The USSF A-Senior license: a coach’s first-hand experience

USSF course v United Soccer Coaches course

USSF concentrates on how you teach and goes into a lot of oth- er areas such as periodization, leading the player and game analysis for example.

I’m sure the USC methods have evolved since I last took a course with them, as it was more based on systems of play and lots of discussions which I enjoyed.

I honestly think a lot of it comes down to your instructor and what environment they create.

I was blessed with Lesle Gallimore on my A and Vince Ganzburg on my advanced national who helped create a culture where you could be yourself and didn’t feel like you were walking on egg shells, asking “am I doing this right?”

Meetings

The A-License consisted of three in-person meetings in Kansas City (the national development center) and Florida (the IMG Academy).

After the first week in Kansas City, I headed back to Nebraska to work on my development period, which consisted of three or four assignments before we met again in February.

The second meeting at the IMG Academy, FL, was over another six days. Our final meeting was due to be in Kansas City in May, but COVID-19 hit so we did it virtually through April, May and June.

The candidates’ final assessments were supposed to be in their own environment, but this had to be virtual as well, consisting of video presentations and a two to three-hour interview with our instructor.

Takeaways

There were many key takeaways with every meeting as I gained knowledge in the areas I’m weakest in - leadership and periodization.

As I’m only 18 months into being a head coach, it was great to be surrounded by coaches who are in the professional game and an instructor with 30- plus years coaching a program at NCAA D1 level.

When you are there each week, you try to soak in as much information as possible but you don’t really digest it all until you go through your develop- mental months, back in your own environment.

When planning a session, the biggest takeaway for me is the five elements – Organized > Game- like > Repetition > Challenge > Coaching. If it’s not organized, then you have no chance getting to the next four elements.