Many of you may recall that Cullen Wilson (Stanford University and former DUSC standout) was home last winter and offered his college experience to work with dozens of our players' one on one and small group sessions. It was a complete success in my opinion with regards to the level of individual training our players received. I also recognized that our players were motivated by his success & experiences playing at Stanford and were inspired with the knowledge that they are currently following a similar path through player development. Cullen and I have traded emails since then and he always remarks how thrilled he was to work with the Desert United players and how impressed he was with the growth of the Club that forged his way. He feels a great sense of pride in Desert United Soccer.
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Coach Tom and I utilized Cullen's services during his recent stay while home visiting his family. I also know that he worked individually with other players to know and attest to the positive experience that our kids had in this effort. It is very difficult as a coach to cater practice sessions toward many of the training exercises that Cullen shared in small group session. Susan and Khoi also worked with many of our younger players recently over a four week training course and utilized many of our older players to demonstrate skills training catering to individual work outs which was a huge success and very well attended. The older players that worked the sessions also received credit hours in school for their efforts which was a win-win for all parties involved. I caught one of my G97's working on a dribbling exercise in warm ups a few weeks ago and asked her where she picked it up as I have never shown her that exercise before. She responded that it was an exercise that Khoi had shown her in one of the training sessions they did and now a part of her individual warm up routine so it made me realize the importance of individual training for our players. One of the major rules of thumb in coaching teams is to keep the players active throughout a 1-2 hour session with little to no stand around time therefore some of the individual time gets fairly little attention on an 18 player roster. Case in point, the club has provided goal keeper training on Monday nights throughout the soccer year to develop the goaltenders which is a position that is overlooked in group session. Please believe me when I state that shooting exercises only aid the person striking the ball and in very little way actually improve our goaltending which is why goal keeping training on Monday nights is crucial to developing the individual skills necessary to play that position (I did not see a lot of consistency in attendance by our goaltenders last year, FYI). But anyhow, the same can be said for some of the basic field conditions such as turning on the ball or individual striking session for example. Yes we all spend time on finishing in training but if you get in 200 shots per session divided by 18 players...you do the math...11 shots per kid before goalie begins to convulse. The same level of individual attention is also necessary for those players that aspire to play at higher levels of CSL such as Premier Division or get opportunities to play in college. Every college coach that I spoke with over past year has informed me that our players can never have too many fundamental or technical skills. If our goal was to develop the best high school players in the valley than congrats...the All DVL team is full of Desert United stand outs. I know that most of you have loftier goals and feel that Desert United is capable of sending the next Landon Donavan or Amy Rodriguez to the next levels (former CSL players and current Nat'l Team stand outs).
To make a long story, longer...I say all of this to inform you that we have another Desert United stand out home for the summer interested in working one on one with our players or small group sessions. Ben Sperber graduated to the Arsenal Club and played at the Premier Level. Ben Sperber played his freshman season for St. Mary's which qualified for the NCAA Tournament. He transferred this past year to UC Riverside and has enjoyed much success in playing at the college level thus far with two years of eligibility remaining. He is a phenomenal scholarship athlete and teacher of the game. He credits the game of soccer for the luxury he now has at a higher education. Ben has offered his experience and expertise to our club this summer and is available to schedule times with any of our players aspiring to play at higher levels of the game. Please see attached if you are interested in scheduling with Ben for one on one or small group session. Ben is extremely responsible and is eager to share his vast knowledge of the game while home this summer. I truly appreciate your time and hope you will take advantage of this opportunity. Please forward the attached file to your team.
I hope everyone is enjoying the summer and would like to remind that we are playing pick up games at Indian Wells Tennis Garden on Monday and Wednesday Nights from 6-8pm for those of you not currently training or available on those nights. We take lots of water breaks! I look forward to seeing you there.
Sincerely,
Jeff Petoskey
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