Volunteering to coach a junior AFL team is one of the most rewarding things you can do in your community — and one of the least prepared-for. Most new coaches receive a squad list, a training slot, and a good luck. The rest you figure out as you go.
This guide covers the practical fundamentals: how to run training sessions that actually develop your team, how to create an environment where every player wants to show up, how to reduce injury risk, and how to make better decisions on game day — without needing a background in elite sport.
Your Job Is the Team, Not the Scoreboard
The first mindset shift worth making: your job at junior level is to develop a team that enjoys playing together, improves week to week, and stays intact through the season. The scoreboard is a byproduct of that, not the goal.
This matters because it changes every decision you make. It changes how you handle rotations, how you talk to players who are struggling, and how you respond to a heavy loss. Coaches who chase the scoreboard at junior level tend to make the same mistakes — playing their best players too much, benching struggling players during difficult moments, and training for results rather than skills.
The teams that are well-coached at junior level look different. Kids are engaged at training. Rotations are varied. Players who don’t make the highlight reel still feel like they’re part of something. That environment is what you’re building.
Running Training Sessions That Actually Work
A common trap for new coaches is planning training around what they remember from their own playing days, or what they see on AFL broadcasts. Junior training needs a different structure.
Start with a purpose. Before every session, know what you’re trying to improve. It doesn’t have to be complicated — “we want to work on our handball under pressure” or “we need to clean up our stoppages” is enough. A session without a focus tends to drift into familiar drills that keep players busy without developing anything specific.
Build in game-based activities. Isolated skill drills have their place, but players transfer skills better when they practise in contexts that resemble real games. Modified games, small-sided contests, and situational drills (defending a lead, ball-up at centre, forward 50 entries) are more useful for junior development than repetitive lines of kicking practice.
Vary the difficulty. Good training has moments that feel achievable and moments that stretch players. If every drill is comfortable, players aren’t growing. If every drill is beyond their current level, players disengage. The sweet spot is slightly harder than comfortable — and it’s different for every player in your squad.
End well. The last five minutes of training set the tone for next week. Finish with something players enjoy, a brief word on what went well, and a clear indication of what you’re focusing on in the upcoming game. Players who leave training feeling good about what they did come back.
Inclusion Is Not Optional
Junior sport is one of the most significant social environments in a young person’s life. The experience players have during these years shapes whether they stay active for decades or quietly drift away from sport in their teens.
Inclusion at junior coaching level means more than having everyone on the list. It means every player has a genuine role, feels capable of contributing, and is seen by their coach.
Watch who you’re watching. Coaches naturally watch the most skilled players most of the time. Make a conscious effort to direct your attention to players who don’t generate highlights. One specific observation per player per game — even just a mental note — keeps your awareness honest and your feedback meaningful.
Rotate with intention. Rotation is good. Parking the same group of players in low-contest situations every week is not. Vary your rotations deliberately so that every player experiences different parts of the game, including some challenging ones appropriate for their age and ability.
Praise effort, not just outcomes. At junior level, what you praise shapes what players value. A player recognised for chasing hard in a losing position will chase harder next time. A player who only receives feedback when they kick goals learns that goals are all that count. That’s a poor lesson for a ten-year-old — and a poor development environment for your team.
Be mindful of player confidence. Public criticism in front of teammates damages confidence, particularly at younger age groups. Redirect in the moment if needed, but save detailed corrective feedback for one-on-one conversations. A player who feels safe to try — and to fail — develops faster than one who is afraid to make a mistake.
Injury Prevention Starts Before the Warm-Up
One of the most impactful things a junior coach can do for their team is take injury prevention seriously. Junior athletes are still developing physically. Overuse injuries, muscle strains, and joint problems that start in junior sport can follow players for years.
A proper warm-up routine is the single most accessible injury-prevention tool available to community coaches. The AFL’s Prep to Play program is specifically designed for community football and takes around 15 minutes. It combines dynamic movement, neuromuscular activation, and sport-specific preparation — replacing the traditional “a few laps and some static stretches” routine that most junior teams still use.
Static stretching before activity (holding a stretch for 20–30 seconds) has limited evidence for injury prevention and can temporarily reduce muscle power. Dynamic warm-ups — leg swings, lateral shuffles, controlled lunges, progressive running — prepare the body more effectively for the demands of football.
