Utah Soccer Trip w/ Gage - Part 1 of 4

This was a friendly soccer trip to get some training and games in versus some Salt Lake teams that the Broomfield Soccer Club has established a relationship with.  As a first trip for these boys, we sat them down for some instructions on how to represent the team away from home and how to ensure that they are putting themselves in a good position to be able to perform at their best for the week.

The first event for the week was a special training session on Real Salt Lake's practice pitch.  The field was probably one of the nicest that I have ever played on, so the boys were definitely in for a treat.  This also comes at a time that most of the neighborhood fields in the area are on water restrictions and there are only a few places that are maintained this nicely.

This is the coach that led the team through drills and practice for the day.  He was an old friend that Coach Liam knew from back in England and now he leads a big youth club in Salt Lake.  Here he started talking mostly about space and shape and creating opportunities to open up the passing lanes.

He was really impressive with his instruction and control of the group, getting them to talk through how they think through what the activity is that they are about to take on.  I have to say this was as focused as I have ever seen these guys in a training session.  They were all locked in, which was great to see with such a special opportunity.

After about 90 minutes of warm up, instruction, and training, the group was happy to get a team picture with the coaches that help out.  The heat of the day was also starting to creep up on us, but what a great day and a beautiful area to be able to train.  Amazing!