11: Grow Coach Newsletter

Football Coaching: A full Session on Dominating Duels.

Mar 07, 2024

A warm welcome from JustCoachMD. We are happy to have you on board. We are looking forward to providing you with helpful content.

Here is what to expect:

Education: Competition as a tool for engagement.
Arrival Activity: Ball mastery to focus on core moves.
Activity 1: 1v1 dribbling and escaping pressure.
Activity 2: 2v2 combining to score.
Activity 3: 4v4 small-sided game.
Session Commentary: Thought process behind the session plan.

Developing Competitive Players

Football coaches can harness competition to enhance player performance by creating a competitive environment during training sessions and matches.

When organizing your session activities competition can be used in many ways:

Game-like scenarios: This can be used to make training activities match the speed and tempo of a normal game.
Grouping players: This is a good way to get players using each other to test themselves. For example group a set of top defenders against the best attackers.
Benchmarks: Often used to set a level of performance for others to chase after.
Challenges: A great method of testing individuals within a practice. For example in shooting practice, a player could be challenged to use first-time finishes only.

Competition instills a sense of accountability, motivation, and drive among players, pushing them to push their limits and continuously strive for excellence. Additionally, coaches can utilize competition to build teamwork, sportsmanship, and resilience.

Types of Competition

You vs You (Intrapersonal Competition):

This type of competition focuses on individual improvement and self-motivation. Coaches can set personal goals for each player, such as using a type of pass or skill to beat an opponent.
Players are encouraged to track their progress over the training session and strive to surpass their previous performances. This improves self-discipline, self-awareness, and a growth mindset as players continuously seek to better themselves.

Me vs You (Interpersonal Competition):

Involves pitting players against each other in drills, small-sided games, or one-on-one challenges. This form of competition promotes rivalry among teammates, as they strive to outperform each other while still maintaining a healthy respect for each other.
It sharpens players’ skills, decision-making abilities, and competitiveness, as they learn to adapt and react to the actions of their opponents in real time.

Us vs Them (Team Competition):

Emphasis is placed on collective effort and collaboration toward a common goal. Coaches can divide players into teams for games, relays, or tactical exercises, where they must work together to achieve success.
This type of competition enhances communication, cooperation, and cohesion among teammates, as they learn to coordinate their movements and support each other. Team competition also reinforces the importance of shared responsibility in doing your job for the team.

By incorporating these different types of competition into training sessions and matches, coaches can level up their player’s performances while developing a competitive culture that drives continuous improvement and success.

‘‘We Do Not Want to Tell Our Dreams, We Want to Show Them’’

(C, Ronaldo)

Arrival Activity: Ball Mastery

Set-Up: In a 20 by 20 square, give each player a ball and the coach leads them through some basic ball mastery moves. The coach can focus on using both feet and different parts of the foot to manipulate the ball.

Make it competitive: Be sure to add in a little competition for example who can juggle the ball for the longest without dropping it or for each ball mastery activity who can get through a sequence of 5-10 reps the quickest.

“Never Say Never Because, Limits, Like Fears, Are Often Just Illusions”

(M-Jordan)

1v1 Duels

Set Up: In the 20 by 20 square add some coloured gates (black and red). Match up the players to challenge them. Have 3-4 pairs of players going at the same time. They play their mini-game. Each game should last 30 -90 seconds.

Scoring: Players score a point by dribbling through their colored gate.

2v2 Duel

Set-Up: In the 20 by 20 area, add small goals centrally (reds) and in opposite corners (black). Position the players on the outside of the playing area. Red serves the ball to their teammate and blacks enter the pitch to defend. The game is a 2v2.

Scoring: Reds combine and score in the red goals and blacks win back possession and score in the black corner goals.

4v4 Small Sided Game

Set-Up: In a 20 by 20 square, offset a pair of mini goals (5-8 yards) at each end of the pitch. Each team attacks and defends a pair of goals. Quarter up the pitch and place a pair of players in each quarter. When a team is out of possession they are fixed to their quarter. The team who is IN possession can overload a quarter of the pitch.

Scoring: Break over the end line and cross the ball for a first-time finish into the mini-goal.

Session Commentary

Aim: The session aims to give players lots of opportunities to get into duel-based competition.

Objectives:

Develop attacking and defending skills that challenge players to find ways to overcome the duels they are faced with.
Use super strengths to dominate opponents, this could be skills, speed, and stop-starts in the attack.
In defense use their physicality to overcome difficult opponents. For example, steal the ball, stick to an opponent, or step into an attacker and scoop the ball away.

Coaching Process: This is the method you could use to coach the session to the players.

What: Show, tell, or ask the players WHAT you would like them to do.
When: Ask the players WHEN is the best time to do it.
Ways: Get the players to think about how many WAYS there are to achieve it.

Coaching Points: Share some coaching points that are most relevant to the players

In attack:

Skill: Use it to beat pressuring opponents.
Speed: Escape pressure by speeding up.
Share: Is it quicker to share the ball once we get beyond 1v1 moments

In defense:

Steal: Can you steal the ball from your opponent?
Stick: Stay close to your opponent and be tough to beat.
Strength: Bump and nudge your opponent to unbalance them and then steal the ball.

‘‘Dont Be Afraid of Failure, This is the Way to Succeed’’

(L-B, James)

Coach Project

Objective: List some ways to make your practices competitive.

Task: Think about ways to make your practices competitive for the following.

Me vs Me
Me vs You
Us vs Them

Extension Task:

Practice Design: Using the sessions above as inspiration, create another full session on dominating duels. Think about different progressions you could add. For example, a 2nd ball, another player, a mini-goal, etc.

Coach Task :

Design the activity for around 6 – 12 players to work on dominating duels:

•Keep it SIMPLE

•Ensure it is REPETITIVE

•Include a COMPETITION

Note Down:

•The rules and organization

•Progressions and regressions

Please feel free to get in touch or share your ideas, actions, and interventions. We would love to hear from you. If you have any questions, post them here; we will do our best to answer them.