Soccer Lessons - How To Kick a Soccer Ball Properly

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One of the most important soccer lessons and the first thing to know on kicking a soccer ball is what not to do. Do not kick a soccer ball with your toes, unless you are poking the ball to steel it from an opponent. There is not enough surface area on the toes to be able to aim the ball properly.

When kicking the ball the most powerful place to strike the ball with is the instep of your foot (the place where the shoelaces are). You will use this kicking technique most often.

Your supporting foot should be in line with the ball and the leg should be slightly bent. Once you strike the ball, follow through with a sweeping motion.

The inside of the foot is also used to kick the ball.

The supporting foot should be pointed at the target and in line with the ball.

Swing your kicking foot through the ball using a sweeping motion.

The ball should move smoothly along the ground.

A more advanced kick is achieved by using the outside of the foot

The supporting foot should be angled at about 15º from the target.
You need to be sure your foot is firmly locked before striking the ball.
This is one of the most important soccer lessons and guidelines that you should follow when kicking a soccer ball.

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Soccer Coaching - Soccer Skills and Training Lessons From the World Cup

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Below are 6 lessons about soccer skills and soccer training that I learned from the 2010 World Cup:

1. One-Touch Play is Critical in Order to Play Fast. Good soccer players must play fast. There often isn't time for 2-touch. You can use the Dribble Around Cone & Pass Relay Race Practice Game to teach one-touch play.

2. Teach Soccer Players to Block the Ball When they are Running Onto it Near the Goal Rather than Trying a Big Shot. Landon Donovan's goal vs. Algeria is a perfect example. He blocked it into the corner using the inside of his foot - there was NO backswing. The ball had plenty of power because he was running onto it. Think of how many shots went wide over the top because players kicked the ball too hard. Donovan kept his eyes on the ball, ran onto it and blocked it (one-touch) for the goal.

3. What Makes a Great Soccer Goal Scorer? In this World Cup, Klose of Germany and David Villa of Spain were 2 of the best. Both of them are smart players who anticipate where the ball will be and move to the right place. They are persistent, opportunistic and determined. I don't think either of them would win a skills contest, but they know how to score. Klose isn't flashy, but he is very smart.

4. Teach Your Attackers to Stay a Step or 2 Behind the Ball on a Counterattack. If you watched Klose, he would stay a step or 2 behind the ball on a fast counterattack. This gave him 2 advantages: he was less likely to be called offside and he could run onto the ball and block it into the net.

5. All Forwards Should Pressure the Goalkeeper Like David Villa. I was very impressed with David Villa of Spain, not just because of his scoring but because late in the Germany game (75th minute and later) with Spain leading, he kept pressuring the German goalkeeper. That didn't let the German Keeper take his time on punts or kicks off the ground. (Remember, a player can't "harass" the Keeper, but a player can pressure them to pick up the ball). I thought his hustle set an example for his team. At that point he had scored 5 of Spain's 7 goals and had assisted on another, so he was responsible for 6 of the 7 goals, and if he had just stood there like most Forwards no one would have said anything.

6. A Great Dribbler Who Can Break Down the Defense is Very Valuable, BUT He Must Know When to Pass. Messi is the ultimate example. He uses the dribble to set up the pass. He pulls defenders out of position to create space for a teammate and then passes the ball and follows up the shot. Arjen Robben is also a great dribbler and can disrupt defenses, but he has the reputation of sometimes dribbling too much when he should pass.

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Lessons From Starbucks' Product Managers - How To Protect Your Product's Rear

So there you are product manager, sitting on the top of the world in charge of the #1 selling brand of coffee and you're pulling in something like $4 a cup. Then all of a sudden: blam! The global economy falls off a cliff and suddenly there are a whole bunch of competitors who start to poach your customers by offering premium coffee at a much lower price. What's a product manager to do?

Starbucks' Low-End Problem
Everyone knows about Starbucks coffee - it seems like there is a Starbucks store on every corner right now and new ones seem to be popping up all the time. Well, according to the Starbucks product managers, that's not enough.

Lately McDonald's, Dunkin Doughnuts, and just about every other fast food chain out there have started to offer espresso-based coffee products. Oh, and they've been doing it at prices that are lower than Starbucks. The Starbucks product managers have seen this happening, but they have been constrained from doing anything because by necessity Starbucks has a limited menu (in order to keep things moving quickly) and the majority of their business is done in the morning.

