The Mount St Benedict under 14 girls’ team that plays in the North West Sydney Women’s competition will hit the pitch for the first time this coming Sunday.
Preparing for the season has been a nightmare in light of the dumping Sydney has copped over the last three weeks. Thankfully the nucleus of the team is intact, so the first half of our opening match against Beecroft FC might not be the shemozzle it was last season, when the majority of the girls were tasting the game for the first time.
While more developed as players, one problem will undoubtedly remain, that being, a left foot, or better still, a lack of them.
Having a rookie team, I stacked the defence for most of the season, ensuring we stayed in games.
This meant that my one left foot, played at left back for the entire season, sweeping across the back four and cleaning up loose ball situations. Her greatest challenge was often who to pass the ball to when she looked ahead.
The strategy worked to some extent and with a right winger blessed with speed and a decent strike we managed to rustle up three draws and two wins for the season.
The manager survived the axe, mums and dads were all happy and considering the 15-0 drubbing we copped on the opening day of the season, we did okay. Yet the problem of the left foot still lingers.
When my left back looks ahead, the right footed mids are A.W.O.L. They all shift right, wanting to swing onto their preferred side and roar down the flank. The whole shape of the attack is affected.
On numerous occasions, the ball makes its way through the mids and the attack heads to the right corner flag. It all looks very exciting and the parents cheer feeling a goal is looming.
Unfortunately the net result is a ball imbedded on the byline, possessed by a player without the skill or power to play a twenty metre cut back to a lurking nine or ten.
All the while, I stand on the sideline staring at the paddock available on the left side, you know the bit I mean. That area on the corner of the box where, in an alternate universe, a team would stretch the defence by switching the ball quickly and isolating that player one on one with a defender.
Much like the way the Phoenix attempt to use Roy Krishna. Geez I could use him on the left!
I’m sure that my problem isn’t unique and feel confident that many managers struggle with an attack that grinds to a halt down the right side, stifled by throw in after throw in, as right footers try to chip their way down the right edge.
Hopefully, with a couple of new girls this year, I should be able to use my left back higher and play her in midfield. If I can find one player to conceptually grasp width and sit in front of her to occupy the right back of the opposition, I may be able to create more space in the centre for a couple of capable girls who fill the number ten role.
I’m wondering if this dilemma is a byproduct of poor parenting. Just as Ken Rosewall had his racquet snatched from his left hand and strapped to his right to prevent his tennis career blossoming while using the ‘devils’ hand, are we failing Australia’s footballing future by allowing our kids to grow up doing everything with their right foot?
When we purchase a cheap inflatable ball from the service station to keep our kids quiet while travelling home from another family BBQ, what makes us think we can just leave them to their own devices?
Most would begin by playing in the back seat with the ball in their right hand, therefore explaining why left arm seamers are so valuable. Cricket is a perfect example of the value of the molly-dooker and much is made of the challenge created by batting partnerships involving a left and right hand combination.
A football attack needs to have the same balance. When that child arrives home with that ball, we can’t just leave them in the backyard without appropriate guidance. It’s too late for my girls, they have both adopted the ‘commercial’ foot and their career opportunities are severely hampered by their choice.
Given my time again, my plan would have been simple. Using the trampoline as a stable base, my child’s right leg would be tied with twine to one of the legs, rendering it useless to defend against a football heading in their direction.
The second part of the strategy would be a bag of ten to fifteen balls, launched, one by one, at five second intervals in the direction the free, left foot.
Ensuring that contact is made with the instep, the youngster would be forced to parry the balls away with correct technique and thus, become adept on the left.
As a time frame, I wouldn’t have thought anything more than two to three hours a day of this from the ages of three to six would be required.
I regret missing this opportunity and often think of the enjoyment the child would have had doing the drill, as well as the quality bonding time it would have created for us.
The writers of the National Curriculum made an enormous blunder in not including this drill as a fundamental part of their program. I did forward it to them at the planning stage, yet it obviously fell on deaf ears.
As our seasons begin in junior football, many managers will grapple with shape, structure and balance and most of those challenges arise from the lack of left feet at our disposal.
At the risk of melodrama, it is a sad time, not just for football, but for our nation, to see a dominance of overused, commercialised and boring right feet. With some political will, I am sure something could be done on a parliamentary level to redress the imbalance.
I’m calling for an enquiry and unless a nice young fourteen year old girl rocks up from out of nowhere to our team BBQ this week, saying she is keen to join the team, the under 14’s will once again, fail to use the full width of the pitch.
The discriminatory and boring right footers will continue to grind their way down the right flank and the manager’s progressive journey to complete baldness will be accelerated. That is, unless my plan works, what a managerial master stroke that would be.
Josh Barton
Roar Pro
As a natural left footer myself, I always found myself being put a left back. I think every left footer has a some point. Except I hated it there! I always felt more natural playing on the right, where I could cut in and make a run infield. So I trained my right foot to the extent that now it has more power and control than my left, thus ruining my one gift.
FootOverHand
Guest
Maybe take a leaf out of Napoli's book, get that LB forward :) https://tacticalcalcio.com/2016/04/18/an-analysis-of-maurizio-sarris-napoli/ Anyway good luck mate, I hope your girls do well.
Stuart Thomas
Expert
Gold, can't believe I forget to venture down the ivf angle.
