During the month of June I have been highlighting my four favorite 1 v 1 training methods. This final week focuses on 1 v 1 Round Robin Evaluation. The ultimate test of a player's 1 v 1 ability is to play a competitive game against a motivated defender. A number of coaches I know use
Continue readingDuring the month of June I am highlighting my four favorite 1 v 1 training methods. This week's 1 v 1 exercise is 1 v 1 Rotation. The previous exercises in this series were very controlled. Soccer is not a linear or controlled game. Once the players have an understanding of the basic methods and
Continue readingDuring the month of June I am highlighting my four favorite 1 v 1 training methods. This week's 1 v 1 drill is 'Team 1 v 1'. This builds on the 'Two Line 1 v 1' exercises from last week. The two lines are now placed on opposite posts of two goals as shown in
Continue readingIn the month of June I'm going to focus on my four favorite ways to train 1 v 1 attacking. These same exercises can also be used to train the defender but I only coach one side of the ball in each drill, exercises or small-sided game. I'll begin with the simplest progression and move
Continue readingIn addition to being a youth soccer coach I'm also an avid runner. I listen to a lot podcasts and review blogs from a number of sources in a search for the latest training information. A recent post by Ben Greenfield of BenGreenfieldFitness.com focuseds on the different nutritional needs of young athletes as opposed to
Continue readingThe Technical Director for the club I coach with, Blue Valley Soccer Club, is Peter Vermes, who is also the Coach and Technical Director for Sporting Kansas City. Peter and the other directors of the club run sessions for the coaches two or three times a year. The sessions cover a variety of topics and
Continue readingWe had a discussion in the office the other day about the difference between fakes and moves. The discussion revolved around how you can use a move that doesn't fake the defender and whether we should be teaching young players moves or how to fake. This is an interesting subject because there's no shortage of
Continue readingThere was a recent discussion on our local soccer forum that talked a teams that were playing 'Kickball'. One poster suggested that goalkeepers should be encouraged to roll the ball out or drop it to their feet and pass their way out of the back rather than punting it up the field. I've never coached
Continue readingI'm always looking for ways to transfer shooting technique into goal scoring in games. I've used multiple games and competitive situations. Some have been more effective than others. I saw a new one last week while doing a combined training session with another coach. Many of you may be familiar with it but I had
Continue readingI think most of us who coach are fascinated by what motivates players and how we can use this to draw the very best out of them. Today's post if from our Soccer Conditioning Experts at Soccer F.I.T Academy and looks at this topic in a way that I thought you'd find interesting. What motivated
Continue readingTeaching players to turn with the ball is an area that I don't see covered very often by coaches working with players from eight to 12. I'm not sure if it is because the coaches think the topic is difficult to teach young players or because they don't want to take time away from areas
Continue readingIntegrating goalkeepers into team sessions is often a challenge for coaches who have experience playing or coaching the position. John Murphy deals with this subject in his excellent book, " Team Training for the Goalkeeper". Below is an excerpt from this book. It is from the Goalkeeper and Team Warm-Up Chapter. If the goal is
Continue readingThis post comes from our official Soccer Conditioning experts at SoccerFIT Academy. I found it interesting and thought you might too. Rhythm and Soccer: a theoretical coaching approach to effective movement February 17, 2011 By Scott Today’s post is written by John Lytton, a sports performance coach and former pro-soccer player with a facility in
Continue readingBrazilians learn the game by playing the game. In many countries training sessions are focused around drills and exercises that isolate techniques and tactics. Brazilian coaches spend most of their time creating playing environments with small-sided games that put an emphasis on the specific areas of the game but also train the player ‘globally’. One
Continue readingWe all want our players to be able to recognize certain situations and then choose the correct option to take advantage of it. One very effective way of showing players these situations is to set the attacking team up with an advantage and condition the defenders to play in a certain way. This allows the
Continue readingSAO PAULO - Brazilian football legend Ronaldo, who helped his country to two World Cup trophies and is still the tournament’s top scorer, retired yesterday, Brazilian media reported. Widely regarded as one of the greatest players of all time, Ronaldo (known as ‘El Fenomeno’ during his prime), had held out hopes of one last World
Continue readingThis thought provoking post about whether or not you always need to have a ball included in every aspect of training is from our friends at Soccer Fit. The folks at Soccer Fit are on the cutting edge of the latest soccer conditioning science so their perspective is worth listening to. Today’s post is by
Continue readingThe winter is a natural time for coaches to evaluate the progress of their players during the first half of the year. We are always 'evaluating' our players but most of the time this is information we use to make decisions about where to play one kid or another and what we need to work
Continue readingThis is a game that I've used as a warm-up and in the main part of the session. I like it because of how many different things you can coach depending on your focus. As with most small-sided games, the kids really enjoy playing it so they get a lot out of it. Here is
Continue readingWe came across an article recently that points out that we often do our children a disservice by protecting them from distress or difficulties. Allowing our children to fail, and learn from that experience can be the best thing for them. Why allowing failure can raise successful children By Gregory Ramey, Ph.D. 2:29 PM Friday,
Continue readingThis is a post from the Soccer Fit Academy. It is from Missy Geha, SoccerFIT Academy trainer. Her post reflects her thoughts on a recent article from goal.com. Most young soccer players react in the same way as the professionals do in tight games. One would think after playing for so many years that keeping
Continue readingBasic passing exercises like the one below are great for focusing on the technical aspects of passing the ball but it's easy to get stuck in a rut of doing the same progressions over and over. I was playing with different ways to add movement as well as force the players to think about where
Continue readingThere are times that I'll have a practice on a Thursday when the team has a Friday game. This is a session that comes from our Brazilian Academy Journal that I have used. It provides a relaxed environment where the players can have some fun and express themselves. The small-sided games give the players a
Continue readingWhen I make teams in practice how I do it will depend largely on the type of team I’m working with. When the team has a large disparity between the top players and the weaker ones, I try to balance the teams by putting the top players with the weakest ones and then work my
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