Soccer Drills – Page 24

Six surface shooting

This soccer coaching game is good for practising kicking the ball with all six parts of the foot – the toes, sole, laces, inside, outside and heel – and showing your young players which ways of kicking are the most accurate and powerful.

Younger players will find it difficult to shoot with their heels and outside of their feet, but it’s good practice to let them try. Older players should be able to use all parts of their feet to kick the ball.

Set up:

Place a row of flat cones across the middle of a square playing area. Balance a ball on top of each one. Divide your players into two teams and line them up on opposite sides of the cones.

The distance from the players to the cones is determined by the age and skill of the players. The players on one of the teams have a ball each.

How to play:

The object of the game is to knock the balls off the cones by using different parts of the foot to strike the ball.

The team with the balls shoot first. Count the number of balls they knock off the cones. The balls are then reset and the second team shoots.

Each team’s players have five attempts at knocking the balls off the cones with each of the six surfaces of their feet (30 shots in total).

The team that scores the most ‘hits’ wins the game.

Get your head up!

Objective

Younger players will learn why they need to keep their heads up when they have the ball. At the end of the game, they will also have practised turning with the ball and they will understand when to push the ball ahead of them and run after it and when to keep it close to their feet.

Set-up

This is a very simple game to organise and to play.

All you need to do is cone off an area about 20 yards square.

Your players line up a long two sides of the square with a ball each.

How to play

On your command, players dribble across the area towards the opposite cone, turn and dribble back. Then stop with their foot on the ball.

Coaching points

To begin with, watch your players dribble across and back without any instruction or guidance from you.

Note which players keep their head up to avoid collisions.

And how do they move the ball – do they keep it close or push it ahead and run after it?

After a minute or two ask the players why they need to keep their heads up while they dribble across the grid.

Then ask them to have another go.

Next, demonstrate the difference between keeping the ball close and pushing it ahead and running after it.

Ask: Which is the quickest way to get across the grid?

Now make the game competitive. See who can get across the grid and back five times in the shortest time.

Progression

Use this game to practise the different ways to turn with the ball.

For young ones, a simple drag back turn is probably the easiest. Older players could try the inside hook.

For more soccer coaching tips and products visit Soccer Coach Weekly.

Side supports

Objective: To improve possession play and to use the full width of the pitch.

Age groups: U10s and upwards (but can be used with better-than-average younger players).

Set up: Use a 60×40 yards playing area with normal-sized goals on the end lines. Divide your squad into three equally matched teams, wearing bibs.

How to play: Two teams play “normal” football. The third team acts as side supports. Players of the third team spread along both side lines and can receive passes from the teams on the pitch. When they do receive a pass, they cannot be tackled and must pass back to the team that passed them the ball. They should move up and down the line, calling for the ball if the player in possession is running out of options.

You can encourage wall passes by restricting side supports to one touch.

Switch the teams around regularly or play “one goal, winner stays on”.

Progressions

Side support players must return passes in less than four seconds.
Restrict players on the pitch to two or three touches.
Goals only count if the move that leads up to them includes a pass to a side support player

For more soccer coaching tips and products visit Soccer Coach Weekly.

Rattle

This game is named after the great English conductor, Sir Simon Rattle.

This is a short warm-up game that you can use with any age of player.

You play the role of a conductor and your players, who are the orchestra, must concentrate and pay close attention to what you are saying or doing.

How to play Rattle

All your players stand facing you in a semi-circle or straight line. They should be about 10 yards away.

Their objective is to listen (and watch) for instructions and carry them out immediately.

Call sequences such as:

Sidestep left.
Sidestep right.
Jump.
Touch the grass.
Run on the spot.
Run forwards.
Run backwards.

Commands should start slowly then increase in tempo until you’re changing the instruction every two or three seconds.

Variation

Make some of your instructions visual rather than spoken. Point to your left or at the ground instead of saying “go left” or “touch the grass”.

Stand in front of your players, perform the moves and tell your players to copy what you do. Then ask them to do the opposite: if you sidestep left, they sidestep right.

For more soccer coaching tips and products visit Soccer Coach Weekly.

Shoot, head, shoot

Objectives: To improve heading and shooting technique.

Age group: U9s and upwards.

Set up: Use a normal sized goal and penalty area marked by lines or cones. Divide your squad into two teams (X and Y) including two goalkeepers. The outfield players wait in two lines about 20 yards away from the goal.

Two coaches (C1 and C2) stand in the penalty area with a supply of balls.

How to play: The first player in team Y dribbles and has a shot on goal from beyond the penalty area.

The player then moves towards coach C1 who passes a ball for a one-time shot on goal.

The player then moves towards coach C2 who serves a ball for the player to head towards the goal.

Rules:

If you…

score no goals from your three shots, you wait on the end of the line to be freed (see below).
score one goal you stay in the game. Go back to your team and wait for your next turn.
score two goals you free up a team mate who is waiting on the end line.
score three goals you free all of your team mates!

The team that lasts the longest wins.

For more soccer coaching tips and products visit Soccer Coach Weekly.

Shark attack!

I played this game with a group of U6s last week.

They enjoyed it so much, it was hard to get them to anything else!

Shark Attack is simple, easy to explain, every player is involved and it teaches lots of essential skills.

What more could you ask for?

Objective: To improve dribbling skills (especially keeping close control of the ball and playing with the head up), turning with the ball and shielding the ball from pressure.

Set up: Mark a playing circle appropriate to the size of the group. For a group of twelve 10-year-olds, 20 yards across is ideal.

Every player has a ball and goes inside the circle except for two players – the Sharks – who don’t have a ball and stay outside the circle.

How to play: Players dribble around inside the circle and the two Sharks jog around the perimeter.

On your signal, the Sharks have 10 seconds to kick as many balls out the circle as possible.

Any players who lose their ball leave the circle and join the Sharks for the next attack.

The last two players left dribbling are the winners and they become the Sharks at the start of the next game.

For more soccer coaching tips and products visit Soccer Coach Weekly.

Score 4 to win

This game is an excellent example of the type of conditioned SSG that develops your players’ creativity and improves their ability to solve problems on match days.

Age group: U8s to U14s.

Set Up: Create a 30×20 yards area with four goals as shown below.

Divide your players into two teams of four plus four goalkeepers.

How to play:

Both teams try to score in each of the four goals.
The first team to do so is the winner.

For more soccer coaching tips and products visit Soccer Coach Weekly.

Quick passing

This is a very simple but very effective way to practice quick passing and supporting play with older or more experienced players.

Experience: intermediate.

Set-up: Two teams of four in an area 30 yards long by 20 yards wide, marked with flat cones.

How to play:

Each team has two players in the inside of the playing area and a player at each end as a target.
The objective is to get the ball from one target player to the next without losing possession.
The two teams play in two different directions. One team plays north to south, the other east to west.
Make the game competitive by awarding a point for each successful play. First to five points wins.

Tip: set up several playing areas next to each other and rotate the teams so that all the teams play each once. Then add up the scores to decide an overall winner.