August 2012 was dominated by the Olympics, and what a breath of fresh air it proved to be. We put on a world class event and our Olympians demonstrated all that is good about sport. They competed fairly, with passion and magnanimity, congratulating opponents whether they won or lost. No surliness, sulks or strops
One of the hardest skills in football is the ability to run quickly and positively with the ball. Young players will run with the ball, but very often pick the wrong time to run with the ball, run with it in the wrong areas of the pitch and run with their heads down and end up running the ball into defenders.
In the days after our defeat in Kiev, the talk centred on England’s inability to win penalty shootouts. That’s a red herring. An honest analysis of England’s four matches would focus on a more fundamental problem. An inability to keep possession of the ball and complete simple 5 yard passes under pressure.
When the FA formed in 1863 the course was set for our beautiful game to become the dominant global sport. Since then a handful of coaches have had a lasting impact on the way the game is played.
I am often asked how coaches can effectively coach a team. Many coaches can put on practices and drills to improve players’ techniques and skills, but coaching a team to work together to achieve a specific team objective can be difficult and intimidating for many coaches. In this blog, we look at the topic of coaching a team to defend effectively as a team. In this example, we look at a UEFA B practical curriculum topic and play an 8 v 8 game. The principles and structure of defending shown here are equally applicable to coaching 4 v 4 games through to 11 v 11 games.
I had another question from a Grassroots Coaching fan regarding a key UEFA B Coaching topic: "What is the difference between Coaching a team to defend to counter attack compared to coaching a team to defend deep to counter attack?" In this article, we look at how to Coach a team to defend to counter attack.
