Top Tips - Pitcherofiles.pitchero.com/clubs/17771/f4kjuggling_122640.pdf · up again for a catch....
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In this Issue Page 1 Top Tips: Coaching best practice Page 2 The Main Feature: Juggling - an essential soccer skill. Page 3 The Game: Ghostbusters Page 4 Steve’s Coaching Clinic: How can I help my U8s get better - quickly! Dear Coach, Every coach I know would like his or her players to have a good ‘feel’ for the ball, to have a soft first touch and to be able to control every pass that comes their way. But not many coaches realise that one of the best ways of helping young players develop excellent ball control skills is to teach them how to juggle the ball. You can find out how to teach your players this essential soccer skill on page 2. The game on page 3 is by my colleague, Keith Boanas. Ghostbusters is a soccer style game of ‘it’ that players from 6 to 9 or 10 are guaranteed to enjoy. The Clinic on page 4 is a plea from help from a coach whose team are simply not as good as the more experienced teams in his league. How can he help them get up to speed…quickly? Yours in soccer, Welcome from Steve Watson Coaching best practice Top Tips 1) Set up situations where the players can learn by playing the game. The game is the best teacher for young players. 2) Coaches can often be more helpful to a young player's development by organising less, saying less and allowing the players to do more. Set up a game and let the kids play. Keep most of your comments for before and after practice and during water breaks. Comments should be kept short and simple. Be comfortable organizing a session that looks like pickup soccer. 3) Teaching and learning the game of soccer is a process: make your goals seasonal, as well as daily and weekly. Often, at the younger ages, the developmental efforts of one season are not noticeable in children until sometime in the next season. From Best Practices for Coaching Soccer in the United States 1 www.footy4kids.co.uk Issue 61 30th September 2014 footy4kids Premium is a monthly subscription service for youth soccer coaches. Try it free for one month at www.footy4kids.co.uk/premium or call +44 1483 892 894.
Transcript of Top Tips - Pitcherofiles.pitchero.com/clubs/17771/f4kjuggling_122640.pdf · up again for a catch....
In this IssuePage 1!! Top Tips: Coaching best practice!
Page 2!! The Main Feature: Juggling - an essential soccer skill.!
Page 3!! The Game: Ghostbusters!
Page 4! !Steve’s Coaching Clinic: How can I help my U8s get better - quickly!
Dear Coach,!!Every coach I know would like his or her players to have a good ‘feel’ for the ball, to have a soft first touch and to be able to control every pass that comes their way.!
But not many coaches realise that one of the best ways of helping young players develop excellent ball control skills is to teach them how to juggle the ball.!
You can find out how to teach your players this essential soccer skill on page 2.!
The game on page 3 is by my colleague, Keith Boanas. Ghostbusters is a soccer style game of ‘it’ that players from 6 to 9 or 10 are guaranteed to enjoy.!
The Clinic on page 4 is a plea from help from a coach whose team are simply not as good as the more experienced teams in his league. How can he help them get up to speed…quickly? !
Yours in soccer,!
Welcome from Steve Watson
Coaching best practiceTop Tips1) Set up situations where the players can learn by playing the game. The game is the best teacher for young players.!
2) Coaches can often be more helpful to a young player's development by organising less, saying less and allowing the players to do more. Set up a game and let the kids play. !
Keep most of your comments for before and after practice and during water breaks. Comments should be kept short and simple. Be comfortable organizing a session that looks like pickup soccer.!
3) Teaching and learning the game of soccer is a process: make your goals seasonal, as well as daily and weekly. Often, at the younger ages, the developmental efforts of one season are not noticeable in children until sometime in the next season.!
From Best Practices for Coaching Soccer in the United States
1www.footy4kids.co.uk
Issue 61 30th September 2014
footy4kids Premium is a monthly subscription service for youth soccer coaches. Try it free for one month at!
www.footy4kids.co.uk/premium or call +44 1483 892 894.
Many youth soccer coaches see ball juggling as a fancy ‘trick’ and not an essential soccer skill. !
But players who can juggle (even a little bit) have a better 'feel' for the ball and a better first touch than those who can't juggle. This allows them to be more composed when playing in matches and gives them more time to make the right decisions when under pressure. A good ‘feel’ for the ball and a nice first touch also make soccer more fun! !
In short, juggling the ball is an essential soccer skill and it’s important to teach it - even if your players are as young as 5 or 6.!
However, learning to juggling is not easy and it can become frustrating if you work on it for too long at any one time. Just spend a few minutes on it in every practice (have a juggling contest as soon as your players arrive) and make a big fuss of players who show any sort of progress.!
