Build your squads for the season
Know where your squads come from, add players and team managers, and watch next season’s squads take shape from your offers, on a list or on the pitch.
Every other part of your season hangs off the squads: training nights, fixtures, player plans, who a coach can see. Your programme's Squads page is where you check they're right this season and watch next season's take shape.
Building your programme's squads for the first time? You never start from a blank page, because the squads themselves already exist. Your part is filling and staffing them, in this order.
- Check your age groups are there. They arrive with the season, so you don't create them. See Where your squads come from.
- Fill next season's squads from offers, to your own players in Run your retention round and to new ones in Recruit players for your programme. Each offer lands under Next season's squads.
- Give every squad a team manager, under Set each squad's team manager.
- Assign your coaches, in Manage your coaching staff.
- Plan each age group on the pitch before trials, under Plan on the pitch.
Until the first offer goes out, a planning season with nobody on its squads has nothing to list, so the page reads No 2027 offers for this programme yet with a Send an offer button. That's the normal starting point, not a missing squad. Once players are on your squads for the season your programme is in, the page lists them squad by squad, ready for team managers.
- Set up your Season Plan first, so you know when trials, grading and pre-season fall.
- Next season's squads fill from offers. Your side of that is in Run your retention round and Recruit players for your programme.
You don't create squads one at a time. They come with the club's season setup:
- In a club's first season on Clubhouse, this season's squads arrive with the club's league records, with the players from the team sheets already in them.
- Every season after that, Clubhouse creates next season's squads empty, mirroring this season's age groups. They fill as your offers are accepted.
If an age group you expect is missing, ask your club administrator. The age groups a programme runs come from the club's setup, and a missing one is fixed there, not on this page.
This follows the competition rules, not a setting. Football NSW requires a Mixed JDL licensee to field two teams per age group, so each Mixed JDL age group has a Blue and a White squad. Girls JDL, the youth leagues and the senior programmes field one team per age group, so each age group is a single squad.
The page lists each age group with its players: shirt number, age, training attendance, games played and minutes. Access shows whether the family has an account yet, and a player who is injured or captains the side is marked on their row. Use the Squad filter or the search to find someone quickly.
Export saves the players you can see as a CSV, so filter to one age group or search first if that's all you need. You choose what to add to the name, age, team and position columns: parent contacts, season stats, S&C results, development plans and registration. Parent contacts come with the players in the programmes you run, including those who have accepted a place for next season; the export tells you if any are left out. On next season's offers, Export saves the players listed there with a Place column showing where each offer stands. There are no season stats to add yet, and the team column stays blank until players are on squads.
Open a squad for its full player table and its Attendance report, which covers the season's sessions and matches and has an Export button of its own. The squad page's Export button saves that squad's player list.
Open a player for everything the club holds on them, on tabs such as Overview, Matches, Training, Development Plan, Medical, Full Profile and Contacts. Tabs like Workouts and Wellness appear only where that player uses them.
Check first that the player isn't already at the club, in another squad or programme. A player the club already knows should keep one record, history included, rather than gain a second. If they really are new, Add player (1) opens a short form: their name, date of birth, squad, shirt number and mobile. For a junior you then add their parents or guardians, so the family can be invited to Clubhouse.
Each squad shows its team manager, or No team manager with a Set team manager button. You can choose a parent of the squad, someone from another team, or someone new to the club. Once assigned, the manager gets the squad's logistics on their phone (reminders, changes and cancellations, availability and results) without seeing clinical or development detail.
When you choose Assign next to a parent or someone from another team, Clubhouse asks whether to make them team manager, by name, before anything changes. It shows the notification they'll get, "You're now a Team Manager", word for word, and assigns them when you select Assign and notify 1 person. If they haven't signed in to Clubhouse yet, it says no notification will be sent and the button reads Assign. Back leaves the squad as it was.
A Volunteer you add with a mobile number doesn't have Clubhouse yet, so the team manager window opens on Text their invitation? It names them, shows the text word for word and asks you to Text 1 person. Choose Not yet to send it later with Resend invite SMS, which asks again before it sends (Resend to 1 person). The link installs Clubhouse, they sign in with that mobile, and they land on their squad's Home. From then on the window shows Signed in to Clubhouse instead of the resend button. What they see from there is in Your week as a team manager.
Coaches only see a squad once they're assigned to it, so walk your squads before round 1 and make sure each has its staff. Adding and assigning coaches is covered in Manage your coaching staff.
Once next season exists, the Season dropdown gets a second entry, for example 2027 (planning). Once your season has finished, or while your programme hasn't started yet, the page opens on it by itself; otherwise switch to it. Coaches follows the same rule, so both pages show the same season. Until anyone is placed on next season's squads, the page shows them as provisional squads, built live from your offers:
- Each age group counts how many players are confirmed and how many are still awaiting.
- Every player shows where their offer is, from Offer sent and Offer viewed through Awaiting deposit to Confirmed, or Declined and Offer expired.
- If you can recruit, Send an offer on an age group opens an offer for a player to fill a gap.
Nothing here needs keeping up by hand. It's worked out from the offers themselves.
The offers list only stands in while nobody is on next season's squads. Once your programme has moved into that season and players have been placed, choosing it shows the real squads, just like this season's, and the dropdown reads plain 2027 rather than 2027 (planning). Add player is there on the season your programme is actually in, and steps aside on the other one.
The move places everyone who secured a place before it, so you don't move retained players up yourself. In Mixed JDL they go on their new age group, for example MJDL U10, rather than on Blue or White. Blue and White are picked each week in the lineup, starting with round 1, and the age group's players are on both colour teams' training sessions.
Under the squads, Accepted, not yet on the roster lists anyone who has accepted a place for that season but isn't in a squad yet, such as a family who accepted after the move. If nobody is waiting, the section doesn't appear.
Each age group can switch between List and Pitch. Pitch is a planning board: pick a formation sized to the age group's format (7v7, 9v9 or 11v11) with the formation button under the pitch, and drag players onto positions. The shapes come drawn as small pitches, with the club's own shapes alongside the standard ones, and you can make one of your own there too. It saves as you go. For a Mixed JDL age group the pitch plans both colour teams, with a Blue and White switch over the pitch. A player can only be in one of them, so placing someone on one team takes them off the other.
It's the quickest way to see whether next season's squad actually covers every position before trials, rather than finding the gap in round 1.
First Grade works differently. Its card shows each member as Contracted, Signing or Planned, and Manage in Contracts takes you to where senior deals live: Run your First Grade roster.
- Every age group you run appears on Squads with its players.
- Each squad has its coaches and a team manager.
- Your coaches can sign in and see their squads in the coach portal.
- On the planning season, every age group's confirmed count is where you need it before trials.
More on the planning view is in How do I plan next season's squads?
Last reviewed 20 Oct 2026
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