A focused guide for coaches working a tryout. If you haven't read the For Coaches basics yet, start there, this guide assumes you already have an account and know how the evaluation form works.
A 5-minute check the night before saves you from scrambling on game day.
Text your director tonight, not tomorrow morning. They can re-send your invitation or fix permissions before tryout day, but only if they know there's a problem.
About 15-20 minutes before tryout begins:
For each player you're evaluating:
Your "Invite / Hold / Cut" is a recommendation, not a final call. The director sees all coach inputs across the session and makes the final decision. Be honest, your view is one input, not the whole picture.
Players who weren't pre-registered but show up to tryout can be added on the spot, but adding walk-ups is typically the director's job, not yours.
If you spot a player on the field who isn't in your assigned list, flag your director. They'll add the player as a walk-up and assign them to a coach (usually you).
Once the player appears in your list, evaluate them exactly the same way as any other player.
You may see a player in your session with a "Playing Up" badge on their card. This means they're younger than the standard age group for this session but the director has authorized them to try out at a higher level.
Evaluate them the same way as everyone else, but understand the context: their anchor descriptions are still tied to their actual age, not the session's age. A U10 playing up to U11 is still evaluated as a U10 player. The badge stays visible throughout your evaluation so you don't lose track.
Your job ends when every assigned player has a complete evaluation. Confirm this by going back to your session list, every player should have a Save indicator. If any are blank or partial, those need to be finished.
Once all your evaluations are in:
Find your director immediately. They can re-send your invitation or get you signed in. In the worst case, they can re-assign your players to another coach so the tryout keeps moving while you sort out the issue.
Keep working, that's expected at most fields. Your evaluations save locally and sync when signal returns. You don't have to do anything to make this work.
Tell your director. They can re-assign your remaining players to another coach. Evaluations you already saved are safely synced to the cloud (or queued to sync once your phone is back online and signs in).
Tell your director. Walk-up management is their job. Once they add the player, they'll appear in your list.
Tap back into the player from the session list. Update the rating, decision, or note. Save again. The history of changes is logged for the director's reference, but you can edit freely until the director closes the session.
Text your director first, they know the session and can usually fix things faster than support can. For genuine app issues, email support@sportformiq.com.