The Boot Room


4 3


"Every practice should have an


element of direction ensuring the


principles of attack and defence are


fundamental to the practice"


Issue 10 August 2014


Choose a football focus


Once you have looked at what research can tell us about effective coaching practices and also developed some ideas about your own practice philosophy it is important to fit the framework you are developing to a football theme.


Coaching session themes develop from lots of different sources. You may work at a club or organisation where there is a coaching programme or syllabus with weekly coaching topics. Alternatively, you may work in a performance environment where preparation for specific opposition provides the theme. Or, similarly, the detail of your session may arise from a particular issue the team or an individual are currently finding difficult.


• A Programme Theme: playing forward • A Particular Problem: we are finding it difficult to defend crosses • Performance Preparation: breaking down opposition who defend late in a 4-4-1-1


Design


Pitch I work from four pitch types which the players become familiar with and understand. This familiarity helps reduce the time the players spend trying to learn how the practice works and instead increases the time for them to practise and learn. Additionally, the considered choice of pitch type can implicitly help the players develop around the session theme.


A big pitch is useful if you are looking to test defending skills or if you want to create space between units to play through or behind the opposition. Similarly, big pitches are effective at generating full game pictures with realistic distances.


A small pitch is a great way to test touch and release skills along with the associated speed of thought and decisions to really put the players under strain to stay with the ball.


Narrow pitches challenge the players to play forward as there is limited width to play around the opposition. Narrow pitches help the players practice themes such as playing through the opposition and breaking the block.


Using a wide pitch (a pitch wider than it is long) can provide a focus for switching play, attacking and defending in wide areas and crossing and finishing


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68  |  Page 69  |  Page 70  |  Page 71  |  Page 72  |  Page 73  |  Page 74  |  Page 75  |  Page 76  |  Page 77  |  Page 78  |  Page 79  |  Page 80  |  Page 81  |  Page 82  |  Page 83  |  Page 84  |  Page 85  |  Page 86  |  Page 87  |  Page 88  |  Page 89  |  Page 90  |  Page 91  |  Page 92