activity HERE!
DOS WHEN WINNING
Tip #1: Always sustain a +1 situation in the back. This does not necessarily mean defending next to the goalkeeper but making sure we are outnumbering the opponent in dangerous spaces.
Tip #2: It’s an obvious statement, but we want to keep possession, preferably in the opponent’s half.
Tip #3: If you lose the ball far from your goal, try to kill the counter right away. If the counterpress works, that’s great. If it doesn’t, consider a tactical foul.
DON’TS WHEN WINNING
Tip #1: Rushing set pieces, such as throw ins, corners, goal kicks, free kicks, etc, will allow the rival getting in a direct, fast rhythm that may decide the match. When killing the game, you need an organized defense, that prevents quick kicks, and protects dangerous spaces. Safety first.
DOS WHEN LOSING
Tip #1: Mentality is key, it is imperative that you stay focused. The opponent will do everything in its power to disrupt your rhythm. Stay in tune with the game. All you can do is control the controllable – yourself.
Tip #2: Adjust system but carefully: You don’t want to be down in numbers for the rival’s counter. Consider the risk of modifying the +1 in the back to equal numbers.
Tip #3: Play the Offside Trap. DO NOT underestimate this item, strikers aren’t always as aware as you think. This can be the solution. The GK becomes almost a sweeper.
DON’TS WHEN LOSING
Tip #1: First, desperation will not take you anywhere good. Remember to stay focus on the mission: scoring, that’s all that matters.
Tip #2: Your team will take some extra risks like we mentioned above, but careful, you don’t want the search of a goal into securing your team’s defeat.
Check all the Tips and some good (and bad) examples of Dos & Don’ts when Up a Goal, Down a Goal! Click HERE!
Yes, sign in to Rush Soccer Development and start the new season downloading our curriculum per age group!
Find the ‘Curriculum‘ link option under the Rush Way drop down menu.
These inclusive guides are organized for our developmental branches as U6 to U13+. For the competitive branches, they cover U6-U13.
Our competitive Junior (U14-U15) and Senior Division (U16+) guides will be released by the end of 2021.
Coach Rush Sessions, the Rush Way.
“These are not just season plans. These are the product of years of work, in which we carefully planned every session and activity to fit the big picture and be a reflection of our club, our philosophies, style of play, and lead to the development of the future Rush player”.
Pablo Toledo, Rush Soccer’s Sporting Project Director.
Alongside the also downloadable Player & Coach Handbooks, these guides provide all of the tools for your coaches to execute an entire season in full alignment with the Rush Way.
And these are not all the good news.
Would you like to customize your season plan to the specific days and dates that your team trains?
Stay tuned then because in early July we will be releasing a season planner feature within The Rush Coaching Manual that will allow you to do so.
A lot more coming up, coach!
As explained in The Heart of The Rush, one of the two pillars of our Player Development Approach is to maximize weekly playing time in direct confrontation. In this article, we present an alternative that two Rush clubs use for that purpose: FUTSAL.
Quoting the section What We Believe In from The Heart Of The Rush.
“Stating that the game is the teacher is more than a philosophical idea. Our 70 Games Rule is the overarching expression of it. At the youth stages, we want our teams to play 70 11v11 scrimmages a year. Some will be formal and some others as part of a training session, just like some will last longer than others, but they will present the stage for learning to take place. At the grassroots level, the 70 Games Rule is expressed through the constant encouragement and club initiatives to increase the overall weekly playing time of the participant. That doesn’t mean increasing the number of training sessions (team or individual), it means providing opportunities for the players to play more time in direct confrontation“.
The Heart Of The Rush.
This month we are not debating or presenting on our player development approach. This is not a theory based campaign, but a pragmatic one. We want our players to play more time in direct confrontation than they do in any other club. This article is not about why?, it’s about how?
For many of our clubs, the answer (at least partially), relies in FUTSAL.
You will notice in the two cases presented below that training is divided into three categories: Formal, Alternative Formal, and Informal. This is what the categories represent:
RUSH CANADA
Working alongside Rush Canada’s Technical Director Slobodan Pavlovic, we collected information regarding the club’s Futsal program for U10 and under, and U11 and older. At Rush Canada, Futsal is not only impactful in player development, it is also a revenue stream. Check below.
Brief description of the program: Futsal at Rush Canada is mandatory and included in the annual registration package. U10 and under play one hour a week (minimum) and U11 and older two hours a week.
Disclaimer: This varies considerably depending on the time of the year, as they use Futsal increasingly during the off season periods with additional camps, tournaments, etc.
Futsal costs the player $450 (for U10 & Under) and $700 (U11 & over) a year.
From a soccer standpoint and the main reason why we evaluate the case, the Futsal program contributes with a minimum of 20% extra playing time in direct confrontation, or the equivalent of 0.81 hours weekly (average) at U10 and under, and 1.77 hours at U11 and older.
As it says on the (*) above, we are aware that the impact of Futsal in the overall confronted playing hours measured as a percentage might be overestimated as we have no data for informal play, which we believe to be pretty marginal (unfortunately). However, the impact is still significant and that doesn’t affect the hourly contribution seen in absolute terms.
Why Futsal in Slobodan’s words:
If you would like to learn more about Rush Canada’s Futsal program, please contact Slobodan Pavlovic at [email protected]
MIAMI RUSH KENDALL
Another club that uses Futsal as part of their regular programming is Miami Rush. We spoke to Renatto Soriano, Miami Rush’s Technical Director, to understand their program further:
Brief Description Of The Program: At Miami Rush, Futsal is used for U12 and under. One day a week for one hour, and for an average total of 60 sessions a year and seven games, so the total impact is estimated in 67 hours of futsal a year per player.
The program affects about 25% of the U12 and under membership (30 out of the 120 players). It is not mandatory, and external players can participate as well.
From an operational standpoint, the program requires four fields (three outdoors and one indoors are used) and there are three coaches running the program.
From a financial perspective, the program costs the player about $20 per hour / session.
From a soccer standpoint, Futsal contributes with a 33% of extra confronted playing time a week, even though we know this percentage is overestimated as we don’t currently have additional data for informal play. However, the impact is still significant and can be seen in absolute terms, as a 1.29 average hours added per week.
Why Futsal in Renatto’s words:
‘Most of South Americans like me grew up playing like this. We believe in its impact in player development. They learn a lot of things through Futsal, like staying on their feet when marking or using the sole of the cleat. They also learn things like playing/restarting play quickly through the game. Coaching for us needs to be brief, we want a lot of freedom.
If you’d like to learn more about Miami Rush’s Futsal program, contact Renatto at [email protected].
Welcome to Rush Soccer!
We offer this handbook (linked) to you as a tool to assist you in becoming familiar with our club, that is now your club too.
Please take some time to acquaint yourself with our history, goals, policies & procedures, programs & services: The Rush Way.
We have a mission and a dream and we want you to be a part of it. This is a dream that we can only accomplish together. It is important for you to understand your role and represent the Rush in a positive impactful light. The real secret behind the continuing success of Rush is our hardworking, dedicated and loyal membership, players, coaches, and employees.
We are the Rush, all together. Thank you for joining us.
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