While all of this has been going on, the number of Americans who drink premium coffee has increased. In fact, in just the last three years alone the number doing so has jumped from 29% to 35%. Great, so what's a coffee product manager to do?

Is It Time For A New Brand?
Seven years ago Starbucks bought one of their competitors: Seattle's Best Coffee. They haven't done that much with them since then, but thanks to the Starbucks product managers that will soon be changing.

Starbucks plans on rolling out a second coffee brand, you guessed it, Seattle's Best Coffee. This is the brand that they are going to use in order to compete with the lower-priced fast food coffee offerings that have been nipping at their heels.

This is where the real product management innovation will occur: this new brand is going to be sold everywhere. That means that you're going to start to see it in about 30,000 different locations ranging from fast-food outlets, supermarkets, bookstores, and even vending machines.

Can We Talk About Risk?
I can almost hear some of you starting to mumble concerns about this approach. You've got a good point. Since Starbucks is going to be selling most of the Seattle's Best Coffee through franchisees they are going to have a significant quality control issue. Additionally, the coffee that is sold though vending machines is generally the worst coffee out there - what is Starbucks thinking?

The product managers at Starbucks point out that they really don't have all that much to risk. Right now Starbucks has less than 4% of the U.S. market for brewed coffee. There's no place to go but up. Additionally, the engineers at Seattle's Best have created a new type of vending machine that they believe can actually deliver a good cup of coffee.

What All Of This Means For You
Starbucks finds itself in a difficult spot: it's got the #1 selling coffee product; however, the competition is coming on strong. The product managers at Starbucks realize that if the competition is successful at taking away the lower end of their customer base, then there will be nothing to stop them from moving up and capturing more and more customers over time.

Starbucks is taking the novel approach of launching another brand: Seattle's Best Coffee. They hope that by distributing this product everywhere they will be able to take some of the wind out of the sails of their competition (and money out of their pockets).

For product managers everywhere we have been given a front row seat to a major product strategy move. If you keep your eyes open and see what Starbucks does and how their competition reacts, then you'll be able to find out how this story turns out...

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Business Lessons From the Soccer World Cup

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OK, let's talk about the World Cup. If anyone got up early on Monday morning to watch the match between Australia and Germany, you no doubt walked away disappointed with the end result. But full credit to the German team - they really were brilliant and obviously the deserving winners. Today I am not here to talk about Italy and Australia - I am here to talk about something I heard in the game between Greece and Korea.

Now my wife is Greek, so even though she shows very little interest in the soccer, I thought it was my duty to also watch the last half of that game. Unfortunately, Greece lost 2-0. And here's what's interesting: at half-time I was listening to the commentators and they said something which I found interesting...

"Korea is playing to win whereas Greece is playing to not lose" And that's a fine distinction, isn't it? After all, how many of us play the game of business just to stay in business... just to survive? It's easy to fall into the trap of thinking small rather than thinking big. It's easy to think of break even rather than how you are going to build an empire. It's easy to avoid risk rather than take calculated risks which allow you to take your business to the next level. But what happens when we do that? It's really quite simple.

Think of it like a soccer game. If you don't take your chances... if you don't implement some aggressive strategies... and if you are always thinking about defence... Somehow the enemy manages to slip through your defence and all of a sudden you are heading for a loss which kicks you out of the tournament. By the same token, in business you might lose a client or an ad might stop working. You might lose a staff member. Many things can go wrong. In fact, we shouldn't be surprised when they do...

Even though we should at the same time be focusing on what we want and thinking positive. You need to stay ahead of the game. Here's how it works... "Every morning in Africa, a gazelle wakes up. It knows it must run faster than the fastest lion or it will be killed. Every morning a lion wakes up. It knows it must outrun the slowest gazelle or it will starve to death. It doesn't matter whether you are a lion or a gazelle: when the sun comes up, you'd better be running"

So take a moment right now to decide to stay ahead of the game... and play in your business with an attacking game plan. Interestingly enough, in Keith McFarland's book, The Breakthrough Company about how everyday companies become extraordinary performers he says this is one of the most important aspects to breaking through to the next level: Being willing to take calculated risks. Anyway, time to start running.

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