Hockey Session (Senior): Pressing
Profile Summary
| Name: | Robert Dent |
|---|---|
| City: | Cheltenham |
| Country: | United Kingdom |
| Membership: | Adult Member |
| Sport: | Hockey |
Description
Aim of these exercises is to practice pressing the attacking team in a variety of ways.
In a press, it's important to make sure everyone is doing their jobs and the team is holding the correct shape/structure.
Typically, each playing line should follow the below roles:
Strikers/attacking: responsible for denying the direct pass from opposition defenders straight in to the middle of the pitch/hotline. Responsible for marking the opposition back line - either back 3 or 4 depending on their formation. Some oppositions will rotate from a 4 to a 3 in the back line. IN my opinion, if the opposition promote their right half/back up the pitch, then the pressing teams left striker should follow to prevent their being an overload against us in midfield. Other coaches prefer the free man to pick this player up. Pros and cons of both - so find which one works best for your team.
Midfield: Typically I prefer these to be man to man marking the opposition midfield as typically this denies an easy pass in to the midfield and forces the opposition wide. Other ways is midfield to hold in a zone / flat line across the pitch and 'pocket press' the opponents as soon as they receive the ball in midfield. If this is the case, it's important to cut off any easy pass back to the defender that passed them the ball as this will open up a big overload on the help side if the ball can escape.
Defence: Typically when the ball is in the opposition half, most teams will play a zonal press where each defender is responsible for their zone and don't follow attackers across the pitch. This needs a lot of communication and trust with fellow defenders. If you have a back 4, then one of these defenders will be a free man and should track the hotline, working laterally across the pitch and be able to intercept any crash ball attempts. Once the ball gets closer to the goal, normally around the final third of the pitch, then teams will convert in to a man to man press where each player will be responsible for marking one player and following them around - ideally touch tight, shoulder to shoulder with the aim of denying them the ball.
Different teams press in different ways, so feel free to mix up. Some teams like pressing in to the opposition left half. Other teams prefer pocket pressing in to midfield. The choice is yours.
See the guidance at the top of this page to understand why you are not seeing interactive Hockey images.
See the guidance at the top of this page to understand why you are not seeing interactive Hockey images.
Pressing 2
Half pitch game (or bigger if you have the space).
Orange Team is looking to outlet the ball and score a point for each time they get the ball into each box on the half way line.
Blue team is pressing and trying to deny the orange team from reaching the boxes. If/when the blue team win the ball, they earn the right to attack the goal and score a goal.
Ideally set the teams up so you have a your defensive unit outwitting with midfield, and then your attacking players pressing.
To maintain intensity have a points system and the losing team with the fewest points at the end does a punishment.
See the guidance at the top of this page to understand why you are not seeing interactive Hockey images.
Half court Press
2 Teams. Either even numbers or attacking overload.
Orange team attacking the goal.
Blue team pressing - but focusing on a half court press.
Blue Team: allow the orange team to pass the ball outside of the half. As soon as the ball crosses the half way line, that's the trigger to spring the press.
This press is not passive, everyone should be doing their job and holding their zones. Lots of communication in order to keep tracking players movements from the orange team.
Variation:
Tell the blue team they are winning by 1 goal, and the orange team is losing by 1 goal. See how the players adapt and change their style of hockey. Put a time limit of 3 minutes. Works well to get both teams playing under pressure in the final minutes of a game. Punishment for the losing team at the end.
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Pressing 1
3 Teams of even numbers.
Aim:
2 teams working together to keep possession (blue and orange). The pink team is pressing and trying to win the ball.
Can make this competitive by timing each team and how long they take to win the ball.
If Pink don't work together and end up chasing the ball then the press won't be effective and they will be running in circle. They need to communicate and work out an area of the pitch to press the ball in to.