HOW THE MATCH WAS WON by Keith Scarlett Barclays Premier League Sunday, 10 August, 2014 Everton 2 v 2 Leicester It has been a long summer, but finally the Premier League is back! It was a fantastic opening weekend and one of the matches was Leicester City vs Everton where both clubs entertained in a 2-2 draw.
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The practice is focused on dribbling and running with the ball skills, connected with physical content of the ‘power to recover’ ability. This game is especially attractive for players in the younger age groups, however, it can be used effectively even with senior players. Engaging practice design helps players to have fun, while working on conditioning.
Set up and directions
Organize four squares of 2x2 m., 15-20 m. apart. Divide players into four groups. Each group should have 3 balls and occupy one square. For younger players, treat each square as a stadium, letting players to choose the name for it (ex. Old Trafford).
The aim of each group is to collect as many balls to their ‘stadium’ as possible. The game starts on
Continue readingBy Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible.
Welcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter. Today’s featured activity works on shooting from a distance.
Start with a field that is 44 yards wide and 36 yards long (add a second 18 yard box to a regular one and it’s perfect). There is a goal on each end line and a midfield line. This is a 3 v 3 + 1 with keepers.
The ball starts with a keeper and the rules are
Continue readingBy Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible.
Welcome to the Goalkeeping Newsletter. Today’s topic deals with quick counter attacks via distribution.
Too often a keeper makes a save and then waits for both teams to clear out and then kicks the ball downfield. While there are definitely times when this is the right choice (when your team has been under intense pressure and needs time to catch their breath and change the area of the field the game is being played in) other times it’s best to play quickly to take advantage of certain situations.
In the situation below the black team is attacking and the keeper has just made a save. If the keeper looks up and sees this situation where he has a forward one on one with the last defender, he should look to play an early ball long to take advantage of this situation.
By Stevie Grieve
Jose Mourinho’s Porto won the UEFA Cup in 2003 then the UEFA Champions League in 2004. They did this on the basis of having a very strong defence, very organised in midfield with fast attacking transitions.
When I organised possession, they would play direct and often lose possession but look to recover the second ball while the opponent were unorganised and exploit space that they leave to press.
This week, I will look at the counter attacking phase and how Deco was the main attacking outlet in short pass counter attacks with plenty of support running at pace ahead of the ball, knowing Deco was good enough to find most passes in even the tightest of areas.
Deco initiates the counter attack
Here, Costinha wins the ball and passes to Maniche, who splits the midfield with a 1st time pass to Deco who is
Continue readingHOW THE MATCH WAS WON by Keith Scarlett 2014 Community Shield Sunday, 10 August, 2014 Arsenal 3 v 0 Man City To some, it is nothing more than just an over-hyped friendly. To others, it is the first official match of the season. Regardless of which camp you fall into, the Community Shield is an occasion
Continue readingBy Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible.
Welcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter. Today’s featured activity works on getting to goal and staying onsides in a breakaway type situation.
Start with two attackers just across midfield and a defender at midfield. There is a second defender 10 yards back from the attacker with a ball and a keeper in goal.
As soon as the attacker with the ball touches the ball, the game is
Continue readingBy Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible.
Welcome to the Goalkeeping Newsletter. Today’s featured activity works on footwork, fitness and balance.
There are still too many coaches who think that running laps is an effective way to work on fitness. Others lean toward full field or half field sprints. The problem with this type of fitness work is, while there is a place for it, it’s not the type of movement that a keeper does. Keepers do a lot of forward and backward movement but more in the 5 yard range as opposed to the 50 yard range. This is an activity to work on the type of fitness and movement that is more applicable for keepers.
Start with 6 cones staggered in two lines 5 yards apart. The keepers start in a line at one end and there is a server 10 yards from the last cone, on the other end.
One thing to emphasize from the very beginning is
Continue readingBy Stevie Grieve
Since I was young, I have always had an interest in tactics, specifically successful coaches, or coaches who have seemingly come from nowhere. When Jose Mourinho’s FC Porto won the UEFA Cup in 2003 against Celtic, I enjoyed the direct style of play much more than I enjoyed watching Celtic’s direct style of play, mainly because it had some unpredictability, fluidity of movement and the talents of Deco as a number 10 in a midfield diamond.
Costinha’s role was an interesting one; a common thing in all of Mourinho’s teams has been the utilisation of a defensive midfielder who sticks to his position and protects the defence – Costinha, Claude Makelele, Esteban Cambiasso, Thiago Motta, Xabi Alonso, Nemanja Matic – but for me it was interesting because it was a ‘new’ position as I had grown up in Scotland with a 4-4-2 and no set defensive or attacking midfielder, and certainly not within a diamond midfield which is common in Switzerland and Italy.
Mourinho’s Porto were a strong defensive team with pace and efficiency in attack, with a good supporting cast in midfield in the form of Thiago, Nuno Maniche and super-sub Dmitri Alenichev.
Porto’s defensive solidity - Establish a block width, depth and compensation system
Wide area turnover; Porto drop off and form a flat back 4
As the ball is lost on the side instantly the back 4 drop off and get
Continue readingBy Alex Trukan
This exercise connects ball control, dribbling and shooting skills with conditioning content. The opposition included in the practice demands speed and power from the attacking players. Therefore, speed and speed endurance qualities can be developed. The exercise can be done with various amount of players at all levels.
