Session 1: Individual 1vs1 Play & Ball Skills

Warm-Up (8-12 minutes)

• Less focus on stretches, more emphasis on touches on the ball and getting warm.
• Introduce technical moves and ball mastery that will be useful for the session ahead. For example, using a warm-up with stepovers, body feints, Cruyff turns and Roulettes.
• Keep it basic, and introduce a new coaching point every 2-3 minutes. 
• This is your time to get the kids’ attention for the rest of the 90 minutes, so make it fun, make it energetic, and keep it short in nature.

Drill 1 / Unopposed Practice (18-25 minutes)

Repetition-based practice or drill to help players learn a move, technique, or movement in its fundamental form.

For Example, practising ball skills such as stepovers, body feints, roulettes, and finishing with a shot or a pass into a target. These drills don’t need to relate to any of the four pillars, but should be solely focused on developing the individual skill of the player.

Teach them the set-up for the technique, where on the pitch to use it, when to use it, and why they are using it.

These are the basis of your coaching points, as shown below in the example, Cruyff Turn:

• Where? Down the wing, final third, or in the midfield. Pretty much anywhere.
• When? When you don’t have a passing option available.
• Why? To bait opposition into lunging in, and to change the angle of the pass to create an available pass and retain possession.

This is the level of detail we want to be striving for when breaking down each skill or technique we are teaching our players.

Drill 2 / Opposed Practice (30 Minutes)

Now it’s time to take what they have learned and put it into practice in a more realistic situation. The live opposition is trying to win the ball from them. This is the time for you to observe and see if they have fully grasped what you have taught them, or if you need to polish the move now that they are doing it under pressure.

These drills should focus on 1vs1 play and give the player live opposition to try and beat with the moves they learned previously.

1vs1s: As the name suggests, set up a 1vs1 environment and help them recreate the success of the unopposed drill in a more competitive setting. Make it fun, make it competitive, and make sure they regularly switch defending, attacking, and opposition to keep it fresh and engaging.

Progression: To progress from this section, you can introduce a combined variant of practice.

Combined Practice: Drill starts in a 1vs1 situation before developing into an overloaded practice. Great for introducing transitions, such as defence wins the ball, and an extra player joins for a quick counter-attack.

Drill 3 / Match-Scenario (20 – 30 minutes)

Matches, small-sided games, or attack vs defence-based waves to create the match setting. This is not only the ‘reward’ for the players for putting in a good shift in the session and giving them a fun end to the session, but also a chance for you to sit back and see if they have listened and learned.

Condition the game in a way that creates opportunities for them to do what they have learned in the session…if you have trained Cruyff Turn all session, don’t limit them to 3-touches, otherwise you kill any chance for them to do it. Instead, make it so that they can only score after all defenders have touched the ball, or that a goal scored, including a Cruyff Turn in the build-up, counts as three goals.

Debrief (5 minutes)

This is your final chance to make sure the players have taken something away from the session. Bring the players in and recap through your session from start to finish, asking a few questions and having them give you the answers to reinforce what they have learned. Think back to your When, Where, Whys in the unopposed drill for a good place to start.