all of this is dependant on whether the club at which you hope to coach, isnt political and give the gig to who drinks piss with the technical director...............

Hi Andy

Great initiative. Given this group of players already train with their clubs I think your focus should be totally on ball work. In fact even at club land I'd be doing the warm-up with the ball and put the dynamic stretches in between a particular warm-up ball drill.

Eg Toe taps, then move to heels up, to dribbling back to knees up etc

Why would you get them doing sprints without the ball? Fitness work should all be done with the ball, and if this group are with you for technique then this is where I'd focus.

Han Berger said recently research shows that players sprint fastest when they have a ball and are being chased. Even professionals, including Thierry Henry responded to this. Players only need 30 metre sprints at full pace in a game these days.

Two goals 30 m apart. Two cones 5 m from each goal. Give player A a ball at the side of one goal and put Player B 10 metres behind him/her. Player A runs towards a goal with the ball and then passes to the goal once they get past say a cone marked at 25 m. Player B is chasing hard determined to stop Player A. When finished they both run round the back of the goal and ready to go again. 10 sprints should have them heaving and working with a ball!

You can adjust gap between players at start depending on pace of players, change player with and without the ball, make it into a competition two teams of attackers v defenders etc etc

Similarly you mention two teams but to me that means in a squad of 12, or more the players aren't touching the ball enough and not working hard enough in your session.

Maybe it's just the teacher in me but lines of more than 3 maybe 4 players max are very wasteful in terms of time players get to actually kick the ball, messing around ability, and all round fitness focus.

And if you have 4 coaches that should work really well with the quality of practice, technique and opportunity these kids will get.

Yeah I had 16 U12 last year got 32 U10 next season...we have 1 coach for every 8 kids though so tehre will be 4 of us running this however I find sometimes this makes things more complicated with 4 coaches potentially jumping in at different points.

LAst year there were 2 of us working with 16 and we used to alternate running the session with one coach preparing the session (as per the one I shared) and the other coach acting as assistant that week...used to work really well but not sure how this will work with 4 coaches.

Will definitely give this a go but after seeing the final trials yesterday will probably be a few weeks in! I'd forgotten how much younger U10 is than U12!

Will definitely look for that book...thanks for the heads up.

The sample session was set up for 16 x U12 year olds not 32 x U10 year olds (too many for one coach) As mentioned, set up a 8v8 game that involves a task to score. Watch what they do then do then break the session down into smaller SSGs or isolated tasks to get the core of the session. Again if your philosophy involves isolated training then do so. Then put the 8v8 game back together with similar constraints to the beginning then allow free play. Give it a go and see what happens. I will be coaching a U11 Elite development squad from Jan 2011. Similar situation to you where they come in for two sessions a week then go back to their clubs. As a team the boys will play once a month against other academies. More than happy to share my experiences. A great reference is "Coaching Soccer" (KNVB) by Bert van Lingen.

For 16-32 kids you need to break the groups down into say 4 x 8. You would also need to have sections. For example 1 x passing, 1 x trapping, 1 x heading, 1 x shooting and rotate them. then you would need a minimum of 1 assistant for 32 kids.

You can't have eyes everywhere so spreading the workload is a good idea. Parents can help out here if you tell them what your doing and trying to achieve.

I'd be keen to hear how people get on with a whole part whole approach with a group of 16-32 ten or eleven year olds....they are easily distracted and you run the risk of not all kids getting the chance to work on the technique you're looking to develop.

I can imagine myself doing a lot more coaching within a game environment with slightly older kids who are starting to appreciate the tactical side of the game a bit more.....but at ten years old I feel like I should be trying to get as mnay of them as possible to try to execute each technique as many times as possible with me stepping in and corrected where appropriate....and then progressing to introducing this technique into a game setting later in the session.

Keen for any advice or tips for how to execute a whole part whole approach with this many kids at this young age.

Andy should be congratulated for publicly sharing his knowledge, not all coaches do this. What he gives is of great value to the coaching community. Andy has done what all great communities do and that is share and pool knowledge for the benefit of the coaches who coach young players and old alike.

Life and football have a lot in common. Never think you know it all. Never stop learning. The more knowledge you have in your armoury will make you a better coach. A win for yourself and a win for your players.

As a player many years ago a lot of coaching decisions had me puzzled. It wasn't until I started coaching that much of it made sense.

Keep up the good work Andy. It's really appreciated.

That is a fair point.

What I would suggest is that the best technique learnt is through game play.

Example: You and I playing kick to kick learning to pass to each other. vs Me playing a through ball to you in a game and you scoring.

