Football/Soccer Session (Moderate): U12 Girls - Defending as a unit (Pressure, Cover and Balance)

Warm up (15 mins)

Organization:

- As much space as needed, each player with a ball.

Instructions:

- Before the start of session inividual juggling arrival activity

- Ball mastery warmup, focusing on dribbling using different parts of the foot, changing speed, direction, and allowing the players to incorporate different skills and movements with their dribbling

- Challenge the players with added pressure of time or # of touches

- Incorporate tag games in to warm up E.g. Freeze tag, hospital tag

Coaching Points:

- Preparing ourselves physically and mentally for the session

- What are the different areas of the foot we would use and why?

- Head up as we are looking for open space, instead of going in a circle or a line can we change our direction and try and cover as much of the pitch as possible.

- Close control, one step in between every touch, how is our body position? Position of our foot?

- When taking bigger touches and exploding into space, what changes with our body position?

- Turning to find new space, identifying where the space is and moving into it.

3v3's (20 mins)

Organization:

- 3v3 to goal

Instructions:

Coaching Points:

- Third defensive principle of balance

- Distance between second and third defender

- What do we want to deny? Where? Why? How?

- Body shape

- When to tackle vs when to jockey

- How are we tackling

- Where do we want to force the play?

- As the ball moves how do we switch off from pressure to cover or cover into pressure?

- When to delay vs when to move in for the ball