A simple warm-up structure for junior training:
General movement (3–4 minutes). Light jogging, changing direction, gradually increasing pace. Not a sprint. Not a plod.
Dynamic activation (5–6 minutes). Hip circles, leg swings, lateral movements, arm circles. Get joints moving through their full range.
Football-specific preparation (4–5 minutes). Short kicks, handballs at pace, contested ball work at low intensity. Connect the warm-up to what you’re about to do.
Progressive intensity. The last activity before your main session should feel close to game pace. Players should arrive at the first drill ready to go, not still warming up.
Cool-down matters too. A few minutes of easy movement and light stretching at the end of training supports recovery and reduces soreness — particularly for players who have multiple training and game commitments in a week.
Building Fitness Into Your Sessions (Without Making It Feel Like Fitness)
Fitness is often treated as a separate block at the end of training — a few laps, some shuttle runs, then everyone goes home. At junior level, this approach works against you. By the time you get to the fitness component, engagement has dropped, quality is low, and the last thing players associate with training is enjoying themselves.
The better approach is to build fitness through the session rather than bolt it on at the end.
Game-based drills are the most effective tool here. A well-designed small-sided game — say, four versus four in a confined grid with quick transitions — generates more cardiovascular work than a structured running drill, while also practising decision-making, skill execution under fatigue, and communication. Players are working hard without thinking about working hard.
A few practical ways to increase the fitness load inside your existing session structure:
Reduce rest between repetitions. The same kicking or marking drill becomes a fitness activity when the rest period shortens. Start with enough recovery that technique stays intact, then gradually reduce it as the season progresses and fitness improves.
Use transition activities. Between drills, rather than having players stand and wait, use short transition tasks — 20-metre runs to a new position, lateral shuffles across the grid, a sprint to the next cone. These add work without feeling like a fitness test.
Finish with a contested game. A short high-intensity modified game — 10 minutes, small teams, everyone involved — at the end of the main session builds fitness while being the part of training players look forward to most. It’s also where coaches get their best look at how players apply skills under pressure and fatigue.
Match fitness demands to age. Under 10s and Under 12s don’t need structured fitness programs — game-based play provides more than enough. From Under 14s upward, you can begin to introduce more deliberate conditioning, but it should still be largely activity-based rather than running for running’s sake. Kids who associate sport with grinding fitness work are more likely to stop playing.
The goal at junior level is for players to arrive at the end of the season fitter than they started — without any of them being aware that was part of the plan.
Game-Day
Game day for a junior coach is a blur of rotations, in-game adjustments, and sideline conversations with parents. Having a simple system helps.
Know your rotations before you arrive. Don’t figure out your rotation at quarter time. Have a plan going in — which players start where, when you’ll make your first changes, which players you want to give exposure in more demanding positions. Plans change in response to what happens in the game, but starting with a plan stops rotations from becoming reactive and unfair.
Pick one or two things to focus on, and watch for those. If you’ve decided this week is about tackling pressure and handball under contest, watch specifically for those moments. Coaches who try to track everything end up retaining nothing useful. A narrow focus gives you something concrete to reinforce at quarter time and something real to build training around the following week.
Watch the patterns, not just the ball. Your players are already watching the ball. Your job is to see what’s happening away from it — who’s moving into space, who’s dropping off their opponent, where your structure is breaking down. That’s where the useful observations live.
Record what you can, even simply. A tally of tackles, marks, or disposals — even scribbled on your phone between quarters — gives you something to work with beyond memory. It doesn’t need to be comprehensive. Even one or two tracked stats per game starts to show patterns across the season that your instinct alone won’t catch. Which players are doing more than they get credit for. Where the team is improving. What still needs work. Apps like ScorX let parents help with this during the game, which means you can stay focused on coaching while still building a useful record.
Adjust at quarter time, not continuously. Junior players can’t process a constant stream of instructions during the game. Save your key messages for breaks. During the quarter, keep direction short and specific — one clear instruction to one player at a time.
After the game, note three things. Before the week gets away from you, write down three things you want to address at training. What the team did well that’s worth reinforcing. What broke down that’s worth fixing. And one individual moment — positive or developing — for a player who doesn’t often get specific feedback. Those notes take five minutes and make your next training session significantly more purposeful.
