It was a picturesque summer night along the Wasatch front. The sun was beginning to set over a little park that was tucked behind homes in a neighborhood in South Jordan. Along the perimeter of the field, were young parents who sat and watched as Real Monarchs veterans Tyler Arnone and Alec Sundly taught the kids some fundamentals of the beautiful game.
The duo had just finished up a quick practice session with a high school aged group and now were lending a hand to some young soccer hopefuls. In fact, it wasn’t that long ago when Arnone and Sundly were in these seven-year-old shoes. The two teammates and friends both started playing soccer at just five and six years old. They were also both multi-sport athletes before it came time to pursue just soccer. Now, the pair is playing at the professional level and following their dreams, and one of those aspirations is to start a coaching career early.
“Coaching in general is harder than it looks. When you have to reteach fundamental skills to seven-year-olds, or introduce higher-level tactics to 16-year-olds, it challenges us,” Arnone said. “Not only to have knowledge about the game but being able to break that down and teach it to someone else increases our own soccer IQ.”
Neither Arnone nor Sundly ever had professional players teach them, but they both know how important it can be to pass on their soccer knowledge and help spread love for the game.
And the goal for both is to keep going. Arnone joked, after a long playing career he hopes to be one of the best coaches out there and Sundly shares that dream as well.
“We hopefully one day will go up the ranks and go through the whole process,” Sundly said. “Hopefully one day we will be D1, or professional or even national coaches. We are setting big goals and have to shoot somewhere.”
It all starts with their time working with young players in Utah.
