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by Gary Rue
garyrue@bellsouth.net
 

NOTE:  Gary did not write these exercises and tips with the idea that someone would publish them.  I subscribe to the Soccer-Coach-L e-mail list and Gary is one of the coaches that posts extremely well thought out replies.  These are some of Gary's posts that I collected for use in coaching my own teams.   I approached Gary and he was gracious enough to allow me to publish them here.  If you like what you see or have a question about one of the exercises you can reach Gary at garyrue@bellsouth.net There are 50+ more pages of Gary's posts categorized at the Home Page of Exercises of the Day by Gary Rue. Click here and enjoy.

Practice Tip - Defensive Positioning - Sideways

        When defending off-ball, a player has two ways he has to move VERY quickly - towards the opponents goal or recovering back towards his goal. Unfortunately, these directions are in opposite directions.

        The solution, turn sideways, facing the ball (unless the ball is straight ahead, then face towards the center of the field). True, players also have to move laterally, but being able to quickly close down the ball or recovering back take should be the priority movements.

Goalkeeper Exercises - Strong Hands

       Here are a couple of GK exercises to reinforce quick and strong hands on the ball. Poor hand position will quickly be apparent to the coach and GK.

• Quick hands--the coach will serve the ball from about 2 yards away from the GK; once the GK will catch and send the ball back to the coach; the coach will punch the return pass immediately back to the GK. This catch/return is continuous. The coach should punch the ball in different directions.
  
• Jump and Catch--with the GK standing in the goal mouth. The coach serves the ball to the maximum height the GK can reach. The GK is to jump,
  catch and toss back to the coach before hitting the ground. As soon as the coach catches the ball, he serves it again. Use the cross bar to help locate the serve. I like to do 2-3 sets of 10 jumps with a rest break between.
  
• Sit-up and Hold On--the GK does a sit-up with ball, bringing it forward as the coach kicks the ball. This reinforces the GK hand position on the ball. If the ball gets loose, the GK is to recover it as soon as
  possible and do another sit-up.
  
• Dive and Hold On--the coach serves a ball to the GK who makes a diving catch. As the ball is planted, the coach kicks the ball. As above, this reinforces the hand position. The coach should vary the power of his
  kick based on the GK's ability. The aim is to improve and give the GK confidence in his hand position, not to discourage. Kicking the ball on the dive should provide the GK confidence that his face and torso are
  protected.

Practice Tip - Creative Structure

       There is a fine line between creativity and structure.  Both are important, but where the coach draws the line is critical. Players by nature are rigid and if they do something different, it is often because they don't know how to or couldn't do it the other way. Coaches have to encourage players to experiment and test the waters, without stepping over the line of the team framework.

       One of the areas where a coach may be a little too strident is the way an exercise is conducted. By being too restrictive, we make our players robots. More often than not, an exercise will breakdown if a component of the exercise (pass, reception, etc.) breaks down. By asking the players to adapt to a bad pass (play it back to the original passer or drop it to another player that is waiting their turn in the exercise) a bad ball can turn an exercise into a very dynamic session.

       Many years ago I was running the following with a U12 competitive team.  I remember the session because it was the first time that I truly understood how to turn a bad exercise into a great coaching opportunity.  We were running a switch field exercise with 2 wings, a center midfielder and a forward. The ball was to be played from one wing to the center mid, to the other wing, who played it down the touch for the forward who had made a lateral (diagonal) run to that touch. For some reason, we kept mis-playing the pass from or to the wing.

        I then went to the center mid and asked him what he would do in a game if he gets a short ball? What were his options? He said, the most probable option would be to run to the ball and touch it back to the wing. I then asked the wing what he should do if he played a short ball.  He said (I'm sure with a little coach prodding) that he would drop back to receive the next pass form the center mid. Very quickly (shorter than what is taking me to write this), the bad short ball was a return pass to the dropping wing who played a centering pass to either the center mid who had dropped back or one of the substitutes waiting to come into the exercise who was converted to a supporting fullback when there was a bad pass.

        Other bad balls, such as behind or in front of the center mid were addressed. The forward came into play as a passing option for the center mid. We still ended with the ball to someone down the touch who made a cross onto at least two players making runs on goal. It just wasn't necessarily the same players as the exercise was originally designed.

        Soon this uni-dimensional and unilateral exercise was converted into a dynamic session where the side the ball was taken down was wholly based upon the type of pass the players made. Players from different positions would be making the crossing runs depending upon their situation at that time.

        Keep your framework in focus, but let the pieces inside have a little freedom for experimentation.

Combination Play - Tactical (3-Man)

      The following session the tactical session of developing combination play. It is based on the foundation of 3 players. Another session will be presented later on that is more advanced and will use more players with earlier defensive pressure. <BTW, there will be 6 posts, not 5 as originally stated.>

       Because of the increased area, the playing environment is now more suited to adapting towards full field combination play. This is considered a tactical session (versus  match conditioned exercises) because the development is still without much pressure The coach should put a strong focus on the player's movement off the ball and timing of the movement. The speed of play should gradually increase as the players understand the process. It is important for the coach to remind players of the clues for each combination (e.g., dribbler toward teammate indicates that a takeover or overlap is on).

