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Football Coaching Pre Season

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Pre season football coaching – players work in threes One player working intensely retrieving long passes, other two players on the jog Progression to pre season drill – rotate players roles after each pass

 Football Coaching Pre Season

Before a football coach begins planning a pre season training programme, they must consider and take into account a number of key factors, particularly concerning the health and safety of the players.

Age of the players - Children grow at different rates: For example, in a group of 10 year-olds some players might be significantly taller or heavier than others. Inevitably such differences will have a great influence on a child's fitness levels for pre season training.

It is important that as coaches, we organise our groups when considering the pre season programme, to take into account the ability and size differences amongst players of similar age.

Strength in young players - As young players will have not reached adolescence and have immature bodies, with weaker muscles and bones, it is important that they should not be subjected to intensive strength training during pre season training.

Flexibility in young players - Believe it or not, after the age of ten, children begin to lose flexibility. Therefore it is important that the players develop good habits in pre season with regards to their warm-up and cool-down habits and attitudes as stretching and mobility exercises can help maintain this flexibility.

Young players and pre season - As children start to play football their need for energy grows. To meet this need, oxygen supply to the blood and blood supply to the muscles must improve. Children breathe more quickly but less deeply than adults and extract oxygen less effectively. Because of this, young children (6-12 years) must work harder than adolescents or adults to provide the oxygen their muscles require when training during pre season. Therefore as responsible coaches you must consider this when planning or implementing any pre season training routines and provide plenty of rest and recovery periods.

Many people in football consider a good pre season to be like money in the bank. It is always there to draw on. But whilst we want to get players fit for the forthcoming season, good coaches are always mindful of the different fitness levels of the players, the age and ability, the weather conditions and are aware that there a lots of fun ways, which utilise the ball with games, competitions and drills to get players fitness levels higher during pre season training.

We have put together a complete pre season section that considers the health and safety considerations a coach should take into account when planning a pre season training programme. We also examine young players’ fitness limitations and provide a pre season programme that feature fun warm up drills with a ball, football fitness drills and conditioned games.

In the members area of the site there are over 250 computer game quality 3 - D animated football training drills and coaching sessions, with a chapter specifically dedicated to coaching and improving pre season training. Using the same technology as the virtual football replays that appear on the Premier league and BBC football web sites, we have designed a wide variety of pre season football drills that allows the coach to interact with and understand completely pre season requirements.

Imagine being able to view the animated pre season drills from any number of angles, zoom in and out to see how the session evolves, slow the speed down. It is totally interactive and delivers a unique online learning experience for all levels of football coaches.