All Posts by Mike Saif

3v3 Small-Sided Game To Train Goalkeepers

Welcome to the Goalkeeping Newsletter.  Today’s featured activity is a game working on positioning, communication, shot blocking , distribution and much more.

Start with a 40 x 30 field with full sized goals and a mid field line.  There is a keeper in each goal and 2 attacking players and 1 defending player in each half.

gk173a
One keeper starts with the ball.  He can play to

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Attacking With Creativity

Take a virtual pitch side seat and watch how Chelsea Academy Coach, Chris Woodward trains players to move, think and react so they can be more creative in attack   This special six-part video series runs you through a complete creative attacking session with Chelsea Academy Coach Chris Woodward. Watch how Woodward trains a group of

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Defending the Counter Attack – Continuous

By Daniel Severn

This exercise will help your players to develop an understanding of key defensive positioning, delaying an opponent and help to develop their decision making. It can be broken down into a more tactical practice, but I like to play this game with a continuous aspect to increase the intensity. It is also a great way to teach players how to keep focus when tiring in the game.

Set Up
You will need a minimum of 9 players to run this exercise as continuous (you can play this with just 6, but for the best intensity, 12 players is ideal). You begin with 1 Goalkeeper and 2 Defenders placed just inside the penalty area. You now have 3 lines of attackers set up as if they are playing the roles of a striker and the two wingers/wide midfielders. The Striker starts with the ball.

Set up is shown below in Fig 1.

Defending the Counter Attack 1

Rules
- 2 minutes on the clock
- The defenders begin with 10 points
- Each goal they concede, they lost 1 point
- Winning pair are the ones with the most points remaining at the end

Directions
The striker begins with the ball centrally. As soon as the striker takes

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Coaching Soccer the Spanish Way

Today's article is an excerpt from our new book, Coaching Spanish Soccer by Jordi Pascual

Coaching Spanish Soccer contains the player development and training methodology that has made Spain the #1 Soccer Nation in the World tells you everything you need to know about Spain’s rise to dominance. With an in-depth look at the players, formation and the infrastructure that created a golden era of success, this comprehensive book is the ultimate guide to unlocking the secrets to Spain’s success and how you can apply them to your own team.

This excerpt shows one of the training sessions introduced in Spain by Johan Cryuff when he was the manager at Barcelona in the '90s.

Coaching Spanish Soccer

We talked before about how are the sessions organized in Spain and what is mainly the methodology. In this chapter, we’ll see some of the most typical exercises used in Spain.

The first thing to notice is that these activities can be used (and they are used), at all levels and ages. “Rondos” and possession games are introduced at early stages of development. It won’t be strange to find kids of 9-10 doing it. It’s just a question about how to adapt the size of the grid or the number of players and coaches.

CoachingSpanishSoccerdiagram1

The first one is one of the most typical in warm-up, being used, first, by FC Barcelona (as far as I know, it was used in the 90s, when Cruyff was the manager; probably, it’s one of the exercises he

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Leading With the Hands When Diving

By Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible.

Welcome to the Goalkeeping Newsletter.  Today’s featured activity is a warm up diving activity working on leading with the hands.

Start with 6 balls on the center circle with a keeper in the middle

gk171a
The keeper starts by sprinting to one of the balls and dives on it as if it’s a breakaway.  This means leading

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The Importance Of Finishing Rebounds

By Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible.

Welcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter.  Today’s featured activity works on getting to goals and finishing rebounds.

Everyone loves the great shot.  The blast from 30 yards out.  The half volley from the top of the 18.  The bicycle kick off of a cross.  The thing people tend to forget is all goals count the same. Whether it’s a spectacular goal or a simple goal, they all count as one.  For every spectacular goal, there are many more simple goals coming off of rebounds.  The player who scores a goal off of a rebound doesn’t get nearly enough credit for being in the right place and making the effort to get to the ball first.

This activity is a  4 v 3 with a “keeper” in goal.  The reason I put “keeper” in parentheses is because I would recommend using a coach or field player as opposed to a real keeper because a real keeper might develop bad habits in this game.

drills171a
This is a regular game except all shots must be below waist height and the keeper can not use his hands.  They must defend using the

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The ‘Complete Player’ Challenge

By Daniel Severn

This week we have a fun, exciting and competitive exercise for you to try in your session. When I think of the ‘complete player’ I think of someone who can dribble past opponents, pass over varying distances, has a great first touch, shows composure in front of goal and also has that drive to win the ball back for his team. This exercise will work on each aspect mentioned! It’s time to create your very own ‘Complete Player’.

Set Up and Directions
Firstly you will need to set up the five stations as shown in the diagram. You can put the players in groups of three or four (I use groups of four in the diagram; this number helps keep the exercise moving as quickly as possible). Two players at the beginning of station 1, one player in the middle of station 4 and the final player in goal. If you have only three players in a group, then you would start with just one player at Station 1. The players will rotate positions with every turn.

