By Justin Cresser - Author of Total Soccer Conditioning: A Ball Orientated Approach When focusing on the overall agility development of your players, one of the major factors to consider is stop-and-go capability. This component of agility involves the ability to rapidly accelerate and decelerate in a variety of directions and after performing various actions.
Continue readingWelcome to the Goalkeeping Newsletter. Today’s topic deals with simple conditioning for keepers.
Frequently we try to complicate conditioning. The more equipment we use, the better we think the activity is. The reality is there are some simple ways for us to help keepers get better conditioned, quicker, faster and more explosive.
Close to 20 years ago I started doing different types of plyometrics. These were jumping activities and could be done many different ways. If we want, we can make them even easier.
Let’s start with a keeper and a short hurdle (1-2 feet high). The keeper stands with his feet perpendicular to the hurdle.
The keeper jumps sideways over the hurdle and as soon as he lands, he
Welcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter. Today’s featured activity works on midfielders finding holes to pass into.
This activity uses half a field and has a full sized goal with a keeper in it. There are 3 midfielders on attack and 3 midfielders defending. They are restricted to an area from the midfield line to another line 25 yards closer to goal. There is one attacking forward between the top of the 18 and the midfielders restricting line
The attacking midfielders pass the ball between them while looking
Our club recently established a set of benchmarks for how many times the players should be able to juggle at a given age. Here are those targets:
U8 - 10 with feet only - 10 with thighs only - 4 with head only
U9 - 20 with feet only - 20 with thighs only - 6 with head only
U10 - 10 with feet only - 10 with thighs only - 12 with head only
U11 - 80 with feet only - 80 with thighs only - 24 with head only
U12 - 100+ with feet only - 100+ with thighs only - 50+ with head only
Unfortunately, most of our players in the club are below these standards so we'll be working to improve that this year.
When you talk about juggling with coaches you usually
Continue readingBy Justin Cresser Welcome to the July-August issue of Coaching Soccer Conditioning’s Soccer Science; where we present the latest findings from Sports Science research in soccer, and discuss how these findings may influence the way we train we our players. ARTICLE TITLE: Today’s featured article is entitled: ‘Effect of Additional Speed-Endurance Training on Performance and
Continue readingWelcome to the Goalkeeping Newsletter. Today’s topic deals with positioning on crosses.
When we talk about positioning and angles we usually are talking about situations when the ball is toward the middle of the field. Positioning can be figured by using string that goes from one post to the other post and then the middle is pulled toward the ball so the ball is the vertex of the angle. The keeper then has to position himself so that he can make a save on any ball inside the string. This usually means coming off the line and being centered within the angle.
As the ball moves, the angle changes and the keeper has
Welcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter. Today’s featured activity is a 3 v 3 game to one goal.
Start with a 40 x 30 grid with a goal in the middle made up on cones or flags. A keeper is in the goal and a server is off the field with some balls. There are 3 players for each team
Each team is assigned an attacking side of field and that is the
Continue readingBy Stevie Grieve
Spain and Portugal are 2 of the top sides in the world, Spain current World and European Champions, and ranked number 1, Portugal are ranked number 8 and are always a dangerous side with players like Ronaldo and Nani in the team. Portugal played Spain in a friendly 2 years ago and won 4-0, but Spain are a different team in competitions, and Portugal knew this game could be the defining moment in a potential Euro Championship win. Portugal played Spain with bravery, playing a high pressing game, with lots of possession, but with more direct play around the goal. Spain were far away from their best during the game and Portugal although played very well, couldn’t capitalise on the overloads they created near the goal. Spain won on penalties and reaches the final, to play against Italy or Germany.
Portugal 3v3 opportunity – Almeida wastes a chance with a long range shot
Nani finds Almeida behind Spain’s midfield but as Nani offers a pass behind the defence, Ronaldo makes a run behind
Continue readingIs it time to start 'Fall' practices again already! If you're like me you found yourself asking this question this week. I don't know where the summer break went but it's gone.
Like the first few series of the football game, I like to plan out my first few weeks of training way ahead of time. I know I want to cover a number of topics including some technique to knock the rust off. I also want to start talking about how were going to
Continue readingBy Justin Cresser For many coaches, speed is considered to be one of the most important predictor’s of soccer performance. Indeed, one of the first things that come to mind when doing tryouts is speed assessment. In today’s activity, we are focusing on developing starting speed and acceleration. These components of speed are especially important
Continue readingBy Stevie Grieve
This article is an excerpt from the books, Modern Soccer Tactics Volume 1&2.
Many of the most expensive players have been attackers. Most of the attackers have either been goal scoring machines, or players who play with flair and surprise the opponent with unpredictable dribbles, passes and shots from nowhere, that often result in goals, or goal scoring chances.
Carlos Tevez is one of these players. He is renown for his work ethic, and his ability to harass defenders when he doesn’t have the ball, but what separates him from hard working attackers is his ability on the ball. We have seen him score from long range, score tap in’s, dribble between multiple defenders in tight spaces, and take shots so early that the goal keeper cannot react to it. This week, against Norwich, he scored 3 goals, including one from long range that was taken so early that Ruddy the Norwich goalkeeper couldn’t get close to at his near post from 30 yards. What we also saw was his ability to play with flair and unpredictability with team mates of the same mindset, namely Sergio Aguero.
