Soccer Coach Weekly Practice Plans give you a blueprint for an entire training session – warm-up, training, progression, games and warm-down. If your next training session is fast approaching and you haven’t had time to put together your own plan, Practice Plans could be the answer.
There are now over 350 Practice Plans on the Soccer Coach Weekly website, so there’s bound to be something to suit your needs. And the great thing is that Practice Plans can be adapted by to suit any age group from age 7 to 16, and are also appropriate for adult teams.
To get you started, here’s a selection of my favourite Practice Plans:
Getting your players to pass across the pitch and link up play with good passing moves is critical to playing a possession game. Zigzag through the pitch is a great way to get players moving the ball like they would in a match.
If you want to win games you have to score goals. Finishing off attacks helps you coach your players to take goal-scoring chances when they come along, with great tehnique work and a good amount of repetition.
When it comes to coaching skills, it can be hard to put together a training plan to work on the skill you want to coach. Practice Plans can help you to get it right first time – try The art of turning for example, it’s great for getting players to turn with the ball and head off in another direction.
Games are a great asset to any coaching session. With Practice Plans the games are all set out for you – take a look at Three team triangle games, which encourages players to play with the freedom of the playground. Great fun and well worth trying with your team.
Scoring goals is one of the key aims of football. This technical session works on finishing and movement. It gets players shooting from both sides of the penalty area and from the centre. MORE
Being able to turn with the ball under close control is an important skill in any player’s armoury. “The art of turning” will improve your players’ ability to turn whilst dribbling the ball and turning away from a defender when receiving a pass. MORE
This training session is designed to encourage your players to play with the freedom that they might have in a school playground where they are in control of the environment. MORE
Defending against overloads can happen whether your team is in an organised or disorganised state. You can plan defending when organised much easier than when you are defending disorganised. MORE
I was talking to a coach this week about how to control balls in the air, especially when heading the ball in training is off the menu for most clubs. I imagine that there will be much more of a contest to win the ball with a volley once it has dropped from head height. So how do you coach controlling balls in the air? MORE
This week I have been reunited with parents and players from my teams because the club I coach at has used the Easter school holidays to give back to the players what they have been missing for the last four months. So this week I have been coaching full days – around 7 hours – in three sessions. I've coached U9s, U10s and U13s boys and U11 girls. I really enjoy it but it does come with some very obvious problems. MORE
Now we are back playing matches and training after nearly four months of lockdown I can certainly notice the difference in my players. It isn't like when they come back from summer holidays because that is usually just down to a bit of fitness and rusty match play. So how can you relight their fire? MORE
A high pressing game gives teams a huge advantage when they win the ball back because you are close to your opponents goal. Lose the ball, win it back in 6 seconds is a rule that I use in training sessions. But how does that work? MORE
Player trials are likely to be one of the most stressful events facing young players after they have been missing games due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Even the most confident players will get stressed out when they have to put their talents on show to a new group of coaches and players. And now without the help of a full season behind them they will feel a lot more exposed than normal. MORE