Complete Player - 1

Station 1 – Agility. Jump over the cones with

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Goalkeeper Drill for Conditioning and Shot Blocking

By Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible. Welcome to the Goalkeeping Newsletter.  Today’s featured activity works on fitness, footwork and shot blocking Start with a keeper in a goal and a server 15 years away with some balls. The keeper starts by sliding, side to side, to one goal post He then slides to

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The Importance of One-Touch Passing

By Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible. Welcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter.  Today’s featured activity works on one touch passing and understanding the importance of accuracy in passing. Watching various teams of different levels play, one of the big differences between the truly top teams and the others is the ability of the

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Arsenal v West Ham – Good movement Disrupts the West Ham Defense to Score Four In the Second Half

By Stevie Grieve, Author of Coaching the 4-2-3-1Modern Soccer Tactics and Winning Soccer Tactics.

In the recent Arsenal v West Ham United match, the score was 1-1 at half time. Santi Cazorla was playing at the top of the midfield triangle in a 4-2-3-1, and was being followed almost everywhere across the line between midfield and defence by Mark Noble. In the 2nd half, Arsenal changed shape slightly, with Cazorla dropping into a midfield 3 with Wilshere and Ramsey, in theory, allowing himself to drop deep and play without Noble. In effect, Noble continued to follow Cazorla as he moved even deeper, and this allowed lots of space to open between the lines and opened up passing lanes that Noble had previously covered playing in the defensive midfield role. In one instance, Cazorla’s goal, Noble followed him around the field but once Cazorla passed and moved to the blindside, Noble never recovered into position, and Arsenal exploited this via good movement from Podolski, Gibbs, Giroud and Cazorla.

Cazorla inside his own half in possession

Arsenal West Ham 1

Cazorla has dropped almost into a defensive midfield position to receive and distribute, but Noble has

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A Four-Keeper Warm-Up Game

By Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible.

Welcome to the Goalkeeping Newsletter. Today’s featured activity is a 4 keeper warm up.

Start with 4 keepers in a 30 x 30 area.  One keeper starts with the ball in his hands and the others are jogging around.  You can alter the size of the area and the number of keepers.

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The keeper with the ball rolls the ball, hard. to one of the other keepers.  Before rolling the

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Coaching the 4-2-3-1 Training Games

By Stevie Grieve, Author of Coaching the 4-2-3-1, Modern Soccer Tactics and Winning Soccer Tactics. Grieve is the author of the "original" Coaching the 4-2-3-1 book and has now authored a book that focuses on the advanced tactics of the 4-2-3-1.  This article is from the free eBook, Small-Sided Games to Train the 4-2-3-1.  This eBook is given free

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2v1 Attacking to Goal

By Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible.

Welcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter.  Today’s featured activity is a 2 v 1 game toward goal.

In designing training sessions we frequently create numbers up situations for the attacking team.  This is done to create positive goal scoring opportunities.  The problem with this is that most defenses are designed to always have one additional defender than the other team is attacking with.  Since that is the case, shouldn’t we spend more time in those situations so both the attacking and defending players can be prepared?

Start with an attacking player 25 yards from goal with a ball.  One defender is 5 yards closer to goal and the other one is 5 yards back.  There is a keeper in goal.

drills169b
The attacking player starts with their first touch and as soon as that touch

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Working on Anaerobic Fitness in a 1v1 Situation

By Jebreel Bubtana, BRASA, Brazilian Soccer Academy

This is a great way to get your players working hard in a 1v1 situation and you can set this up a number of times using small groups to keep your players active throughout the exercise.

The exercise starts just outside the 18 yard box with an attacker, defender and goalkeeper as shown below in figure 1.

Working on Anaerobic Fitness in a 1v1 Situation - 1
The attacker will go 1v1 against the defender who is stood around the penalty spot. The aim for the attacker is to

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Paired Technical and Conditioning Circuit, with Finishing

By Daniel Severn

This exercise focuses on many key aspects of the game; first time passing, the volley pass, shielding the ball, aerial control, through balls and crossing and finishing. You can also incorporate your goalkeeper(s) into this practice very easily.

Before starting, ensure the players are thoroughly warmed up as this is a high tempo, continuous exercise.
I like to set the team targets to reach during this exercise (goals scored; successful passes; total number of circuits within the time etc). Or I may reward the ‘best performing pair’ with the captaincy for the scrimmage – something they will feel proud of.

Paired Circuit wFinishing 1

Set-Up and Directions

Set up the six stations as shown in the diagram (station 6 uses the

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Soccer Specific Endurance Training With Shooting

This conditioning article has been created by Gabriel Celante when he was running preseason training for BRASA – Brazilian Soccer Academy.  This session helps to develop soccer specific endurance, agility, leg power, and shooting skills from different distances. This session can also be used for individual training.

Agility

Organization

Divide the field as showed in the diagram.

  • Station A
  • Station B
  • Station C
  • Four players in each station
  • One Goalkeeper in each goal

Instructions

Conditioning with a Technique and Conditioning Circuit

This conditioning article has been created by Gabriel Celante when he was running preseason training for BRASA – Brazilian Soccer Academy. The session helps to improve both aerobic and anaerobic fitness through an economical and dynamic circuit.

Organization

Divide the field as showed in the diagram.

Small Sided Game   Pliometric

  • 3v3 Small Sided Game in the middle.
  • Agility and Plyometric circuit around the 3v3 field.
  • 4 teams of 3 players – Orange, Yellow, Black, and White.

Instructions

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