Stuart Thomas
Expert
Very true, have mostly played a right footer up front as you suggest. Attack turns back to front of box, love to have some run to the left byline. Must under used part of the field.
Stuart Thomas
Expert
Thanks tk, I think it is worth pursuing as a drill. Getting both feet in play might seem tough for relative rookies but the younger the better. You are spot on, some will grasp and others will excel.
sei
Guest
Check out the goal by Ronaldo with his weaker left foot for Portugal against Hungary last Saturday! Every junior striker should watch that! What a great shot!
Stevo
Roar Rookie
Good call jb re Johnston. In my teenage years (way too long ago) I'd spend time in the back yard doing exactly that. Kick the ball against the brick garage wall with one foot and trap it dead or kick it back with the other. Alternating feet. For some strange reason I loved the challenge and spent hours at it on my own. Was I mad? But as Craig learnt, in life there is no substitute for hard work and hours of training - at what ever you want to be good at. That applies today as well. If not a garage wall then maybe in the local park there is a brick tennis wall that can be used. Good luck Stuart and keep up the stories. I'm sure we've all got more tips for you ;)
Chris
Guest
Haha that was a great book! When he was cut my 'boro I think and he hung around the car park and he eventually wangled his way back in. Manager quizzed him down the track and said something like "didnt I cut you?" lol The rest is history as they say.
Chris
Guest
Good luck with the new season Stuart. I used to coach rep girls in the NWS area - Ellyse Perry country! It's a very strong girls footballing area so hopefully you will unearth the next young matilda :)
j binnie
Guest
Pacman - Craig Johnstone tells a similar story in his book. Having been told by his manager at Middlesborough that he had the worst "first touch' he had ever witnessed,his advice was "go way back to Australia". Johnstone developed his own program for improvement and that too involved a wall.His exercise involved a left foot to right foot touch against the wall with ,if it touched the ground, he began again till he reached a hundred touches with either foot. He succeeded .Cheers jb
j binnie
Guest
Stuart - here is a story that might amuse you and your readers. My father in law had a brother who played for Arsenal and Scotland as a right and left winger. When the scouts came calling in his early football days they asked his mother if they could speak to her son, "J Milne". Her answer, "both my laddies are J Milne , is it Jim or Jack you want" ???? The scouts,stuck with this quandrey, blurted out ,"its the one with two feet". You can guess the answer, yes, "both my lads have 2 feet". Can you start to imagine where the scouts went from there. This is a true story. Cheers jb.
sei
Guest
If a kid is really talented and hungry, then yes, encourage the kid to train the weaker foot - as early as possible. In my youth in Europe in the eighties we weren't encouraged to do it, but some coaches and parents encourage it and it is definitely a benefit.
FootOverHand
Guest
Hahaha I like the two left feet, get on it FFA, an untapped goldmine!
Griffo
Roar Guru
Funny you mention walls - our club has a plan to put a few in around the edges of the fields' boundaries for kids to kick against. The back brick wall of the change sheds and canteen gets a real workout most months of the year. They already have a few goals with drop nets for shooting and free kick practice up year round...just gotta appoint a club volunteer to police which foot they can shoot from 8-)
TK
Guest
Now you mention it that was another benefit. As I said you don't see many walls around like we had on our home field anymore...was great cos you could go practice by yourself if you wanted to...including shooting and as long as the ball hit the target it would come back to you....otherwise it was off into the scrub behind it to find the ball which was a pretty good incentive to get it right.
murdic
Guest
Get on to the IVF clinics. Identical twins have different chirality (yeah that's the flash word for handedness) quite often, so a bit of sophisticated zygote splitting could go some way to satisfying the demand for lefties. That's a start, then you can hang out at the doors of a dance studio, where, legend has it, there should be a steady stream of discards with not one, but TWO left feet, so you're off and running, even if it is in circles.....
pacman
Guest
Juggling is another way to develop the weak foot. First junior team I had included one left footer who showed tremendous promise. At about 7 or 8 years of age he could keep the ball up for 100 touches with his left foot. His father issued him a challenge - "do the same with your right foot". So the kid did, and succeeded. I helped by sometimes switching him from the left wing to the right wing. He was soon equally at home on either side of the field, and was playing in the old XXXX League before he turned 18.
FootOverHand
Guest
Just as a suggestion, you could always have a right footed player playing on the left wing to stretch the defence and to cut in or dribble forward, whilst getting them to develop their left foot in training. Maybe play your most creative player there and make them a wide playmaker, like Thomas Muller in the meantime?
Post_hoc
Guest
I'd argue a 3rd would also be a pretty good first touch, I bet a few times you built up quiet a bit of power hitting the wall, for it to bounce back, you to control it and then pass it back
TK
Guest
Stuart great to see you highlight the value of what most regard as the standing foot. Seriously my old man hammered into my brothers and I the value of being able to kick with both feet and we used to practice against a besser brick wall one kick right foot on kick left. It takes a bit of time and a wall (don't see many like we used to have in my day which was basically the size of a senior goal) but you'll get two results. The first a bunch of kids who get a bit more used to using their left foot and two (fingers crossed) maybe find a few kids like me who once exposed to a bit of practice found a natural affinity for using their left foot also which may have remained undiscovered if not for the fathers insistence on kicking with both feet. Good luck.