Set up and directions
Set up a square with min. 5 small gates in front of the penalty area. Organise a goalkeeper and two groups as shown on the diagram below. Each player from the attacking groups has one ball.
The practice starts on the first touch of the attacking player. His aim is to
Continue readingBy Keith Scarlett
This activity is a 4 v 4 game plus 2 flank players plus 2 neutral players to regulation goals. Two goals should be set up about 25 metres apart. The field is 30 metres wide. A channel is made along the sidelines 5 metres wide.
Each group puts on the field, one player in their offensive half in the channel and
Continue readingBy Alex Trukan
Transition from attack to defense is regarded as an essential component of every practice by many professional coaches. This exercise includes this phase both in the attack-defense and defense-attack versions. Moreover, physical demand placed on players develops power to accelerate, which can be used to exploit unbalance in the oppositions’ defense.
Set up and directions
Organize a rectangle of approximately 30x40 m. with one goal on each end. The size of double penalty areas can be also used. Set-up four different stations. Divide players into groups of 3/4 on each station. Coach’s position as shown on the diagram. Each player from the bottom right group needs a ball. Moreover, min. 6 balls should be placed by the top right station.
The practice starts with the first player from the bottom right group playing a ball to
Continue readingBy Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible.
Welcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter. Today’s featured activity works on takeovers and quick shots.
Start with two lines of players (no more than 5 players in a line) facing each other from 20 yards apart, 10 yards outside the 18. There is a “defender/dummy” in 5 yards closer to goal, in the middle. Also have a keeper in goal. One line of players starts with balls.
The first player with the ball dribbles toward the other line and that first player then
Continue readingBy Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible.
Welcome to the Goalkeeping Newsletters. Today’s featured activity works on footwork and coming forward on dives.
The keeper starts by one of the posts and there are 4 cones, in a row, 2 feet apart along the goal line. There is a 5th cone 3 yards off the post. A server is 15 yards from goal with balls.
The keeper starts by going forward and
Continue readingBy Stevie Grieve
In the Copa Del Rey final, Real Madrid went into the game against Barcelona confident of a win, even without Cristiano Ronaldo who mass missing due to injury, but with Bale and Benzema both capable of defending from the front and causing problems on the counter attack, Ancelotti set his team up to defend against Barcelona’s main attacking areas, and exploit Madrid’s pace on the counter attack.
Madrid counter-pressing in the opening minutes
Here, we can see that Madrid, having just lost possession, are reluctant to simply drop deep and defend, instead they
Continue readingBy Alex Trukan The possession game 5v5+2 with four end zones has multiple outcomes important for player development. From the technical and tactical perspective, it can be used to develop passing, support, creating space and transition concepts. Looking from the physical point of view, presented game is aimed at improving aerobic capacity needed to maintain
Continue readingBy Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible. Welcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter. Today’s featured activity works on overlapping runs and taking players on. Start with a 40 x 30 area with a line of players on each end. There are two flags 20 yards aparts on the middle line and a player in
Continue readingBy Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible.
Welcome to the Goalkeeping Newsletter. Today’s featured activity is a simple warm up for 2 (or more) keepers.
Start with 6 balls (for 2 keepers, if 3 keepers use 8 balls) making two 4 x 4 squares. A keeper starts in each square and there are servers 10 yards from each square with balls.
One of the servers is designated as the caller and he can
Continue readingHOW THE MATCH WAS WON by Keith Scarlett FIFA 2014 World Cup, Brazil Sunday, 26 June, 2014 Germany 1 v 0 USA It was on the last day of the group phase when one of the most exciting groups; Group G, was drawing to an exciting close. Each of the four teams in the group were
Continue readingHOW THE MATCH WAS WON by Keith Scarlett FIFA 2014 World Cup, Brazil Sunday, 13 July, 2014 Germany 1 v 0 France The biggest match in world football had the attention of almost everybody on the planet and the two best sides in the tournament faced each other on in a clash of titans. The
Continue readingBy Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible.
Welcome to the Goalkeeping Newsletter. Today’s featured activity works on blinded keepers.
A keeper should be able to save a shot from the top of the D.
It becomes much more difficult when players are
Continue readingBy Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible.
Welcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter. Today’s featured activity works on finishing breakaways.
A breakaway is such a great way to score a goal and while they don’t occur frequently, they do occur frequently enough that teams need to prepare for them. Not enough teams prepare for them and those that do tend to do so in such an artificial manner that it barely helps. We see teams set up with a line of players 30-40 yards out with balls and a keeper in goal.
The first player in line starts dribbling and the keeper
Continue readingBy Keith Scarlett
These activities help to begin bringing out the competitiveness of all the players and their drive to win.
Four 5 X 5 boxes are set up with balls piled up in between the 4 boxes.
The team is split into 2 groups. In each box there are 3 on offense and 1 who will be on defense. Each group has 2
Continue readingBy Alex Trukan
This exercise is focused on developing aerobic power in 3v2 transition scenario. The aim from the physical point of view is to improve players’ power to recover, what in turn leads to producing more actions throughout the whole match. Dynamic counter-attack scenario ensures maximal concentration and commitment.
Set up and directions:
Set up two full sized goals 50-60 m. apart. Divide the team into attackers and defenders and further divide attackers into two groups (one starting behind the goal and one in the middle of the pitch). Two goalkeepers should be positioned in goals. Organize min. 8-10 balls in the goal positioned on half-way line.
The game starts with the goalkeeper (in the goal on the half-way line) playing the ball into striker. At the same time, two
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