If you've coached grassroots football for any length of time, you've probably heard someone mention "the Four Corners" at a coaching course, in a club meeting, or on a touchline conversation. Maybe you nodded along. Maybe you Googled it afterwards and got a 47-page PDF from the FA that made your eyes glaze over.
Here's the good news: the Four Corners model is actually simple. And it might be the most useful thing you ever learn as a grassroots coach.
The basics
The Four Corners model is a player development framework created by the English Football Association. It's used across every Premier League academy in the country. The idea is straightforward: to develop a complete footballer, you need to look at more than just their technique.
The four corners are:
- •Psychological — decision making, resilience, confidence, focus, handling pressure
- •Technical — first touch, passing, scanning, body orientation, weak foot
- •Social — communication, leadership, teamwork, empathy, respect
- •Physical — pace, strength, agility, balance, coordination
That's it. Four areas. Every session, every rating, every piece of feedback can be mapped to one of these corners.
Why the weightings matter
At InsideFooty, we weight the corners like this: Psychological 40%, Technical 30%, Social 20%, Physical 10%.
If that surprises you — particularly the low physical weighting — there's a deliberate reason. At youth level, physical development is the least controllable factor. A child born in September will often be physically bigger and faster than one born in July of the same school year. That's not talent. That's a birth certificate.
By weighting psychological development highest, we're saying: the kid who makes good decisions under pressure, who bounces back from a bad touch, who stays focused when the team is losing — that kid is developing well, regardless of whether they're the fastest on the pitch.
This protects late developers. It rewards the things that actually matter in football long-term. And it stops coaches from unconsciously favouring the biggest, strongest kids in the group.
What this means for your coaching
You don't need to change everything overnight. But here are three things you can start doing this week:
Notice the psychological moments. When a player makes a quick decision under pressure — even if the pass goes astray — that's worth recognising. When a player recovers from a mistake without dropping their head, say something. These moments matter more than a well-struck shot.
Ask about communication, not just technique. After a small-sided game, instead of asking "who scored?", try "who was talking to their teammates?". Social development is a life skill that goes far beyond football, and it's one of the easiest corners to coach.
Stop praising pace. This is a hard habit to break. When a player sprints past the opposition, it's tempting to shout "great run!". But if they sprinted into the wrong space with poor decision-making, they haven't actually developed. Praise the scanning that led to the run, not the legs that carried it out.
How InsideFooty makes this practical
The Four Corners model is brilliant in theory. The problem is that most grassroots coaches don't have time to study it deeply, track it on spreadsheets, or write detailed reports.
That's exactly what InsideFooty was built for. After each training session, coaches rate players across all four corners using a Quick-Tap interface that takes about 30 seconds per player. The system handles the rest: progress tracking, parent reports, badges, AI-suggested training drills based on your team's weakest areas.
You don't need a coaching licence. You don't need a laptop. You just need your phone and 8-10 minutes after training.
The bottom line
The Four Corners model isn't complicated. It's just a reminder that football development is about more than kicking a ball well. The best players in the world aren't the fastest or the strongest — they're the ones who think quickest, communicate best, and handle pressure with composure.
If you can build those qualities in a 9-year-old, you're doing something most coaches never manage. And you don't need to be a pro to do it.