Lee Rangers Newsletter (volume 1 Issue 2)

LEE RANGERS YOUTH FOOTBALL CLUB

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Welcome!

INSIDE THIS ISSUE:

Chairman's Report

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Vice

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Chairman’s Report ”Doing the Level 1” by Alex Wilson

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Our Sponsors

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Doesn’t time fly?! Another Lee Rangers Newsletter already. Just in time to advertise all those Christmas fundraising events, what a coincidence... Ahem. In addition to the Christmas Ads, this newsletter also gives you the latest key updates from our Chairman and Vice-Chairman. They have some important messages to share with you regarding club discipline and both request a call to action from all of us parents and carers.

From the Manager’s Bench we have a fascinating and entertaining article by our Under 10 Blues Manager, Alex Wilson, about his recent FA Level 1 Coaching Course. This article is a must for anyone interested in taking this course. It is also very interesting reading for parents and anyone with more than a passing interest in Jaffa Cakes. As always, your feedback is welcomed regarding this newsletter and any other aspect of the club. Contact

Events Calendar 18th February 2009 Parents/Community Meeting Lee Community Centre 8:00pm 13th May 2009 Parents/Community Meeting Lee Community Centre 8:00pm 13th & 14th June 2009 Lee Rangers Tournament HMS Sultan Polo Fields

Summer 2009 Date to be confirmed Lee Rangers Superstars 1st July 2009 Annual General Meeting Lee Community Centre 8:00pm 8th July 2009 Signing-on Evening Lee Community Centre 8:00pm

info can be found on the back page and on the web site. With best wishes to you all for a very Merry Christmas and a fabulous 2009. Cheers! Yours in football, Stephen

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Chairman’s Report We are now well into the first half of the 2008 – 2009 season and can record both our successes and areas for improvement. We have the Constitution in place and available via our website. By going to Standing orders and reducing our Player subscriptions by 30% we are still collecting 30% more in subs to pay for kit, training facilities and Club development. The push from last season during summer enabled us to develop a significant number of Managers and Coaches through the FA. I am proud to report that we have 16 qualified Level 1 coaches, a Level 2 and a further Manager who has to complete his Level 2. We have identified a further 14 Managers and Coaches that re-

quire these courses and look to them to successfully complete these courses during the season. There is a Level 1 training course in March 2009, it is a week long and runs Monday to Friday. Please let me know if as a parent or supporter of the Club you would like to undertake these courses – there is a quid pro quo – we would like a five year commitment to put this into practice in developing Players to their potential. I would love to transfer a Player for multimillion-pound fee to a professional club. There are two major fundraising efforts on the calendar – Carol singing in December and a Tournament in May – please contact Adrian Dykes for details. David Orpin also organises

our social events and in January we have a dinner at the Lee Golf Club – give him a bell and come along. Our Head Coach Steve Stone is standing down having completed the tasks set him – qualifying Managers and Coaches and delivering our application for Charter Status. On behalf of the Club I wish to thank him for his unstinting contribution and outstanding achievements. We will have more tasks for him in the future.

Lee Rangers in the Community… We will be at this event! LEE

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Chairman’s Report continued... As a Club we have decided not to submit our Charter Club application until we resolve our number one issue – behaviour. We have had a number of red/ yellow cards for Players, and referees reports citing spectator behaviour. As usual it is just a few that are causing us all a problem maybe unintentionally. As parents we all signed a Parents Charter stating we would positively encourage play and respect all. Can I urge you that if a

parent near you is not supporting this line to have a quiet word. We are all ambassadors of the Club – please let us be role models – no swearing, no arguing with the referee, linesman or opponents. What we do - Players emulate. We have as a league (Mid Solent) and a Club embraced the FA respect campaign which covers some of the items above as well as erecting barriers at home games to allow the linesman unrestricted ac-

cess to the touch line and providing separation between Players and spectators. You will read other achievements throughout the Newsletter. They would not be possible without you. Thank you for supporting the Club, acting as an ambassador and role model and fully embracing, with us, the FA Respect Campaign. Manny Chairman

