I've been coaching youth football(8-11) for ten years now. Defensively, have to be solid at D ends and cornerbacks, most young teams do run alot of tosses designed to go wide. Put your fastes most agressive kid at safety, teach him to be a good tackeler and good angles. Linebackers have to work from the middle out. D-lineman if you can find that one big stud, he can reak havoc...let him get into the backfield and have the "average" d-lineman work on getting o-lineman extended and filling their gaps. Offensively a smart QB....doesnt have to be the greatest athlete, prefferebly with som speed....arm stregnth doesn't mean much at young ages. Running backs a stud fullback that will put people on there cans, and runningbacks tough runners.....speed is a bonus. Most important part of offense.......teach those linemen to block!!!! Explode off the ball go tou your man...do not let him come to you. Teach them if your blocking your man to the left get your head and right foot to your mans left shoulder and hook him. Hope that helps a little....Ohhhh....and make sure they enjoy it!! get on their buts when needed but dont leave them discouraged, pick them back up after getting on them.
What we do is video tape the line of scrimmage, then get all the kids together and watch the tape. Run it in slow motion and show the group, and yes single out the player who is slow coming off, show them all how slow he is getting off the ball, he will shape up, I promise. The kids usually get a good kick out of it as well.
Absaloutley.....we just use video for Mondays after the game....film doesn't lie.....call em out, they will know their always being watched.
