SO LETS GET TO THE DRILLS

In my opinion the most important youth football coaching drills are dribbling, passing, clearing and shooting; which pretty much sums up football. However there is the right way and the wrong way to doing these specific drills. I have in the past subscribed to various online websites where they offer a host of effective drills, which in my opinion just don’t work and create more confusion than anything else. Let’s start off with dribbling and again as mentioned in my previous posts, it is important that all of your players have a soccer ball at their disposal.

RUNNING THE BALL:

This is just the basic dribbling of the ball in an open space, which allows for better handling and focus. Do this for at least 5 minutes ensuring that each player is running with the ball.

SPRINTING WITH THE BALL:

Slit your players into three groups one behind the other. Mark a 40 meter line with one cone at the end in front of each group. Then get the first player of each group to sprint to the cone, go around it and come back to the start. Then let the next player from each group go and so on. When dribbling the ball at a speed, ensure that the player keeps the ball close in front and does not kick the ball too far ahead. If done regularly will ensure better control when carrying the ball forward on match days.

FOCUS DRIBBLING:

Make a square of about 30 meters by 30 meters. The size of this square will vary depending on the number of players you have in your team. Have an identical number of players positioned evenly alongside the square. Each player must have their own football and stand opposite each other on the sides of the square. When you blow your whistle, every player will dribble the ball to the opposite side and stop on the line opposite them. In youth football coaching drills, this drill teaches your players to dribble across the square with their heads up and ensures that they do not interfere with the other player’s path, thus ensuring that they control the movement of the ball. I find this to be a truly effective dribbling drill which is far more effective than dribbling through cones. 

Cheers for now.

Mike

P.S. Next time we will look at some more drills.