Attitude covers a wide area in all youth sports. Regardless of level of play, players excell when their parents, coaches, spectators and fellow players keep a positive attitude. When players are expected to be perfect on the field, they will never move towards better soccer. Perfection cannot be accomplished and they will turn into mediocre players. How sad it is when refereeing a game and hearing parents or coaches belittle the children because they didn't execute a play as they thought they should. On the other hand, how wonderful when you hear a group of coaches and parents who always encourage their players,regardless of result.
Cheer the effort regardless of result!
It is my unbending belief that in youth sports a player's attitude is directly related to parents attitude. Players react differently to how parents act. Some become intraverts, some extraverts, some difficult to coach. Most parents are very positive towards the upbrinning of their children, but when it comes to youth sports they often become different people. It is sometimes difficult to realize that their child is not as "perfect" on the field as they are at home. The truth of the matter is that perfection is not what we are after. In soccer the game is so fluid and what the ball does is so dependent on players' action and reaction, that predictability is even less possible than a weather forecaster on TV.
Our coaches in youth sports likely come from our pool of parents (and sometimes grandparents, aunts uncles and other relatives). There are many who become model coaches and some who should not be there.
LET THEM PLAY SO THEY CAN LEARN
Many (actually most) youth coaches have a tendency to want to over-coach. They want to be sure that the players follow every instruction given. If they do it "wrong," they get the wrath of the touchline. Not only from the coach, but the spectators. The spectators ,because the coach is setting the example of constantly instructing. The parents want to please the coach as much as their child does, so they feel that if the child doesn't listen to the coach, may be they will listen to the parent.
I made a comment at one time as I was coaching at the technical area (expensive name for the coaching box and substitute area in the middle). One of the players had so many family and friends trying to coach that I finally said: "(The player's name) has too many coaches." People got the message, at least for that game. The team went undefeated, not because they were constantly coached, but allowed to play.
Players need to find their own solutions to soccer problems during play. Trust me, if you give them the basics and let them play without constant instruction, they will find their solutions. Let them scrimmage for a set amount of time with little instruction during play. Give them general and objective instructions beforehand and let them try them out. If they fail, find some positive things to tell them before going into the negative part. Approach the negative by asking them how something may have been accomplished or done with better results. After a while you can almost hear them think and find the solution.
I run a local advanced program for players with a number of coaches invloved. One of the most difficult things for some coaches, all excellent soccer individuals, was to not holler "corrective" comments to players while they scrimmaged. It was intentional at the start of the program, to get players used to making soccer decisions on the field without waiting for directions from the touchlines. Amazingly, parents started to notice that their players became less focused on the spectators and more on the situation on the field.
We have progressed as coaches to be more cheer leaders and facilitators during scrimmages. Parents are instructed to allow their children to make "mistakes" and not coach them from a parental chair. We take the attitude that players can do NO wrong, only better. Most seem to thrive on that approach.