Talking to Parents
Parent communication is one of the least-discussed challenges in junior coaching, and one of the most common sources of stress for new volunteers.
Most difficult parent conversations aren’t really about the thing they say they’re about. “Why isn’t my son getting more time in the forward line?” is usually “I want to know my child is valued and has a future in this sport.” Responding to the surface question rarely helps.
A useful approach: be specific about what you’re working on with their child, not just what position they’re playing or how much game time they’re getting. “I’m working with him on his positioning at stoppages — he’s getting to the ball well but we want him to be in a better spot to use it” is a coaching conversation. It shows you’re paying attention and that there’s a plan. That reassures most parents far more than a general “he’s doing great.”
If you’re tracking any information about your team’s patterns — even informally — it gives you something concrete to reference. Coaches who can point to observed patterns, not just impressions, tend to have more confident conversations on the sideline.
Building Something Worth Coming Back To
The measure of a well-coached junior team isn’t the premiership count. It’s the number of players who come back next year.
Retention in junior community sport is a genuine problem. Players leave for many reasons — changing interests, school commitments, injuries — but a significant number leave because they stopped feeling like they belonged. They didn’t feel seen by their coach. They didn’t feel like they were improving. They didn’t feel like the environment was for them.
You have more influence over that than any other factor in their sporting life this season.
A team where every player feels included, training sessions have a clear purpose, the warm-up is taken seriously, and game day decisions are thoughtful — that’s a team that stays together. And a team that stays together develops.
That’s the job.
Frequently Asked Questions
How long should junior AFL training sessions be?
For Under 10s and Under 12s, 60–75 minutes is generally enough. Younger players lose focus and quality drops off sharply beyond this. Under 14s and above can handle 75–90 minutes with a well-structured session. Quality of engagement matters more than time on the field — a sharp 60-minute session is more valuable than a loose 90-minute one.
What is the AFL’s Prep to Play program and where do I find it?
Prep to Play is a free warm-up program developed by the AFL for community football. It’s designed to reduce injury risk through dynamic movement preparation and neuromuscular activation. Your state or territory football organisation should have resources available, and the AFL’s official coaching development resources include guidance on implementing it at junior level.
How do I handle players of very different ability levels in the same training session?
Design drills that scale. Modify the same activity for different skill levels — smaller grid for players who need a challenge, larger grid for players who need more time on the ball. Avoid separating players by ability too explicitly, particularly in younger age groups, as it reinforces a hierarchy kids are very aware of. Mixed-ability small-sided games, where skilled players naturally lift less experienced ones, often produce better development outcomes than segregated groups.
How much tactical instruction is appropriate at junior level?
Less than you think. Under 12s and younger benefit most from playing, experimenting, and enjoying the game. Heavy tactical instruction at this age can reduce enjoyment and development. From Under 14s upward, you can introduce more structure — positional responsibilities, set plays, defensive systems — but it should still sit on top of a foundation of game sense developed through play. The AFL’s Long Term Athlete Development framework has useful age-appropriate guidance.
How do I keep parents positive on the sideline?
Set expectations early — ideally before the season starts. A brief pre-season note or meeting that explains your coaching philosophy (development focus, varied rotations, effort over outcome) manages most sideline tension before it starts. When difficult conversations happen, listen first, acknowledge the concern, and respond with specifics about what you’re working on. Coaches who communicate frequently and specifically tend to have fewer difficult parent interactions, not more.
Should I be tracking stats during games?
You don’t have to track everything — and trying to do so while coaching usually means doing neither well. The more useful approach is to pick one or two things to track per game, connected to whatever your current training focus is. If you’ve been working on tackling pressure, count tackles. If you’re developing ball movement, track disposals by zone. Even simple tallies build a picture across the season that memory alone won’t give you. Enlisting a parent to help with recording during the game — using a phone or a simple stats app — means you can stay focused on coaching while still capturing something useful.
ScorX is free for coaches. It’s designed for exactly the kind of community coaching described in this guide — track what you’re seeing across the season, build a picture of your team’s patterns, and have something concrete to say at training and on the sideline. Download on the App Store.