Inside Sport

How to utilise all players in a training game?


https://forum.insidesport.com.au/Topic1766952.aspx

By tjwhalan - 7 Aug 2013 9:24 AM

Does anyone else find one of the most taxing parts of coaching is finding a way to keep everyone interested when practicing 5v4 scenarios etc where there is one or two players waiting for their turn. Of course it would be ideal if we could use all players all the time in our games but sometimes one or two players sitting out is inevitable to practice certain situations.

With young players sitting out I find they will just talk to themselves or sit down and not pay attention to the game. The best way I have dealt with it is always asking questions of the players sitting off about the game. Even doing this I find it hard to keep them interested, they are at the age where they are only interested if they are involved directly.

Anyone have any situations where they have dealt with this effectively?

(P.S I would only have the players off for 2 minutes or so at a time.)
By Decentric - 12 Aug 2013 8:55 PM

Kicker wrote:
I struggled with this for a while and found that I needed to be prepared for whatever numbers showed up. Once I did this coaching got a lot easier. When I plan my sessions I write down the max number of players I'll have and the minimum, from there I'll have a plan for each drill/stage of training based on those numbers e.g. 9, 10, 11 or 12 becomes 4v4+1, 5v5, 5v5+1, 5v5+2 (where +'s are neutral) or 2 games of 3v3. To do this you may need to prepare 2 different drills and pick the most suitable for the numbers as not all drills scale up and/or down well. The drill isn't so important its can you coach what you need to. To take this a step further I plan alternatives if my keeper doesn't show up etc. It also helps to plan in blocks say 2 weeks worth so you can move things around as needed.

Sometimes you can use the extra players as rolling subs but you need to ensure the intensity of the drill is high enough so the players will be happy to have a rest.

This may just be my experience, but I've found if you have more than one group and they are doing different things they will invariably want to do the other and get distracted. It's always caused problems regardless if I've got help or not, the only real exception is goalkeepers.

Edited by Kicker: 12/8/2013 03:50:16 PM


Most of this is standard practice for a teacher on a day to day basis. Planning is a major component of being a teacher. As you suggest, the more thorough the planning for various contingencies, such as different numbers of players, the more successful a session is likely to occur.

What do you mean by 'Rolling subs' , Kicker?

With multiple groups, it is so good having assistant coaches who are confident taking control of various drills. This year, with 13 and 14 year old boys, it seemed better to have a competitive element to every exercise, to intrinsically motivate them through extrinsic goals.