        Previously we warmed up with groups of three players in 15x10 grids that
share a 15 yard boundary. The two grids are merged and the two groups will now the combined area  (the shared boundary markers are left as a centerline). Each group works by itself. One of the two groups could put on pennies to separate them visually. By combining the grids, the two groups must now work in the same area as other players, which builds towards working against opposition.

• Diagonal passing-still working as one group, A1 in grid 1 must pass to A2 who has moved into grid 2; A1 then moves into grid 2; A2 must pass to A3 in grid 1; A2 then moves into grid 2; etc. Be sure players use the full area of space, as most passes should be 15 to 20 yards in length. Players in the other group work at the same time doing the above.
  
• 3-man combos-players A1 and A3 are in grid 1 as A2 is in grid 2.  A1 plays to A2 who checks from the far counter-line of grid 2 and receives the pass within grid 2. Some combination of overlap, takeover, dummy, flick on, wall pass, etc. should end up with two players in grid 2 near the counter-line and the third player near the grid 1 counter-line.
  
• Next will be the match conditioned and match related sections of a training as it builds upon the environment already established here. Another tactical session in this series will be sent later that will try to develop combination play using with more players.

Corner Kick Game

       This is a good transition game. I stole it from the 1994 Vol. 2, #12 issue of Soccer Coaching. The article was by Roby Stahl.

         The game is played on a half field with 2 goals and goalkeepers. Two teams of 8 divide up into groups of four. A large number of balls are split up to the four corners. The game is 4v4 with the remaining 4 players from each team positioned at the corners of their team's attacking goal. Each game lasts 4 minutes and the "corner" players exchange positions with the field players.

         Every time the ball goes out of play, the team that just gained possession is awarded a corner kick at their attacking goal. That means they must sprint to their penalty area and try to execute a quick corner-kick before the defending team reacts. If the GK gets the ball, he is to distribute as quick as possible, hoping to find a breakaway situation.

         There is no off-side. We started play with a GK distribution. After a score, we transitioned to the other goal for a corner-kick. Another option would be for the beaten GK to distribute to his teammate to restart play.

Coaching Points:

• encourage high work rate (sprinting)
• emphasis on quick, but accurate corner kicks
• look to recognize first player who opens space for himself
• make defenders sprint back to their goal after losing the ball out of bounds
• emphasis on aggression in the box
• emphasis on quick transitions from defense to offense and offense to defense

Exercise of the Day - Three Team Scramble

        This warm-up helps to stimulate vision, ball control in traffic, double teaming, communication and decision making. It may be used for players U12 and older, though it may need some modification (fewer balls?) for ages below U16.

        Divide the team into equal numbered groups or as close as you can get them. For instance, if a team is 17 players, then set up as 5v6v6. Play in an 40 x 60 area (e.g., 18 to halfway and touch to touch) or adjust to group sizes. We used 3 balls. Two balls  may suffice with a smaller group containing 4 or less players. Consider four balls if the groups are 8v8v8. The object is to maintain possession of as many balls as possible within your group.

       The players must decide which teammate they will support on the pass or which ball they will try to tackle or intercept. When they are going to receive or gain control of a ball, they may need to call to a player that is not looking to support them.

        As another option, allow the GK(s) to play with their hands (put them on separate teams), either in ground pick-ups or in taking the ball off a dribbler's foot (be sure they have done some warm-up diving beforehand). Have the GK's teammates try to send some chips to the GK for taking out of the air or to a teammate to head to their GK. During some period of play the GKs should be restricted to playing with their feet.

       Balls out of play can be restarted by dribbling in, pass ins, throw ins or chips to other side of the area. Be sure that the players communicate when an air ball is coming, else there may be a few unintentional headers.

"Apparent disorder is a product of control." Sun Tzu, The Art of War

Exercise of the Day - Drive and Drop

       This exercise helps to improve your player's long kicks and the support runs for a player receiving a ball with his back to his attacking goal.

• Setup: Three players per group; players A and B are 20-40 yards apart, depending upon the capabilities of the players; player C is in-between A and B.
  
• Procedure: Player A plays a long ball to B; B one-touches the reception to C, who one-touches a return pass to B; B touches the ball to space and plays a long ball to A; A one-touches the reception to C, who one-touches a return pass to A, etc.
  
• Coaching points: reinforce to the receiving players that this is like a goal kick or punt distribution; often, this is a tough reception and the best touch is often a drop to a supporting back player. The support player should determine where the ball is in relation to the receiver and move into a proper supporting position. For instance if the ball is coming to the players right side, the support run should not be to the players left side. The supporting run should be at an angle to the receiver
  
• Variation: if a fourth player must be used in a group, this player could either be a second support player or could be on one of the ends. If in the middle, the support players can move to either side of the receiver. If on the end, the receiver could lay off to the support player who drops to the extra player on that end for the long kick to other end.

Practice Tip - Soccer with Sole

      The sole of the foot is one of the key areas of ball control development. To incorporate this mentality, as the players to do sole of the foot rolls. The player is to roll the ball forward and backwards with the sole of the foot without losing control. The player should "extend" as far as possible. The maximum would be heel or Achilles on ball when forward and toe when back. On switch, the player should quickly start using his other foot.

        The next progression is to go side-to-side and extend as far as possible with the sole of the foot. At the maximum extension, the side of the foot (inside/outside) should be touching the ball Then work combinations of forward/backward/side-to-side. The coach may even request the players to work the ball during a brief discussion. As the coach is talking the players should be moving the ball and looking at the coach.