Benjamin Helm

15 years of coaching youth soccer players

Currently: Head Coach GU14 and GU16 at Laguna Hills Soccer Club Eclipse

Currently: Assistant coach at Laguna Beach High School

Currently Holds: USSF C license

Currently Holds: NSCAA State and Regional Goalkeeping License

I came to love the game of soccer as a young boy in Eugene, Oregon. I feared no one back then as I charged forward sporting an afro, wearing tennis shoes, bursting by opponents and scoring goals.

My ability in the game took me to college and beyond with some minor stints with semi-professional soccer teams in the US, England and Germany.

Today, 35 years later the legs are a little slower and the hair a lot shorter. My playing days are well behind me but I have had the great fortune to translate my passion for the game into a coaching career.

This career has taken me to Ohio, Colorado, Oregon and California. I’ve coached youth players ranging from 5 years of age to college players.

In my free time I keep up with the changes to the game by taking licensing courses, watching soccer instructional videos, attending games and observing dedicated coaches at work educating and inspiring young players.

I’ve witnessed a lot of positive growth in American soccer over the past 20 years but I have seen a trend in the women’s game that needs to change beginning at the grassroots level.

For many years the US soccer program dominated the international scene with a combination of overwhelming athleticism mixed with the determination and excellence of great players like Mia Hamm.

Today that landscape has changed. Developing soccer countries like Japan, Brazil, Germany, and North Korea can on any given day not only outplay the US women’s team but beat them by being more creative, more imaginative and more lethal in front of goal. Stop and ask yourself who are the most creative, skillful and fearless scorers in the WPS. It is my bet you wouldn’t name an American player. Why not?

It’s because we’ve taken that afro and those tennis shoes away from our players. Today, training sessions are filled with drills that take you in every direction but towards the goal and by doing so we create players that are fearful and not fearless and those who look to pass first in front of goal when they should be scoring and celebrating.

This is why my colleague Dan and I have created Go2Goal-Soccer Academy.

It is a grassroots movement to create a new generation of soccer players that will attain the primary aim of the Go2Goal-Soccer Academy which is to correctly train today’s youth soccer player to be athletic and skillful in the art of scoring goals.