Many strengths, some different needs
Players with ADHD often bring real strengths to football — high energy, quick reactions, and the ability to fully throw themselves into a game. Some common coaching adjustments help these strengths show up more often, and help training feel less frustrating for everyone, including the player themselves.
Structure and predictability help everyone
A consistent session structure — similar shape week to week (see our session-planning guides) — particularly benefits players who find unpredictable environments harder to settle into. This doesn't mean rigid or boring; it means the broad shape (warm-up, activity, game) stays familiar even as the specific content varies.
Short, active instructions
Long verbal explanations are hard for most young players to sit through — and particularly so for some players. "Show, then do" (a brief demonstration, then straight into doing it) generally works better than extended talking for any group, and especially benefits players who find sitting and listening for long periods genuinely difficult.
Transitions are often the hardest moment
The gaps between activities — packing up cones, moving to a new area, waiting for the next thing to start — are frequently where things go sideways, not because of the activities themselves. A quick countdown ("two minutes until we switch"), or giving a player a small job during the transition (carrying cones, being first to the new spot), can smooth exactly these moments.
Channel energy, don't suppress it
"Sit still and wait your turn" is hard for a lot of young players and particularly so for some. Where possible, activities that keep everyone moving (see our small-sided games guide) reduce the moments where "stillness" is being asked for at all — sidestepping the issue rather than fighting it.
Match days specifically
Matches remove much of the structure that helps in training — there's no neat rotation of activities, and a lot of standing around waiting for the ball to come back into play. Giving a player a specific, active role during quieter match moments (encouraging teammates, tracking a specific opponent, a job during a break in play) can help far more than asking them to simply "concentrate" through the quiet patches. Pre-match, a familiar warm-up routine — the same shape every week — helps settle a player who finds new environments (an unfamiliar ground, opposition players) harder to adjust to quickly.
Ask the player directly, not just the parent
Alongside talking to parents, a brief, casual conversation with the player themselves — "is there anything that makes training easier, or harder, for you?" — sometimes surfaces something a parent wouldn't think to mention. Older players especially often know their own patterns well and can articulate what helps, if asked in a low-key way rather than as a formal sit-down conversation.
Working with parents
If a parent shares specific strategies that work well for their child — particular phrases, warning signs before frustration builds, what helps them reset — that's valuable information worth genuinely using, not just acknowledging. Parents are usually the people with the most experience of what works for their own child.
This isn't about labels
Most of the adjustments above — short instructions, predictable structure, minimal standing-around, channeling energy into activity — make sessions better for every player, not just any specific child. Good inclusive coaching practice tends to be good coaching practice, full stop.
Praise that lands
Specific, immediate praise ("great scan before that pass" rather than a general "well done") tends to land better than vague encouragement, and landing it right after the moment it describes matters more than the exact wording — a delayed "well done earlier" loses much of its impact compared to catching the moment as it happens. This is good practice for any player, but particularly helps a player connect the praise to the specific action that earned it.
When another parent or player raises a concern
Occasionally another parent, or a teammate, notices a player behaving differently and asks a coach about it. A brief, kind, non-specific answer — "everyone's a bit different, and we coach to what works for each player" — respects the family's privacy while not leaving the question hanging awkwardly. It's not a coach's place to explain another family's situation, even with good intentions.