By Matt Carroll -
Through ball madness has a threefold purpose. Improve finishing in the box, make darting runs into the box through the channels, and finally conditioning. To set up the drill create a box that is the width of the 18 and 15 yards out. Next split the 18 into two different sections and place a defender in each box, and a goalie in the net. In the box outside the 18 have 5 attacking players pair up with a defender each. Finally, you can either have the coach or a player in this role, but one player should have a set of balls just outside the 18 to be the passer.
The drill starts with the attackers in the box looking to separate from their defender. The passe now tries to slot a ball through the outer box into the 18. The attacking player cannot enter the 18 before the ball or they are “offsides”. Their defender from the outer box cannot follow, and only the defender on the side they received on can defend them. If they take the ball from one side of the 18 to the other only the defender in the box they entered can defend them. The goalie can always defend players in the 18.
If the defender or goalie win the ball the attacking player needs to reenter the outer grid and start over again. If they score you have two options. First you can have the player join the passer and now you have two passers looking for runs. For safety, two players cannot enter the grid at once so if two or more do, they both must go back into the grid. The other option is to award the scorer a point and then reenter the grid.
Regardless of the option you choose the game will start high paced with tons of runs into the box and little bit of chaos, as the game progresses players will be forced to conserve energy and make more tactically advisable runs, but have to have enough energy then to beat a defender 1v1 when they do get there, which can be both physically and mentally taxing.
By Matt Carroll
