Watch Soccer

Please, please, please - encourage your players to watch as much soccer on TV as possible. Even a small part of a high level game will do wonders for the mental side of their game. And the mental side is a much bigger part of the game as they grow older and mature.

ESPN2 and ESPN Classic have (5) UEFA Champions League matches this week. This is the biggest club competition on the planet featuring the best European teams.

ABC, ESPN and Fox Sports Detroit have soccer on every week. Fox Soccer Channel, Gol TV, ESPNU and CSTV have professional leagues, MLS and semi-pro along with Division One college soccer.

Keep an eye on ESPN SoccerNet TV listings on the web along with the TV guide. Let your team know when a game is on.

From USSoccerPlayers.com:

"The Big Three American team sports (hockey should not be considered a major sport anymore) live more or less in a vacuum. True, baseball and basketball now have proper world championship tournaments, but the NBA and MLB have done a great job of promoting the idea that winning league titles is still more important than winning world titles. That will never be the case with soccer, and thus it is vitally important that Major League Soccer, through ABC/ESPN, encourages viewers, especially kids, to watch Champions League matches.

Just as Dwayne Wade and Lebron James were inspired by watching the likes of Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant week-in and week-out, young soccer players need to be inspired by consistently watching the likes of Ronaldinho and Steven Gerrard (even if both played horribly this past week)."