Wii never do things together anymore

I’m enjoying a very pleasant hour after work this evening, playing FIFA 11 on the Wii when wife comes home and selfishly interrupts my fun.

‘I want you to come grocery shopping with me,’ she says, just as I’m about to put New York Red Bulls 3-0 up against over-rated Barcelona.

I don’t even dignify this with a response. I just throw the Wii remote against the fifty decorative pillows she has clogging up the couch.

‘I’ve a lot to get and I need your help,’ she continues, utterly oblivious to my frustration. ‘Are you even listening to me?’

‘I’ll do it in the morning with you,’ I say, very reasonably offering to put off until tomorrow what we can do today.

‘No, we are doing it now,’ she says in that high-pitched voice she resorts to in every argument. ‘And, by the way, you spend far too much time on that thing.’

‘That thing!’ I say feigning indignation.

‘Yes, that video game thing!’ she’s roaring now, having gone from zero to totally unreasonable and illogical in about six seconds.

‘Well, you may think I’m playing a video game here but I’m actually working on tactical formations and trying out new approaches to the sport.’

‘Really?’ She sounds like she totally doesn't believe me.

‘Yes, really. Not that I’d expect you to understand me investing time in my career.’

She pauses and gets this really strange look on her face before speaking.

‘Honey, I hate to break it to you but this is not your career. Coaching is your hobby. A costly hobby in time and money but a hobby nonetheless.’

I hate when she uses the word nonetheless. She always throws that in when she’s being all superior.

‘If you had any interest in my career at all, you’d be offering to play against me, to help me get better.’

‘Grown men should not be wasting their lives playing video games,’ she snorts with derision.

‘Yeah, yeah,' I say groping for a response. 'Grown women should be capable of doing the grocery shopping on their own. Isn’t that what feminism is supposed to be about? No men required.’

She walks out at that point and I start counting the days until I can start using practice again to get out of chores.

Eat the rich

A meeting of all club coaches at the high school gym tonight. It’s a tedious affair about fund-raising and the desperate need to raise more money to defray the costs of running teams. El Presidente, the man who is in my sights for breeding a culture of tolerating losing, goes on and on for an hour about various events he wants to hold between now and September. First off, he wants to have a fashion show.

I can hardly stifle the laughter when he brings this up. Looking around the room, there isn’t a single coach here attractive enough to walk down a runway and turns head except me. Apart from being bad at teaching soccer, there are too many wannabe Tom Selleck moustaches and  bald patches knocking around. And that’s only the women.

Next up, he goes on about a golf day at the local club. This is more plausible because it would at least give me a chance to showcase my superior skills around the greens. When he details how much work is involved though, I just shake my head. After letting the usual suspects blather on about their own ideas, I take the floor.

‘These events are just band-aids over a gaping wound,’ I say. ‘We need to change the entire culture of the club. From now on, when players come to register we should demand to see the parents’ tax returns so that only couples with combined incomes of over $100k are allowed to sign up their kids. If we do this we can charge more and more money to join. Richer people don’t care what it costs as long as you take their children off their hands for a few hours per week and then lie to them about their kids' athletic prowess. If we exploit this vanity properly, there’s no more need for us to waste time fund-raising.’

I sit down content that yet again I’m the smartest person in this room.

Offensiveness is the best form of defense

Have a mountain of work piled up on my desk so I ignore that and start working on the manuscript for my ‘Commandments of Travel Team Coaching’ book. I’m going to add a section with straight-up coaching advice. There’s a lot to pack in. For instance, the question I’m most asked by other coaches is about how I decide which players should play in which positions. I start with the center of defense.

At your first practice of the season, have a contest. Kids love contests of all kinds because they separate the strong from the weak and establish the natural pecking order.  This one is simply designed to see who can kick the ball the hardest and the farthest. It’s usually a big kid. If it is an oversized boy who obviously eats too much, that’s perfect. He’s the man-child you want at the back.

It helps too if this kid is a little on the ugly side. You can never underestimate how other players may be scared off just by his sheer frightfulness. Pretty boys need not apply. No gel-wearers or faux hawks here.

If you want to go into more detail in your approach to selection, try to find out if this defender is a bad boy at school. It’s always preferable if he is the sort who gets suspended for fighting every now and again. This means he’s bringing a lot of pent-up anger to the field. Just what you want when the chips are down and the cleats are flying.

If I was psychologically profiling my players, I’d ideally want my center-d kid to be the type who has a few bullying convictions against him in school too. The last line of defense is not a place for the faint-hearted or the kindly. Especially at nine and ten years old. It’s about mean kids manning the ramparts and striking fear into the hearts of opponents and their parents. Once you find this boy, it's very important to give him a nickname if he doesn't already have one. Something evocative like Animal or Megatron or Tank usually works.

Waiting for the hammer to fall

Still smarting from the embarrassing end to the 5k race, I head to the high school track tonight to work on my fitness. Trundling around, dutifully putting in my laps when I notice a coach working with a group of kids in the bleachers. He’s roaring abuse as he runs them up and down the steps so hard that a few of the weaker ones are stopping to throw up every couple of minutes. A sight to lift the spirits on a summer’s evening. Coaching at its very finest.

He moves them to the track and up close they look like they might be 11 and 12 year olds. They do some fast laps before they head to the steep grassy hill that runs alongside the field. Now, he has them sprinting up and down that and more of them are regurgitating their dinners as they go. This guy really knows his stuff. I decide to keep running laps just so I can watch him at work. You never know where you can pick up knowledge.