Tevez and Aguero play a 1-2
Man City have an attack with David Silva who passes left to Tevez. Tevez spots
Continue readingWelcome to the Goalkeeping Newsletter. Todays topic deals with shot blocking and angles. Too often, when a keeper works on shot blocking they do so from a position which has been somewhat predetermined. For example, a server starts with a ball near the top of the D and either takes a touch and a shot
Continue readingWelcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter. Today’s featured activity works on numbers up attacking, numbers down defending and offensive transition. Start with a 40 x 30 grid with two full sized goals and a keeper in each goal. Two attacking players and one defending player starts on the field and additional players from each team
Continue readingWe all have such limited time to impact the technical, tactical and physical abilities of our players that finding ways to integrate each of these into our training sessions is very important. If we were training four or five times a week we could afford to practice them in isolation but most of the coaches reading this won't have that luxury.
Continue readingWelcome to the Goalkeeping Newsletter. Today’s topic deals with footwork, fitness and shot blocking. Start with a keeper in goal and a server 10 yards out from each post. The keeper starts by sliding to one post, touching the post and then sliding toward the other post. The near server shoots and the keeper has
Continue readingWelcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter. Today’s featured activity works on switching the point of attack and getting to goal. Start with a team attacking with a 3-3-2 and a team defending the goal with a keeper and playing a 2-2-1 This is an unrestricted scrimmage except the teams are put into these formations. If
Continue readingBy Justin Cresser Today’s article focuses on developing anaerobic endurance, agility and to a lesser extent, speed over short distances. Because this activity incorporates more more than one component of conditioning, it is a great choice for in-season training sessions where more time is needed for small-sided games and match preparation, and less time can
Continue readingWell, it's that time of year again. The season is fast approaching and plans are already being made for pre-season training by coaches all over the world. One of the critical parts of pre-season training is of course the fitness and conditioning element. Actually, it is now becoming a crucial part of regular season training
Continue readingAt the end of every major World Cup or European Championship those involved with youth development look at the results, what conclusions can be drawn and how they relate to the youth level of the game. In the case of Euro 2012, many coaches and commentators are asking, "How can we get our players to play like Spain does?"
A loud and consistent voice advocating move toward a more player-centered, creative game has been Soccer America's Paul Gardner. He has often bemoaned the direct, 'kick-ball' game and asked coaches to set aside their selfish desire to
Continue readingBy Rees Linn
As I type this you’d be hard pressed to find an MLS team struggling more than FC Dallas. The North Texans are on a 12 game winless run, much of which can be attributed to the fact that they’ve only scored 4 goals from the run of play during the same stretch. Normally, I spend my time analyzing good attacking football, but since I attend every FC Dallas home match I felt the need to offer a critique of the team in my own backyard.
A lot has been made of injuries to first team players, but Dallas’ attacking troubles really stem from two main deficiencies: poor off the ball movement and poor space recognition/anticipation. To demonstrate, I’ll walk you through three examples that occurred in the first 15 minutes of their draw with Chivas USA from last weekend. In this match, Dallas began in a 4-4-2 with Scott Sealy and Brek Shea at striker, Fabian Castillo at left mid, and
Continue readingBy Justin Cresser
As mentioned several weeks back in our article entitled ‘Functional Training of The Centre Midfielder’, every so often we will present position-specific conditioning exercises. Today’s article focuses on strikers and attacking midfielders.
One of the most difficult tasks for any team is breaking down defenses in the attacking third of the field. In this area, defenses tend to be very compact and defending players more often than not will outnumber their attacking opponents. Strikers are marked very closely, and are immediately closed down as soon as they receive balls. As such, players in this position have to be very
Continue readingWelcome to the Goalkeeping Newsletter. Today’s topic addresses the issue of applying pressure on crosses.
One of the general rules I use with keepers is the sure rule. If a keeper is sure he can get his body behind the ball, he doesn’t have to dive. If he isn’t sure, he needs to dive to get behind the ball. If a keeper is sure he can catch a low shot to the corner, he should catch it. If he isn’t sure, he should parry the ball away. If a keeper is sure
Continue readingWelcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter. Today’s featured activity works on using space, moving without the ball, finding the runner, communication and defending.
Start with a 40 x 40 grid with a 10 x 10 area in the middle
This is a simple possession game. In this example we will
No formation will fit every group of players. A coach that plays the exact same formation with every team will be frustrated by certain players inability to, 'fit the formation'. For years my teams always played 4-4-2. There are some variations you can used depending on how you play your forwards and your central midfielders but that's pretty much it. Sure, you could play sweeper/stopper with the center backs but very few teams play with a sweeper in the modern game. You can change every
formation to a small degree but I feel that the 4-3-3 is the most customizable of all of the popular formations.
There are so many ways to vary the 4-3-3. You can play with the midfielders spread across the field with a right, left and center. They can be in a
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