Just a quick update. He missed training on saturday. Although he wasnt impressed at the time he accepted it and was a good lad all weekend.
Thing is he is quite mature when it comes to accepting his punishment. So do i stick to my guns and continue to keep him away from football for another week or so? Its even harder now that he has been a good boy this weekend.
stick to it - if you waver he'll take advantage. Kids are generally good with rules if they think the rule is fair and it is enforced. If he thinks he can get away with anythign he'll be pushing all the time to see which other rules aren't quite firm.
I would suggest that, as he has been very good all weekend, you relent and allow him back to football but make it abundantly clear that if he misbehaves again you will punish him harder and stick to it.
That way he will either:
A - learn that good behaviour gets rewards
B - learn that you are able to dish out serious punishment and when it matters you can stick to it.
I had a similar thing with my 4 year old lad who is a fairly intense little guy. When I took him out on his bike, he wanted to do really cool things and if it went wrong he started to cry / get angry, he'd seen my DVD's and his expectations were too high. I showed him some clips from a earthed dvd of steve peat (his hero) crashing and then trying again and getting it right, it seemed to help. I agree that's its probably his expectations of himself are running ahead of his age / ability, and he's embarrased if it goes wrong. I tried to get my lad to enjoy it and not worry if things go wrong, just try it again and keep having fun and it has eventually worked. It really helped that some older lads saw him riding and gave him props for trying stuff, even if he had a little crash, it really boosted his confidence and helped him to relax. He has not been bothered or embarrased about crashing for a while now.
It must be much harder to deal with this in a team game and a competitive situation. Also hard to find footage of top players mucking up and laughing about it I'm sure!
Quick Update
Got a call yesterday and i am now having to run training on Thursday and take the match on Saturday (Did i mention i help with running and training).
So i cant really avoid taking my son. His behaviour has been nothing short of brilliant and we have all made an effort to have a laugh this week rather than any telling off etc.
So we will see if it has had any effect by saturday.
He asked me if we could go riding after his football on saturday as well 
Hi.
Got two little ones. Four and Two years old. They are both like chalk and cheese. My wife and I have to deal with them very differently, so no one bit of advice will 'fit all'. One thing I know is kids crave acceptance. Your lad needs to know you love him and are proud of him,whether he does well or not. As for the ref - he needs to trust that the adults in authority are doing the best they can and yeah, sometimes they get it wrong.
Hope this helps.
Just to add to the good advice already here - is he tired. One of my mine (twins) is awful when tired, especially towards the end of the week. A 6 year old needs loads of sleep, and should be asleep (not just in bed) by 7.30-8.00 really.
Just like to add to this thread.
Me and the wife decided recently that there was too much shouting in our household. She's a redhead and i can be a little short tempered for my own good so we can have the odd barny without really meaning it. We decided that we should calm things down in the house and even though the punishment for being naughty remained, such as removing toys etc, we wouldnt resort to shouting or smaking at all.
We havent really had that much progress and it has been good then bad. BUT tonights training was a joy. He was takling, passing, playing, laughing and doing tricks tonight. He finished training covered in sweat instead of tears. There was physical things going on that in the past would have had him throwing a tantrum but tonight it was treated as a laugh. He didnt even care who won. I was the proudest person there when he started flicking the ball up behind his head whilst trying to get past his opponant in the 1 V 1 sessions (and they were coming off). Even the other parents were commenting on him.
We arent there yet but i know he is capable of enjoying things
I have girls not boys, and mine are younger too, but I see in my eldest particularly that she goes through phases not dissimilar to above. They learn, but it's not an overnight thing. Give a message and then stick to it and reinforce it before it really goes in.
Most of the advice I read above is good but I'd make one other point. A lot of it is negative reinforcement (if you do that I'll stop you going / take your toys away...) You say above how proud you were of him tonight and it's really nice that you've come on here to tell us, but have you told the one person that really matters?
Tell him how proud you were not just with his skills and tricks but with the way he played the game. Tell him if he keeps that up he can have a Reading shirt with his name on the back (is he a striker? if so we'll buy him!!) - because you love it when he behaves really well. All kids, especially at that sort of age crave attention and we all IMHO fail to give enough positive attention.
Back to my girls, we're so used to enforcing discipline / breaking up petty arguments that when they do disappear upstairs and play nicely together we leave them to it just because we're glad of the break, instead of telling them how nice it is to see them play together and maybe occasionally join in too.
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