Every club has a few people that do most of the work. It's the same everywhere and certainly not restricted to football clubs. Our club for instance has about 6 or 7 people that do virtually everything. I'm not taking away anything from the hours and hours that every coach puts into his team because, without the coaches there wouldn't be any teams, but running a club is a time-consuming business. You also have to remember that to get your team onto the pitch every Saturday or Sunday, the teams need registering, players need signing on, kit needs buying, pitches need booking, arrangements with the opponents need making, the team selection, formation and tactics need to be decided, the parents need informing of the details and the list goes on and on and on. This happens week in and week out and it could be made so much easier of more people helped out.
As the kids get older, more and more parents stay away, that's just one of those things (don't get me started on parents that treat kids football as a baby-sitting service!!!), but how could we spread this load? After all, the majority of stuff that needs doing is long before the whistle blows for kick-off. A couple of clubs I know offer discounted registration fees to parents of players that help out. They might arrange the pitch booking each week, or they might make the arrangements with the opponents. Some clubs even offer free registration for a player if the player's parent coaches the team. I'd like to see some sort of incentive scheme set up to include benefits of some description given to those parents that do offer their help. The FA National Development Manager For Youth Football is a guy called Nick Levett ( @NLevett on Twitter) and he recently tweeted "It's hard to get a volunteer to give twelve hours a week, but much simpler to get four volunteers to do three hours a week each". But while there's people like me that will do everything so their own lad can get a game with his mates, it's hard to get any help if there aren't any tangible benefits.
If you're still reading this by now, you're probably someone that would offer some help. Why don't you call your coach now and see what help he needs? I can promise you this, he will be extremely grateful and you might even be the reason he keeps coaching next season. I heard a story yesterday of a coach that called all the parents of his U11s team over at the end of a league match and asked for help. They all nodded, agreed to see what they could do and then went home. He then walked across the pitch and took the goals down on his own. He packed it in at the end of that season and the team folded because no-one else stepped forward to coach the team...
What would you do if your coach decided it was too much and walked away at the end of the season?
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