Pick-up Games
North Shore United would like to highlight the importance of pick-up soccer for player development. We hope that our players and parents embrace these ideas after reading this and try to play as much pick-up games as they can, especially during the off time and when school is out.
Structured sports activities and unstructured activities both contribute positively to youth player development. Informal sports, known also as pick-up games, are games organized and controlled by the players themselves. These games are unstructured and do not have official, standard league rules. First and foremost, participants choose to engage in informal sports for personal involvement, inclusion and to have fun. For example, players get involved in setting up rules of a pick-up soccer game based on availability of field space and equipment. Participants decide rule modifications inclusive of next goal wins, do-over and how to restart games after a violation (foul or ball out of bounds). Players assume the role of referee by making their own foul calls. They get to choose teams and deal with undecided disputes that the game presents to them.
Pick-up soccer is very valuable for players’ development because of its high level of action for the players which creates excitement and many scoring opportunity for both teams. Informal soccer games have modified rules and are not necessary restricted to time or goal limits, they can be prolonged if teams are having fun. An important aspect of pick-up soccer is that games should be close and exiting. If one team is dominant players usually stop the game and reshuffle players to have a more balanced and exiting game. Pick-up soccer is very important also to establish friendship before and after the games. In pick-up soccer winning is not the focus of the activity. The activity is about having fun, enjoy playing, exercising, development of players’ creativity, leadership and problem-solving.