What is Juggling?
Juggling is the act of keeping the ball off the ground using any variety of body parts other than arms and hands. Juggling is a key element to training balance and ball control that is often overlooked. Juggling allows the players to use all parts of their body to gain a feel for the ball. These touches build confidence and makes players aware of parts of their body that can be used to control or pass the ball. With a larger range of comfort with the ball, imagination is often sparked in game play. Key items to consider when juggling:

• Use all parts of the body (head, chest, thighs, shoulders and feet) and alternate feet. Don’t get caught only juggling with your dominant foot! If necessary, start with using your hands or allowing the ball to touch the ground, but eliminate hand use or bounces as you gain confidence.
• Focus on good controlled touches/relaxing on the ball to realize the full potential of juggling. If a player does not have good body control this will lead to bad touches.
• Be able to control the ball in different situations. So if a player has a bad touch, they should try to recover it rather than starting over.
• Be able to maintain good body position.
• Find rhythm and harmony between the player and the ball.
• Practice while standing still then progress to walking slowly and then with some pressure by either time or opponents.
• Practice juggling about 10-15 minutes each day.

Why Juggle?
Because juggling will significantly improve your game. Touches on the ball are important to the game of soccer. If you can juggle the ball with good control and consistently, you are more likely to be consistent when receiving and distributing the ball in game situations. Juggling teaches the player how the ball reacts to different touches and surfaces. With each milestone a player passes their self-confidence improves and they will enjoy the game even more.

When to Juggle?
The most effective way to achieving your juggling goals is to simply practice, almost anytime, almost anywhere (that your parents will allow J).  Even with five or ten minutes of juggling practice a day and the player will see improvement weekly. Beating your score and challenging yourself are important keys to improving your game. Juggling a soccer ball with feet, thighs, or head is an excellent activity for both beginners and advanced players alike. It's a great warm-up activity and good cardio.

A basic rule of today’s youth and adult soccer game is keeping possession for as long as possible, which generally equates to keeping the ball on the ground as much as possible. Since juggling focuses on keeping the ball off the ground, it focuses less on the team game or team possession, which is the basic reason why a lot of coaches tend to dismiss this skill and focusing more training time on practical match training. However, juggling is very important in the development of fundamentals and an array of peripheral skills. Juggling develops individual ball control, confidence on the ball, agility, and receiving.

Juggling Club
No bounces between touches or use of hands are allowed when reaching milestones, only for practice. Players must be able to demonstrate their proficiency/achievement to a SVU Staff Coach. Players' accomplishments will be published on the website. Tee shirts will be awarded to the players who reach their desired goal with the back of the shirt displaying their achievement.

* Minimum requirement for awards. Players may choose to strive for a higher Award Rating but will only be able to receive one t-shirt award.

Awards
Travel and Academy Coaches are responsible for submitting to the V.P. of Travel and Academy, the list of players and their juggling goal.  Tee shirts will be ordered bi-seasonally and Team Managers will be responsible for distribution.

The Olympic Development Program is a US Youth Soccer Program to identify players of the hightest caliber which will lead to increased success for the US National Teams.

Virginia ODP is divided into four districts – Central, Northern, Southeastern and Western.  Each district conducts open tryouts each summer for the 5 participating birth years of both genders for the next seasonal year.  For the upcoming seasonal year, the 2010-2011 seasonal year, tryouts will be conducted for the 98, 97, 96, 95, and 94 birth years.