Faith Jasper took up coaching aged 14, when an opportunity arose to take some sessions in between her goalkeeper training.

She undertook her Canada Soccer National C license at the age of 18, the youngest in the group, and one of the only females.

Numerous coaching roles followed in her hometown of Regina in Saskatchewan, before she moved to Winnipeg to make use of her degree in sport and recreation studies as a recreation therapist.

Faith is head coach of Bonivital SC’s U14s girls premier team and assistant coach of the club’s U15s girls premier team.

She caught up with Scott Mowberry, from our friends at the Soccer Coaching Podcast, to talk about her coaching philosophy, how she defines the moments of the game, and why language is so important…

SM: How would you describe your coaching philosophy?

FJ: "I break it down as my ’personal’ - what I’m looking to get out of it - and then the technical and tactical moments of the game. 

“If we’re going into my philosophical approach, I look a lot more at making meaningful relationships on and off the field and focusing on the athletes as humans, rather than robots. They are not there just to play soccer, they are there to have fun.

"I’m looking for players to become confident on the ball. We want to create ’ball hogs’ - we don’t want to encourage them to pass as soon as they get the ball.

"So [it’s about] making a fun-focused session, having players engaged as much as they can be, and creating that everlasting love for the game I was lucky enough to get and have been able to bring to my coaching.

"’Making good players, but better humans’ is what I always say.

“For my technical-tactical side, I am a big fan of breaking down the game for the players to build it back up. So I go by the four moments: AT, DT, AO and DO.

"AT is attacking transition - you win the ball and immediately you look to go forward. If you have space, you’re looking to dribble.

“AO, or attacking organization, would be [where] you win the ball and can’t go forward. You look to secure two passes and then move forward - it’s keeping possession rather than immediately looking to go.

“DT is defensive transition. That would be [where] you have just lost the ball. That’s what I call ’the hunt’ - you’re looking to win it back in 10 seconds.

"I’m looking for players to become confident on the ball - we want to create ’ball hogs’..."

“Then DO is defensive organization, which would be [where] you have just lost the ball and couldn’t win it back in 10 seconds. Now what? You look to get your line of attack set, organize your defensive players, that kind of thing.”

SM: What does a Faith Jasper coaching session look like?

FJ: "I always start with the Fifa 11+ warm-up. I grew up using that - it’s scientifically based and researched, and I believe it works.

"Then I move into a fun warm-up game, looking at getting more movement than skill on the ball. It doesn’t necessarily have to involve a ball at their feet, more of a movement and awareness piece than anything.

"It could be a game not even related to soccer, where it’s more movement-based and relationship-based.

“Following that, I do our first game, which is related to whatever theme is at hand. We pick one of the four moments and focus on that as the theme.

"That is our small-sided game, but there’s conditions that emphasize the theme we’re working towards.