SATURDAY 20th DECEMBER

7.30 till 11.30

At Lee on Solent Community Centre Main Hall ₤1.00 Admission

₤1.00 Admission

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Vice Chairman’s Report Lee Rangers has been an established club for nearly 20 years having began with only one team playing in the under 10 league and run by a gentlemen called Ken McKay. Ken built a reputation for fair play and good quality football, this is a heritage that we should all be immensely proud to be part of.

tee, we will adopt a zero tolerance policy against all bad behaviour. We will do our upmost to ensure Lee on the Solent carries on having a youth football infrastructure and protect the club and its' vast majority of parents and players who demonstrate good sporting ethics week in week out.

As parents, Managers and committee members we have an obligation to protect this reputation which, given the size of our club, with its' 16 teams and over 200 players, will never be easy.

At the Parents evening back in early September I talked about the Respect campaign and the steps we are taking as a club to improve the behaviour of players and spectators. The introduction of barriers and the parent and player codes of conduct are examples of this. I am again asking for your help not only to set a good personal example to our players but where you see other parents or players not doing so, support your Managers in discouraging it.

In October we received 8 fines for player dissent, this is not acceptable. So far in November we have already had a parent booked for swearing at a Referee and we wait to hear what sanction the Mid Solent league will apply to the club. These offenders may be in the minority but, as a commit-

We must avoid any confrontations with

referees, If there is a incident of perceived foul play on the pitch it is the Managers role to discuss this with the match officials not the parents or spectators. This is a fabulous club and over the last 20 years many people have worked extremely hard on a voluntary basis to keep developing what Ken started all those years ago, the future of Lee Rangers YFC is now in all of our hands and we all have a duty to ensure our children still have a club to be proud to play for next season! Martin Lee Vice Chairman

Doing the Level 1 By Alex Wilson— U10 Blues Manager Like most people involved in youth football I found myself here because of my son and because I wasn’t as quick as everyone else was when a new manager was required. I was totally clueless about how to coach football, how to control a group of kids and what was required to run a team (I suspect some still think I am!). But I threw myself into my new role with enthusiasm, I read coaching LEE

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books, I asked other coaches what they did, I sought advice within the club and I trawled many websites for ideas. As time went on I began to feel that I knew what I was doing. I had my own opinions on what was right or wrong for coaching children, I felt very sure that the drills and games my team did in training were not only improving their skills but were also enjoyable to participate in. Our perform NEWSLETTER

ances on the pitch backed this up, we did OK and we had fun doing it. So when the chance to do the FA Level 1 coaching course came along I was keen to do it but wondered how much it would teach me that I didn’t already know. My doubts were combined with some trepidation when I

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learned that I would need to bring boots, shin pads, wet weather clothes (surely we can go indoors if it rains????) and even Jaffa cakes to quickly replace lost energy. Those of you who know me will understand that the Jaffa cakes suggestion was warmly received but these days I am built more for comfort than speed. Since school (I’m 41) my football experience is limited to some indoor 5-aside. So the thought of running about doing drills rather than watching kids do them filled me with some apprehension. The course was at the Army FA facilities in Aldershot, I had visions of it being a huge indoor area with changing rooms and Astroturf pitches plus floodlit grass pitches, disappearing off over the horizon in every direction. The reality was slightly different but what the Portacabin & pitch lack in 5 star comforts is more than compensated by the content of the course. My worries about being the worst footballer to ever take the Level 1 were eased when I saw Manny, the club chairman turn up in his £2.50 bargain kit finished off by a nice pair of black brogues instead of boots. Our instructor was Steve Stone, a parent within the club, just like the rest of us but also an FA County Development Officer, Steve is paid to teach football coaching and has the 3 Lions on his business card! We began the course learning about warm ups, Steve explained the importance of them and how a good warm up can make a difference to a teams performance at the start of a game. An alarm bell went off inside my head, we often concede early goals and appear half asleep for the first 15 minutes. We then learnt some ideas for warm ups, we did it the best way possible, by doing them ourselves and afterwards I was quickly scribbling down ideas. In the afternoon we discussed Long Term Player Development, about how children at different ages learn and respond. This was a useful module, I could see how my coaching techniques will have to change over the years to evolve with the team. We

