UPDATE: There is no deadline for signups. Saturday, Sept. 9 is the first day, but Cougar Soccer Club will take late registrations. Weekday practices don’t start until week of Sept. 11. From Cougar Soccer Club:
Cougar Soccer Club has been helping the children of Maplewood and South Orange have fun playing soccer for nearly 60 years. We are dedicated to ensuring that every child has an opportunity to play and no one is turned away for financial reasons.
Signups are open now for Academy Soccer (ages 3-8) and there are some spots still open for travel soccer for girls born in 2014 and boys born in 2009, 2010 and 2013. Please email cougarsoccerclub@gmail.com if you are interested in Travel soccer.
For younger players, we have made exciting changes to our Academy Soccer program. You don’t want to miss the chance for another great season of fun with your friends. The link to sign up is here: https://go.teamsnap.com/forms/385046
As part of our efforts to continually improve the Academy program for our budding young soccer stars, we have made some adjustments to the U7 (2017) and U8 (2016) experience to provide more of a team experience and a better transition path from Academy to the Travel program.
Our U4/U5 Minikickers and U6 Kickers programs will remain the same, focused on a fun intro to soccer and lots of individual time on the ball to keep kids engaged and excited about soccer in the earliest phase of their development. Minikickers play once a week on Saturdays, and Kickers play one weeknight and on Saturdays.
The key things we have changed with U7 and U8 are:
- U7s and U8s will be grouped into teams (at random, assigned by the club, with girls and boys teams)
- Teams will practice together during the week with the same trainers and have more team/game oriented training
- U7s will practice 1 weeknight, U8s will practice 2 weeknights
- The training focus will still heavily emphasize individual development by maximizing the number of touches each player has, but will introduce the basic elements of team play
- During Saturday Academy, teams will have set schedules to play each other
- Games will be 4v4 with no goalies (based on US Soccer standard play format for U8 players)
- One trainer will “ref” and one will run substitutions from the sidelines
- One Parent Coordinator will support the trainers on the sidelines to help manage the kids
Space is limited, so please register ASAP to reserve your spots! If you have any questions, please reach out to Coach Nick at cougarsoccerclub.academy@gmail.com.
