Let’s look at the first 3 parts of the session and my thoughts on each of them as well as the specific training drills I would use, being:
- Warm Up
- Kicking Development
- Defense
WARM UP
You’ve got 180mins total time to train each week at 90mins per session.
Not long really when you need to cram in skill development, team/line tactical work as well as all the physical-based work teams like to do.
With all these non-negotiables you need to find a way to majorly streamline your warm up.
The days of 2 laps with some stretches thrown in haphazardly should be left to die as it’s 15mins out of your 90mins per session essentially wasted.
You can warm up and get benefit out it at the same time.
DRILL – 4 PLAYER HANDBALL REACTION INTO 4 PLAYER KICK REACTION
Players Required: 4/group
Balls Required: 1/group
Space Required: 5 x 5m + 15 x 15m
Drill Level: East to Moderate
Sequence 1 – 50% intent x 3mins x handball then kick
Sequence 2 – 70% intent x 2mins x handball then kick
Sequence 3 – 90% intent x 1min x handball then kick
Total Time – 16 – 18mins with plenty of skill specific actions performed at progressive intensity to prepare for the main session + plenty of game representational touches of the football unlike 1 player rolling the ball straight to you repeatedly in a line up.
Make your think players think early and think often because whoever thinks the best on game days wins – win training then win the game!
If players want to stretch or whatever then they must do it before the team warm up starts otherwise they miss out.
KICKING DEVELOPMENT
I posted this exact drill just last week so I’ll just link it here and all you need to know is that skill CANNOT and WILL NOT be developed or improved under fatigue – that’s I’ll say on the matter.
DRILL – 4v2 (+) DECISION MAKING
Players Required: 5 – 7/group
Balls Required: 1/group
Space Required: 20 x 20m
Drill Level: Moderate to Hard
DEFENSE
Apart from the odd zone kickout defense never gets trained and for something that has shown to win games, premierships even, this is just crazy talk.
Good defense can start offense but it doesn’t work the other way around so to give your team flexibility, being solid defensively as a team and individually is a must.
I will start training defense with a game called Trap the Player to teach the basic concept of pressing the ball carrier.
DRILL – TRAP THE PLAYER
Players Required: 6 – 8/group
Balls Required: 1/group
Space Required: 10m x 10m
Drill Level: Moderate to Hard
Level 1 – 5v3 in a 10x10m area
Level 2 – 4 v 2 in a 10x10m area
Level 3 – 5v3 in a 15x15m area
Level 4 – 4v2 in a 15x15m area
Even though a lot of coaches do games based activities at training unless it’s literally said, the focus on defense as opposed to offense is not even close which is a travesty as a) you need to train defense obviously, but also b) your offesne will get trained to higher level if you train against better defense.
Anyway I would purposefully say that this is a defensive based activity to get players in that specific frame of mind.
As mentioned in the video you simply play keepings off and the point of the activity is not to necessarily tackle or dispossess the player with the ball but rather trap a player with the ball in the corner using all or some of the defensive players.
I would give the defensive teams plenty of opportunities to strategise here using breaks between reps for them to do so and see who comes up with what before guiding them in the direction you want them to go if they don’t do so on their own.
My next post will be line specific drills for mids, defenders and forwards.
