Built On Belonging
A few weeks ago, I spent two days at the National Training Center in Atlanta Georgia. I was invited by US Soccer to attend the HerLens Conference. Not only was it very cool to see our new digs as a federation. It was so refreshing to be in a room filled with people that I didn’t need to convince, that the girls' side of the game deserves to be looked at and treated differently than the men's side. My favorite parts of the conference were listening to the Kang Women’s Institute inform the room of some of the most current and specific new data they are accumulating. And I also really enjoyed hearing from Fiona McPhee Roberts, the performance psychology coach for the USWNT about Performance Zones and Team Culture. These two days really got me thinking and I felt the need to get my thoughts out there.
For years, competitive youth soccer has placed an immense focus on technical skillsets, strict tactical organization, and clinical-based perfectionism. While tactical literacy is essential, this exclusive emphasis on x’s and o’s—regardless of a coach’s gender or background—often overlooks a fundamental truth of adolescent development: a young female athlete cannot process tactical instructions on the pitch until she feels safe, valued, and connected off of it.
In the drive to build technically superior players, youth sports often neglect Social-Emotional Learning (SEL). This gap leaves adolescent girls feeling unseen, unheard, and misunderstood in the very spaces meant to build their confidence.
The 93%: Belonging Isn't a Bonus, It's the Baseline
Research from the Kang Women’s Institute, highlights a striking insight into why young women play and stay in sports: 93% of female athletes cite the fundamental need to belong as their primary reason for remaining in the game after the age of 15.
For teenage girls, sport is rarely just about soccer. During adolescence, the brain undergoes major neurological and social restructuring. Peer acceptance, identity formation, and psychological safety become central drivers of behavior. When an adolescent female athlete steps onto the pitch, her brain asks three core relational questions before it can engage with complex tactical problems:
Am I safe to fail here?
Does my coach see me as a person, or just a position?
Do I belong on this team?
When coaches lead exclusively with tactics, formations, and performance metrics, they bypass these foundational emotional questions. The result? A player who feels like a chess piece rather than a contributor, leading to anxiety, burnout, and eventually, dropout.
The Discrepancy: Hyper-Tactical Focus & The SEL Void
Across youth clubs, coaches of all backgrounds and genders frequently fall into the trap of prioritizing tactical mechanics over relational dynamics.
In traditional coaching education, standard youth development models rely heavily on direct instruction, transactional feedback, and a top-down power dynamic. Success is often defined by repetition and execution. This transactional model frequently misses the relational nuances required in female adolescent sports, where:
Correction without connection feels like rejection. An authoritative bark from the sideline ("Wake up, turn faster!") is often processed by a 14-year-old girl not as a tactical adjustment, but as a public confirmation that she does not belong.
Silence is interpreted as disapproval. When coaches focus only on mistakes and omit intentional SEL practices (such as regular check-ins, non-verbal validation, and peer bonding), female players often internalize the lack of feedback as failure.
Tactics are prioritized over team climate. Small-sided games and passing patterns are planned down to the minute, yet team dynamics, clique behaviors, and emotional stress are left unaddressed.
The Rise of Professionalization: When Team Belonging Becomes an Individual Transaction
Compounding this tactical fixate is the rapid professionalization of youth soccer. What was once a community-centered team experience has increasingly turned into an individualized commercial industry focused on elite pipelines, private training, and individual exposure.
This hyper-professionalization pushes players and families into a transactional mindset:
Me Over We: With ranking apps, video scouting clips, and individual stats dominating player evaluations, young athletes are conditioned to measure their success in isolation. When individual exposure is prioritized over team collective success, genuine team cohesion breaks down.
Commodifying the Athlete: When youth sports operate like professional businesses, players are treated as assets or commodities to be promoted, swapped, or ranked. This environment directly opposes the psychological need for unconditional belonging.
Fragmented Peer Dynamics: When athletes view their own teammates as direct competitors for roster spots, scholarship offers, or starting positions, the team environment becomes guarded rather than collaborative.
Adolescent girls thrive when they feel part of a collective identity. When the industry forces them into a solo journey focused on individual metrics, the essential feeling of team belonging is erased.
When SEL is treated as an afterthought rather than a core pillar of coaching—and when professionalized individualism takes over—the disconnect produces predictable outcomes across youth teams: When a young girl does not feel seen, heard, or understood by her coach, soccer transforms from a place of joy and empowerment into another high-pressure environment where she feels judged. The statistics reinforce this reality: when the need to belong is unmet, even highly talented players walk away from the game entirely.
Bridging the Gap: Integrating SEL into Modern Coaching
Bridging this gap does not mean abandoning tactical discipline, fitness standards, or high performance. Instead, it requires modernizing how coaches deliver tactical concepts through an SEL-informed lens and actively restoring a sense of shared community. If we can figure out how to 1. Educate coaches that we can have high performance environments that both CHALLENGE AND SUPPORT players and 2. Equip coaches with tools on how to support athletes while helping them to feel they belong is of utmost importance. Here are a few ideas:
Connection Before Correction
Establish relational touchpoints before jumping into tactical breakdowns. A simple 30-second individual check-in before practice begins builds the psychological safety necessary for a player to accept constructive feedback later in the session.Co-Create Team Culture & Shared Agency
Adolescent girls need agency. Counter the individualistic culture of modern youth sports by allowing players to contribute to team expectations, define what support looks like, and share their perspectives on match decisions together.Reward Relational & Mental Execution
If coaches only praise goals, assists, and solo highlights, they reinforce the belief that a player's worth is purely output-driven. Explicitly highlight leadership, active communication, resilience after an error, and inclusive teammate behaviors.Train the Whole Human
Tactical periodization must co-exist with emotional periodization. Recognizing stress triggers, managing peer dynamics, and fostering non-soccer team bonding are just as vital to success as set-piece organization.
Soccer has the power to serve as a transformative space for young women—a place where they build lifelong confidence, executive leadership skills, and deep peer relationships. But that potential can only be unlocked when environments prioritize belonging and team connection as intentional strategy, not a fortunate side effect.
It's time to expand our definition of elite coaching. The best coaches on the pitch won't just be the ones who understand tactical systems—they will be the ones who build genuine culture and ensure every single player feels seen, heard, and deeply understood.
If you are interested in joining me in this discussion and work to make this needed difference, please reach out. We can use all the help we can get.