Sporting Padula Soccer Academy

About Our Training Practices

Behind every great player there is a great coach. Soccer is very much a team sport & good coaching makes a great difference in any age player. On average, after the age of nine, a well-coached team will almost always beat a poorly coached team, even if the poorly coached team has better athletes. By “well coached” we mean players and teams that have been taught in practice the skills, teamwork and other things they need to know so they can have fun and be successful playing soccer. In other words: Play Hard. Play Fair. Have Fun.

At SP Soccer Academy, we want to offer to your child the best available coaching and training programs. This is why our staff is led by professional soccer player Gino Padula and his staff of experienced and professional coaches. Gino Padula spent the most recent years of his career playing for the Columbus Crew and helping them to obtain the first Major League Soccer title in team history and the first major professional sports championship in Columbus history. Gino came to Columbus to work and play the game he loves. With his wife and his kids, they grew to have respect and love for the city and the community. They saw the potential in Columbus' youth, and now Gino is offering his professional experience and knowledge to young players. This project is a result of his passion and knowledge obtained through years of experience in professional soccer. Gino feels that the city of Columbus is the ideal place to develop this initiative.

At our academy, both boys and girls will be trained in the same way, beginning from the basics like footwork, ball control, dribbling, passing, defending, tactics, explanation of terms and concepts, and of course, playing games.

With both boys and girls, we will instill the “winning mentality” that Gino had as a professional player rather than pressuring the children for results. We do not want boys and girls to play under any unnecessary pressure to win. Such pressure is not beneficial either to them, or to their learning and training processes. Training is very important to have a competitive team, but developing a winning mentality will help your child when we play and compete in tournaments and in other aspects of life.

Sometimes we will mix younger and older age groups when training at the academy. This is a system that is used by many successful programs around the world, where many times, for example, U9 trains with U10 and U12 with U13. It is a very good training method, and it will help boys and girls to work harder and improve every day. In addition, if convenient, some players may play tournaments with an older age group.