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heard about how children give up football because of the pressure heaped on them by coaches & parents, its their game not ours and the more positive and encouraging we make it the more likely they are to carry on playing throughout their youth and as an adult. Finally, Steve gave us some homework for the next day, in small groups we had to deliver a simple training exercise to the rest of the class. The next morning was spent either delivering our task to the group or being a guinea pig for someone else’s drill. This was the first step before our proper assessment next week. Steve showed us how to progress a drill so that it became more challenging as the players coped with the task. In the afternoon we learnt a number of exercises that we would be assigned as individuals for next week. Steve coached each drill and we ran about in different coloured bibs impressing Steve with our skills and fitness.

I had a week to get over the aches and too many Jaffa cakes & mars bars but we still had some more homework to complete. I learnt about the laws of the game (laws not rules…), being a ‘soccer parent’ and football for everyone. I also used the opportunity to try out my assessment task on my own team, the boys looked slightly bemused when I explained the location of the nearest A&E hospital to them. The following weekend we made the drive to Aldershot again, I suggest car sharing as you can discuss ideas about the course. I’m just glad it wasn’t me that had to listen to Manny's’ jokes for an hour. Day 3 of the course was an easy one

for us armchair footballers, but we learnt about an extremely interesting subject and one that should be imperative to us all, Safeguarding Children. We discussed the many forms of abuse and inappropriate behaviour and how our actions as a coach could have a long term effect on a child, positively or negatively. It certainly makes me stop and think about how I react to situations, not just in football but at home with my own children too. In the afternoon we were taught Emergency First Aid, when the resuscitation dummy came out so did all the old jokes, we thought we were hilarious but I think maybe that Steve had heard them before. Being an Army training centre the first aid course did have some slides on how to treat gunshot wounds, we skipped this part but I may ask for a refresher if I ever consider coaching in the USA. I can just see Texan ‘Soccer Moms’ reaching for their Peacemaker if their little darling gets a red card. We also learnt some basics on sports injuries although there is a separate course devoted to just that. And so finally the assessment day arrived, We had roped in some Lee Rangers players, past & present to spread the load a bit and give us old boys a breather. Our assessor was a great old guy who had us all scared (I certainly was) at the start but was actually a real enthusiast and knowledgeable character. We all took our turns and he would step in with some advice, a word here or there and the final day passed quickly with some great laughs. At the end of the course I realised how little I knew beforehand and how much there is still to learn. It was a fantastic experience and a real eye opener on coaching football, it gave me some extremely useful pointers and ideas. Since doing the course I am certain that my training sessions are better and that the teams performance has improved massively and I know that the parents of the players think the same too. It’s not the ultimate answer but it’s a good start and I really want to take the Level 2 next.

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Lee Rangers Youth Football Club The home of youth football in Lee-on-the-Solent

Contact Us Your team manager is always your first point of contact. In addition to your manager, feel free to contact these lovely folks for anything else regarding Lee Rangers Youth Football Club: Jeanette Orpin [email protected] Glenn Broadway [email protected] 07917 403040

Committee Chairman Manny Martins Vice Chairman Martin Lee Treasurer Steve Butterworth Youth Secretary Jeanette Orpin Mini Soccer Secretary Glenn Broadway Child Protection Officer Fiona Todd Child Protection Officer Angela Lewis Fundraising Adrian Dykes Social Events Organiser Dave Orpin Communications Stephen Moss

More contact details are available on the web site. We’re on the web: www.leerangers.com

Thank You to our Sponsors