Coaching Soccer Drills: A Guide To Kicking
Sunday, June 27th, 2010
I’m not sure if you know this but young players have real trouble in kicking the ball by using a straight leg? In coaching soccer drills, this is the trickiest part as far as the players and the coaches are concerned. It calls for the player to keep complete balance and bend the leg at the knee in order to kick the ball. Both poise and power to kick the ball comes from below the knee.
In soccer practice, this is the starting position for almost all types of kicks. The acceleration of the foot from below the knee creates a powerful impact on the ball. This provides the players with a lot of power to act upon a range of kicks. However, what type of a kick would it be is determined by the precise contact of the foot on the ball.
For example; it could be knocked very high, driven low, turn left, or sway to the right.
The three essential passes in soccer are a side foot pass, instep drive, and the outside of the foot pass. We’ll now chat about them further.
The side foot pass: In teaching soccer, the simplest and the most commonly used pass is this. This is by and large applied to make short distance passes. Despite the fact that this is somewhat slow and predictable, it’s easy to learn and simple to execute. The ball makes a contact on the inside of the foot and ankle, and the foot is turned outward.
In coaching soccer drills, guide the players to keep their bodies totally relaxed throughout the entire movement. The most essential rule pertaining to various kicking action is this. Players should strengthen the ankle and the foot only at the time of making contact with the ball.
The moment players feel confident about carrying out this task well; their action should seem relaxed, simple, as well as smooth.
Outside of the foot pass: This is a little difficult to learn but is extremely important to master because it is accurate, quick, and cannot be predicted. A contact is made with the ball between the laces and outside edge of the foot with the foot extended and turned inward. The pass is then transformed into a quick throw for short distances by using the foot.
In the course of these coaching drills, players should keep their stance relaxed.
The Instep Drive: Both the versions of the instep drive namely, lofted version and the low driven version are applied to pass the ball to longer distances. Once mastered, this style can also be modified to make a “chip pass” or an “in swinging pass”. Because the approach of the instep drive is angled to some extent, the non kicking foot is positioned about 12 inches toward the side of and behind the ball.
The ball makes a contact with the laces and inside of the foot, which should be firm and extended.
So, go ahead and teach your players these basic kicking techniques with variations to make the ball do slightly different things.
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Andre Botelho is a recognized authority in youth soccer coaching and has already helped thousands of youth coaches to dramatically improve their coaching skills. Learn how to explode your players’ skills and make training fun by downloading your free ebook at: Soccer Training Drills.