There are pro's and cons to this however.
Pro - Kids who are good at problem solving stand out because they try different passes for different situations until they find a "solution" (the right pass for the right situation).

Con- Kids who are not so good may struggle.

This is why in the warm up I would get them to practice possible "solutions" for the game related stuff.
E.g. Step overs and I would tell them possible situations to use it in and encourage them to try this out in a game.

From my point of you the more you modify a football game (equal numbers two goals etc) the more you lose from a development point of view. The game should be the starting point and we should modify and subtract elements to find the players correct level.

From my

Andy you should be congratulated for sharing. Every coach may have a different way to do things. There are a million different drills (drills are for putting into walls) and exercises. Who cares who has the best exercise anyway. What counts is the way you deliver the coaching information and did the players improve from the beginning to the end of the session. The way you do it depends on your philosophy, situation, age of players, and problems to be solved. A whole part whole approach is a great way to do this. My bet is your players improved under your coaching. Well done.

Just one thing to remember - we share the kids I coach with their clubs. The play for their clubs on a weekend and they train with their clubs 1/2 nights a week and come to us on a Monday night for an additional session.

That may explain why I may focus a little heavier on technique work and a little less on gameplay than if I had them myself twice a week and they played as a team together at weekends.

Hey mate

No hate necessary from anyone I hope...the day we stop learning as coaches is the day we should stop.

Already through two people's feedback I've got a couple of things I'd try differently next time.

The whole idea of this forum was to exchange ideas and learn from each other - also sharing what doesn't work.

In no way am I claiming that my sessions are perfect or any sort of benchmark - they are just my sessions...I'm only entering my third year of coaching properly myself....but I'm happy for me to be the sacrificial lamb so to speak to get a regular exchange going.

If anyone else ever wants to email a PDF/word document session plan of theirs I can upload these as well for sharing.

Cheers

Andy

My analysis

Warm up and dribble on demand.

In my opinion the warm up at that age can be done with the ball.

You could combine dribble on demand with your warm up (that's what i did in my sessions.)

And you can add things like 10 on the ball (to replace knees up etc).

- Reason: Players get more touches with the ball.

3. Target practice.

Again very similar to mine however I just have a basic shooting drill.

- Advantage of your drill is that they practice different techniques
e.g. headers,volleys

Wheres as mine is 1v0 so first touch then different types of shots and 1 v 1 which is dribbling then different types of shots.

I don't include volleys and headers as I havn't found a drill yet that i am happy with but I think I might try your drill out.

4&5&6

This is where our training sessions are totally different.

I must point out though I don't agree with finishing being a topic I just incorporate a shooting drill into every session related to the topic i do.

E.g 1 v 0 - Firs touch
1 v 1 - Dribbling
2 v 1 - Passing
1 v 1 (defender starts behind attacker) - Running with the ball

I will Anallise them any.

4. IMO doing speed work without the ball is unnecessary without sounding like Craig Foster at this point in the training session they should be getting as many touches as possible with the ball and be in game related situations. This is in order to develop technique under game pressure and game insight.

5 and 6 are both excellent finishing drills however I would use them immediately after the warm up.

My alternate at this point would be something like this.

Passing - 4 v 2 (2 square drill) players start in the first square against one defender and attempt to move into the second square against another and try and have a shot at goal.

First touch - two touch - 4 v 4 game.

Dribbling - 2 v 2 continuous drill

RWB - 2 v 2 continous drill (defenders start behind attackers)

7.
Then I would do the same and finish with an 8 v 8 game.


I'm going to stress before I get hate posts on how I disagreed with Andy's drills. This is just my opinion and I listen to the podcasts every week and love Andy =)

Thanks Andy, that's really going to help at training. Our fellas ATM just run around goofing off!

Good session. Coaching depends on your philosophy. Do you teach technical skills in context or in an isolated environment? Most players can be taught in isolation but few can complete these skills in context. Getting young players to have vision, understand the visual cues, then act correctly is what all coaches like to see. Isolated training has a place perhaps in warm-ups, own time or academies but adding real opposition as soon as possible saves time and creates a real game environment. Your 8v8 game could be played 3-1-3 + keeper to start teaching positional play of the 4:3:3 system. The Dutch only reduce the complexity of game to no opposition if they cannot solve the problems they see. Coaches are problem solvers


What do you think about the FourFourTwo blog A Sample Session?
I thought I'd use this blog to talk you through a typical session I would run for my 12 year olds and let you download the session plan.
We always try to always cover the same key elements in each se...

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