Demonstrate the following procedure, using a slightly under inflated football or, even better, a futsal. Make sure your players use both feet!!
1. Hold the ball in front of you with both hands, drop it onto a flat surface and let it bounce.!
2. After the bounce, tap the ball back up to your hands with the shoelace or instep part of your foot. Catch the ball and repeat several times with each foot. This a "bounce-foot-catch".!
3. Now, drop the ball for a bounce, tap it softly up towards your hands but let it drop for another bounce. Then tap it up to your hands for a catch. This a "bounce-foot-bounce-foot-catch". Repeat several times, again with both feet.!
4. Next drop the ball directly to the foot for a tap back to the hands for a catch. This is a "foot-catch".!
5. Now drop the ball to the foot for a tap but let it bounce, then use the foot to tap it up to the hands for a catch. (This is a "foot-bounce-foot-catch".)!
6. Keep adding on touches and bounces alternating a foot touch with a bounce and ending with a catch. It's important to end with a catch to maintain control.!
7. Finally drop the ball for a bounce, tap it up with the foot but before it bounces try to tap it up again for a catch. This is a "bounce-foot-foot-catch". If the last step in the process seems too difficult for a player, go back and work on the 1 touch exercises again with bounces in between.!
Now try to link lots of 2 juggles together with bounces: bounce-foot-foot-bounce-foot-foot-bounce etc. See how long your players can keep it going. Have a contest.!
Then go for 3 juggles - bounce - foot - foot - foot - catch.!
When they've mastered the bounce-foot routines your players will be able to drop the ball directly onto their foot to start a juggle.!
Be patient - your players won’t turn into expert ball jugglers in one session - but juggling is worth persevering with. !
It’s a lot more than just a trick!
Juggling - an essential soccer skill.
The Main Feature
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Juggling is an excellent way to encourage players of all ages to develop mastery over the ball. And it’s great fun!
Objective: to improve dribbling skills, ball control and physical co-ordination.!
Set up: create a 20x20 playing area for every ten players.!
Each player has a ball.!
How to play: eight players are inside the playing area and have a ball each. The two remaining players are the ghosts.!
The players with a ball dribble around in the area and try to stay away from the ghosts who attempt to tag the dribbling players.!
Once a player has been tagged they freeze and stand with their feet apart holding their ball above their head.!
See how many players the ghosts can freeze in 1 minute.!
Alternatively, the pair of ghosts who can tag all the players in the quickest time wins.!
The last two players to be tagged become the ghosts in the next game.
Ghostbusters from Fun Games for 5-8 Year Olds
The F4K Game
Progression: allow free players to unfreeze tagged players by playing the ball between the frozen player's legs. The frozen player should shout 'Help!!' or “I need a ghostbuster!!”.
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Player movement Ball movement Run with ball ShotKEY:
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20 x 20 yards
Steve’s Coaching Clinic
QUESTION:!Hello Steve,!
I manage a group of U8s. This is their first season and we have just started to play some friendlies against other sides. !
The main difference I have seen so far is that other teams appear to be more organised, their players know what position they are playing in and they pass to each other! !
Have you any drills/exercises that I can use to help my players to catch up?!
ANSWER:!
First, a word of advice - try not to compare your team with others.!
It may look like other teams are more organised than yours and you may feel that your parents are thinking 'why doesn't our coach get our team to play like that?'!
The reality is that you might be playing teams that have been together for a year or two more than yours or they could just be really advanced, soccer-wise, for their age.!
Also, the teams you play could have had playing in positions drilled into them before they're really ready. And that's not a good idea. Stopping defenders from moving forward into attack, for example, is stopping them from doing what all seven year olds want to do - get a touch on the ball and try to score a goal.!
As far as posing is concerned, these games will reward your players for sharing their toy (i.e., the ball).!
Place two small teams in the same playing area. One ball per team. Ask them to move around the playing area and pass to each other. Make it competitive by seeing which group can make five passes first. Then see which group can pass to every player on the team first. !
Move onto a 3v3 or 4v4 game on a 20x20 pitch with four goals, one in each corner. Require each team to make two passes before shooting. !
Stop the game occasionally and ask the player in possession: 'who can you pass to?'!
Make a big fuss of any player who tries to pass and other teams will soon be comparing their team with yours!
How can I help my U8s get better - quickly!
You can only ask Steve a question if you subscribe to footy4kids Premium. Send your youth soccer coaching questions to [email protected] and Steve will do his best to help. If Steve doesn’t know the answer, he’ll find someone who does.
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