Hockey Session (Under 14s): 3D Elimination Skills clinic (Start Time: 2018-02-18 09:00:00)

3D Skill Clinic (20 mins)

Essence:

Introduction to a range of 3D skills

Structure:

Players find a space and have a ball each (they can work in pairs if they like where 1 is the semi active defender putting a flat stick down for the attacker to lift over).

The Coach shows the skill and then lets players practice the skill, then calls in players again and shows the next skill.

Put White barriers/other obstacles out on the pitch for players to practice lifting over

Skills:

1 - Forehand & Backhand lift

- Get the ball rolling the opposite way that you want to lift the ball, this allows the ball to roll up the stick making the lift easier and more controlled

- As Ball is rolling the players weight goes to their right leg (forehand lift) or left leg (backhand lift) to allow them to get underneath the ball

- As the ball makes contact with stick the player slowly lifts up to bring the ball off the ground

2 - Double tap

- As above, but ask player to lift the ball, then tap it again whilst ball is in the air - this ensures the ball is under control when they lift it and not going out of their reach

- This can be done forehand lift with forehand tap, or swapped round so forehand lift and backhand tap and vice versa

3 - Squeeze skill

- Player hits ball into ground and use the bouncy-ness of the pitch to spring the ball into the air

- Ensure player hits hard into the ground and snaps wrist back after contact to ensure they don't trap the ball into the ground

- Players hands need to drop closer to the ground than normal to ensure the ball comes back up into the air and doesn't spurt too far off away from the player, meaning they lose control of the ball.

- Add in a 2nd touch like previous skill whilst the ball is in the air

Variations:

+ Players perform the skills whilst on the move rather than stationary

+ Players can work in pairs - 1 as a passive defender who puts flat stick down to allow attacker to lift over their stick

Gameplay (40 mins)

Introduce players to the diagram before and during the games

Pitch is split into 8 sections (1 the most dangerous and 8 the least).

Therefore when defending we must work hard to defend the most dangerous areas by jumping back into position straight away when we lose the ball (defend centre of the pitch), and always look to clear/pass the ball to a less dangerous area when we win it in defensive areas.

The flip side is when we have the ball we always want to get the ball to a more attacking zone - ideally zone 1, but not usually with only 1 pass unless there is a safe pass to zone 1. It will usually take 5 plus passes to move the defence out wide, to then create space in the more dangerous zones.

In particular can we take free hits quickly to upgrade our zone very easily.

+ Award teams points for entering certain zones

Place cones/Lines down to mark the zones on the pitch initially if this helps the players.