J is 9, male and from a black African family. He's arrived at football wearing the full brazil strip with 'Ronaldihno' no 7 on the back of his shirt.....I wonder what Ronaldihno was like when he was 9????
J is an interesting young man. He comes along to football on Tuesday nights and also attends youth club on a Wednesday night. In the past he’s been kicked out of every other youth club he’s attended mainly because of his behaviour. Our aim is to be the youth club that keeps him, we want to be the place that he wasn't too bad for... ultimately, we feel this will have a long term positive impact on J. At football last Tuesday he was being particularly difficult, being nasty to the other kids, not listening to instructions and running off if thing’s weren’t going his way. This is difficult to deal with as a leader because it can have a really negative impact on the other kids and also your energy level’s. Towards the end of football we split the kid’s into teams and play matches. Realising that J was struggling I decided to see how he would respond to being made team captain. The result…. J in tears because the rest of the team wouldn’t listen to him (at least now I know not to use the captain thing again because the kids can’t stand the idea of peer authority).
Eventually it all settled down and the games started. It’s total mayhem when these kid’s play and as a referee it’s hard work. You have F who cries when he’s tackled, B who get’s mad when his team begins to lose and so he starts kicking people, E who just stops altogether when the other team scores a goal. The idea of Tuesday night football is that we create a positive peer environment and for a lot of kids it works. However, it demands a huge amount energy from us as leaders to remain encouraging and enthusiastic whilst also handling the conflict that arises on the pitch.
So while this is all going on J is really struggling. He won’t take his turn in goals and he’s not reacting well when his team doesn’t pass to him. In fact if he’s not at the centre of the play and scoring the goals he gets angry. Tim my colleague had been refereeing most of J’s team’s games and it wasn’t until the last round of games that he came onto my pitch. It started out well, both teams playing fairly and having fun. However, when J’s team go on the attack and score he became unhappy that he wasn’t passed too. He later bursts into tears when I disallow a goal for unfair play. With a short one to one chat I managed to restore J’s esteem and he played on (for a short while). J’s team start a wonderful move passing the ball around and he’s screaming for a pass, but they’re not passing to him. Creatively his teammates make their way up the field with the ball. J stands just outside the goal screaming for a pass (becoming more and more agitated). Eventually he gets a pass to where he’s standing and he scores with a wonderful shot but instead of celebrate he runs off the pitch crying, shouting abuse at anyone who gets in his way…. I still haven’t quite worked the whole thing out. Anyway, I gave him a red card for being over elaborate (joke).
It's challenging work. I left football last tuesday feeling totally knackered and de-motivated. These boys had taken everything out of me. But in reflection i realise that's why i'm here. To be pushed to my limits so that in response i will grow as a person. I wrote that Blog a week ago and today myself and Tim (colleague) are preparing for another night of Football. How am i feeling?? The same way i felt before last Tuesday's session.... I canny wait!!
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