The June edition of the WORLD CLASS COACHING magazine that is part of the Member Drills Database will have a session from Elmar Bolowich, Head Men's Coach at Creighton University. He presented it during the 2013 Nebraska WORLD CLASS COACHING International Seminar. The focus is on
Continue readingBy Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible.
Welcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter. Today’s featured activity works on transition, 3 v 2 attacking, finishing and much more.
Start with a 40 x 30 grid with two full sized goals and a keeper in each goal. There is a player on each side of the goals on the end lines and a 3 v 2 to start on the field. Each team has extra players on a side.
The team with 3 starts with the ball and they try to get to goal. They can score directly or use
Continue readingBy Lawrence Fine, Author of the FineSoccer Coaching Bible.
Welcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter. Today’s featured activity works on possession, crossing and finishing.
This activity uses half a field. Have a 30 x 44 grid just outside the top of the D with a 4 v 4 plus 1 neutral (numbers can be changed). There is also a neutral player out wide on each side. There is a keeper in goal.
The players inside the grid are trying to keep possession and are trying to make 5 consecutive passes (the neutral player is always on offense). Once a team makes 5 consecutive passes (passes to the neutral player inside the grid counts) they can
Continue readingBy Daniel Severn
This week the focus is on scoring goals from crosses. I have added in some ladders and need for short sprints to help improve the players’ agility and explosiveness. During this exercise the players will be in pairs as attackers and are required to work explosively in order to get on the end of the crosses and score goals. This is a continuous exercise that you will need a minimum of 10 players plus a goalkeeper to run. The short sprints, agility and sharp changes of direction in this exercise will all help develop your players’ anaerobic capacity.
Set up and Directions:
Firstly, set out ladders in front of your wide players (LW and RW) around 25yds from the end of the field. Add cones centrally, around 30yds from the goal – this is where your pair
Continue readingAs the year progresses I like to add more functional activities to replace purely technical exercises. Not only do the players enjoy activities that are game related more I've also seen a greater transfer of training when I use them.
I prefer drills, exercises and games that are progressive; moving from low pressure to full pressure. They allow the player to have initial success but then be challenged by the ever increase pressure of
Continue readingBy 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.
Set-Up and Directions
Set up the six stations as shown in the diagram (station 6 uses the
Continue readingBy Justin Cresser Author of Total Soccer Conditioning: A Ball Orientated Approach
I was speaking to a coach earlier in the season and he said his team was playing really well but was having problems finishing. I thought to myself: “that’s a problem for so many teams”. Over the past few weeks I have been to, and analyzed, several games, and finishing really does seem to be a problem for so many teams. I have seen some spectacular displays of dribbling and combination play, but the players just can’t seem to get the ball into the back of the net.
In today’s exercise we will address the above problem with a simple 2 v 2 v 2 small-sided game that focuses on finishing. As with any other technique or skill, I believe the key to improving your player’s ability to finish is repetition. The format and structure of the exercise also allows your players to develop their anaerobic capacity. This is an excellent activity to use during the competitive season when match-preparation takes a high priority.
Set-up and Directions:
Divide your players into two groups of 6 players and then further divide each group into three teams of two. Make certain to give each team of two a different colour shirt. Set up a grid 40 yards long and 25 yards wide with a regular-sized goal (or large net) at both ends of the grid. There should be a goalkeeper in each net. One group of 6 plays at a time. The coach should stand on one of the sidelines with a large supply of balls (Figure 1).
Play is initiated with the coach playing a ball into any of the six players. It is each team for themselves. Players can score on either
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 readingI've always had a standing challenge to my teams (U13 and below), if they score a headed goal, I buy ice cream for the next practice. It's been a way to encourage the players to try and score with their head if they can. This has been most successful with the girls teams I have coached. The extra incentive has become something that the team rallies around.
After spending a few weeks working on our combination play to score we played very well in our next games. Two of our three goals came from combinations in the middle of the field.
Another area that I've wanted to address
Continue readingWelcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter. Today’s featured activity works on finishing around the 18 and dealing with pressure.
Start with a server with some balls around 25 yards from goal. A forward starts on the 18 and a defender is marking the forward. A keeper is in goal.
The server plays the ball into the forward and the forwards job is to
It was difficult to choose a winner in our recent shooting drills competition because we received so many good entries. In the end we picked this exercise from Dennis Hillyard of New York. We were looking for drills that were easy to understand, used equipment all coaches have access to, provided a lot of repetitions for the players, were scalable to larger and smaller numbers and provided progressions that could be used as the players develop. This exercise meets all of those criteria.
Shooting Competition - First Time Shooting
Continue readingWelcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter. Today’s featured activities work on crossing and finishing. There is a series of activities you can use in the DVD Winning Crossing & Finishing. The field is 50 x 40 (the size can vary depending upon the level of the players) with goals on each end, a keeper in
Continue readingWelcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter. Today’s featured activity is the first step in working on finishing with combination play.
Start with groups of 3’s spread out 30 yards from goal. Each player has a ball. A keeper is in goal.
Player 1 starts by dribbling toward the top of the 18, making a move and
Welcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter. Today’s activity involves finishing in a competitive environment.
Start with a 30 x 30 grid with two full sized goals and a keeper in each goal. It’s 2 v 2 in the middle and in each attacking half there is a player on each sideline and a player on each part of the end line
In the diagram above the black team is attacking the top goal and the yellow team is
Welcome to the FineSoccer Drills Newsletter. Today’s featured activity works on crossing and finishing. There are many variations you can do with this activity. To learn more, check out the DVD Tactics & Drills For Flank Play.
Start with 2 goals 25 yards apart. There is a keeper in each goal and a server with balls behind each goal. There are 3 sets of 2 attacking players to the side of each goal and 1 player out wide on each end line. Use as much width as you can.
One server starts by playing the ball out wide. The wide player has one touch to receive the
I've written about my teams transition to playing a 4-3-3 in previous posts. The process has been going really well. I've been very pleased with how we are defending with the system. This was a concern for me because I could see how we were going to be able to deal with the other team's wide players. The girls have done well sharing this responsibility between the winger, attacking midfielders and wing backs.
We've been able to create a lot of offense using the wingers and wing backs getting forward. The player we haven't used much is our center forward. The spaces in the middle have been so congested that it's been easier to get the ball wide and attack from there.
This week I want to work on attacking combinations in the middle of the field. We have a number of good resources for this type of session. An article in the September Magazine Update to our Member Drills Database includes a great session from Jan Pruijn of Ajax International. The session was originally presented at the Nebraska WORLD CLASS COACHING International Coaching Seminar held last February in Lincoln, NE.
Another great resource is Player's Roles in the 4-3-3. One of the two books focuses on
Continue readingWhen I work on shooting with my teams I like to create realistic situations that transfer easily into the real game. My favorite resource for these kind of exercises is a book by Chelsea Academy Coach, Michael Beale, called Training Creative Goalscorers. This is the best book or dvd I've seen for exercises that engage
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