His last exercise involves two kids racing off while carrying full-size sledgehammers. No, really. The moment I see one of the boys almost take his own foot off when he drops the thing, I realize this must be a lacrosse team. Who else would be working out with industrial machinery and risking limb loss? I should have known when I saw the players were all wearing those tie-dye stoner shorts, sporting floppy fringes and not complaining there was no ball involved in the practice.

I’m not a fan of the sport but tonight I develop new respect for the training regimen. I head to my car enthused, wondering if the hardware store is still open. I need to introduce sledgehammers and other heavyweight tools into my practices. I’m determined not to be one of those soccer coaches who rely on superior skills over brute strength.

Run baby, run

Like a lot of good Americans, I always want to do something life-affirming on our national holiday. This morning, I decide the best way to get out of having to accompany wife to some Independence Day brunch is by participating in a Fourth of July 5k race in the town next door. As I shuffle around at the start line, I realize it’s also a chance for me to compare how my premature mid-life crisis compares to those of peers who look equally determined to make fools of themselves today.

With the temperature closing in on 90 degrees, the going is tough. Thankfully, as we approach the one mile mark, there’s a water station. Aside from a woman dishing out paper cups of water, there’s also a kid with a hose. Not just any kid either. As I get closer I recognize it’s ____, one of my players. Well, one of my substitutes. He’s asking runners whether they want to be sprayed as they go past.

‘No need to spray me,’ I shout as I get closer.

He just smiles but as I go past, unbelievably, he aims the hose at the side my head and blasts me full on. I’m drenched.

‘Oops sorry,’ says the fresh brat. Obviously I’m too into the race to waste time stopping but make mental note to reduce his playing time from five minutes a game to two next season.

Worse is to come. The last mile is mostly uphill and I’m struggling badly in the heat. Luckily, there’s nobody around so I’m at least suffering in solitude. Until the last 150 yards. That’s when I hear the unmistakable sound of another runner looming behind me.

The footsteps get closer and closer. I try to accelerate away but the legs are gone. Finally, my nemesis comes up next to me

‘Hi coach.’ Another of my players. Another of my least favorite players. I didn’t know ten year olds were allowed in this thing. I’m just about to reply when he sprints away, turning as he does so to blow me a kiss. Much to the delight of the hundreds of people gathered along the home straight.

Even more embarrassingly, they continue to applaud and cheer him as he puts his foot on the gas on the way towards the line. As I shuffle across after him, I don’t even notice my finishing time. I’m too busy plotting how to wreak revenge on that boy at future practices.

Letter not so perfect

Over a week has passed since I applied for the job of head coach of the USMNT and I still haven’t received as much as a formal reply from Sunil Gulati of the USSF. I’m figuring he must be inundated with applications, especially after the humbling at the feet of Mexico last Saturday. However, insult is added to injury when I discover Gulati has had plenty of time on his hands to write letters. Just not to me!

The man who hasn’t found time to get back to me about my suitability to replace dead man walking Bob Bradley has published an open letter to American soccer fans. When I first heard about this, I thought to myself: ‘Well, at least he’s finally seen fit to apologize for the debacle on the field at the Gold Cup and to promise radical changes in personnel and coaching staff.’ Imagine my dismay upon discovering he’d merely written a memo about incidents of supporter-baiting at the Rose Bowl last Saturday night!! Not a word about Bradley!

Reading the missive online this morning, I come to a stark realisation. Bradley isn’t the man whose job I should be applying for. Gulati is the weakest link in this organization. How did I not see that? I mean, has he ever even run a travel team? Has he ever had to make astute tactical chances in the middle of a high-pressure game like a U-10 cup final? I don’t think so!

Decide to spend the rest of Saturday working on a new resume and finding somebody else in the USSF that I can send it to, preferably somebody who shares my belief soccer in this country is rotting from the head down, and that Gulati must go. Apart from anything else, the pressing need to do up the job application gives me the perfect excuse to avoid accompanying wife and friends to the beach. They can celebrate Independence Day weekend. I’ll stay here working for the good of the country’s soccer future. Like a true patriot.

Vacation all she ever wanted

‘Great news honey, I’ve booked a mini-vacation for us in Washington DC,’ says wife the moment I walk into the kitchen. Way too bright-eyed for this hour of the morning.

‘Fantastic,’ I say, doing my best fake version of enthusiasm.

‘Not only that, the hotel is paid for by my company because I have to speak at a conference,’ she continues. ‘And, here’s the very best bit, I’ve got you tickets to see Barcelona play Manchester United at FedEx Field while we are there.’

‘You what?’

‘I got you tickets for this game. Guys at work say it’s a huge deal for soccer fans.’

‘The guys at work?’ I ask, trying not to blow up with anger. ‘Are any of them soccer coaches?’

‘Eh, I don’t think so,’ she replies, completely oblivious. ‘One or two might be soccer dads though.’

‘Yeah, I'm on vacation from soccer dads,’ I mutter under my breath.

‘What’s that honey?’ she asks.


I pause for a sharp intake of breath and decide to make this as quick and painless as possible.

‘Firstly, soccer dads know nothing about the sport, and you know even less taking advice from them and splurging money we don’t have on a game I would never want to see. You think I want to see two European clubs playing. Twenty-two foreigners prancing around doing a version of death by a thousand short passes. Are you kidding me? Those teams have nothing to teach me or any other American coach. They are just over here making easy money off gullible people like you and spendthrift soccer dads like the fools you work with!’

No initial response to that. Just a minute of uncomfortable silence.

‘I just thought I was doing something nice,’ she says. finally speaking up.

‘Well, you weren’t. And another thing. I don’t want to go to DC. You’ll be at your conference all day and I’ll be bored. There’s nothing to see or do in that town.’


She walks out of the kitchen, very obviously defeated by my superior logic.