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Football Parents (2025) - Voetbalouders

The universal comical tropes of ‘Football Parents’ (2025)

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by

MJ-A
in

Soccer Moms and Soccer Dads, the Dutch Netflix series Football Parents (Voetbalouders) is for you — if you want to see all the archetypes of you and your fellow team parents personified and exaggerated in film. Writer-Director-Star Ilse Warringa has pulled characters from her 15 years on the touchlines of youth football so that you can laugh at, empathize with, or be triggered by the tropes.

The Story

In the story, single mom Lilian (Eva van Gessel) brings her 12 year old son Levi (Yosef Weijers) to a new club. Marenka welcomes the newcomers to the team, as Levi is the son of an ex-footballer and has the talent that comes with that heritage. Marenka is the new team mom, and her son Vito (Seb van Gemert) is not just the worst player, but seems to have a mental disability that makes him uncoachable.

Coach Jacco (Bas Hoeflaak) has developed a heart condition and will only be at the games. He makes dad Yusuf the trainer, but Yusuf (Gürkan Küçüksentürk) is sadly incompetent. The parents bicker and backstab on the sidelines during practices and games, Marenka keeps losing the team’s laundry, a few parents want their child to be scouted for the 1st division, but the team struggles to avoid relegation from the U13 3rd division.

Writer-Director Warringa has done a good job laying out many other tropes:

  • The horrors of the group chat
  • The game day field monitor who enforces positive coaching and cheering
  • The rich banned Dad who doesn’t pay his membership bills
  • That every parent wants a say in the coaching, but no parent is willing to be Team leader
  • That no parent wants to help referee
  • The ones that do referee are terribly biased or don’t know the rules
  • The ex-footballer who doesn’t watch his son’s games
  • The Moms forced to volunteer in the canteen
  • The parents trying to get their kids scouted
  • The non-functioning club complaint system
  • The confusing naming of clubs
  • The club’s 10 commandments of parental behavior
  • Coaching kids to win by using the dirty tricks of simulation
  • A mass confrontation amongst the parents
  • and more!

The soccer

There is as much soccer as you would expect from a Dutch football film.

In Conclusion

I appreciate this series because there aren’t many films about soccer parents. The fact that it’s a series means Warringa had the time to cover a large quantity of tropes, which I enjoyed.

As the cringey main character, team mom Marenka, Warringa’s humor is similar to a typical Will Ferrell character — loud, gesticulating, unaware, and without any filter. I found it grating. Like the other team parents, I couldn’t stand Marenka at all until the 6th and final episode, when she toned it down. A little.

Football Parents (Voetbalouders) embodies the comically bad stereotypes of soccer parenting, which most of us have seen in real life.

However, I find it fascinating that almost all of these tropes also take place in America. Is it the football system that makes our cultures so similar? Or has Dutch football imported some concepts from the USA, such as club rules and game day field monitoring for positive coaching and parenting?

Football Parents - Club Rules
Football Parents – Club Rules

Bad Parents (2012) is a similar soccer parenting story with funny tropes, but it veers into dark humor. It’s also directed by a female based on her real-life experiences.

Note: This is my 500th review.

6 Soccer Movie Mom Rating = 6

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