Training Program Book 2 Individual Soccer Training PDF

It is extremely important that young players take the opportunity to practice their technical skills and improve their mobility when not practicing with their team.

As a young player in my native Scotland I practiced individually whenever and wherever I could because I realized that the corner stone of my soccer playing ability lay in the technical and athletic areas of my game.

In Dundee where I was born the streets and tenement entrances were my training areas and although there were several parks with grass fields to practice on the kids appeared to prefer to play soccer in the streets.

It must be said that at that time there were few people in our neighborhood that owned a car and the busses and tramcars were routed through the busy main roads making it less dangerous to play soccer in the side streets.

Another thing that attracted us to the side streets were the gaslights that were lit by the local lamplighter in Dundee.

He was called a Leary, and as kids we would wait for him to light our chosen playing area on dark winter nights.

Playing under gaslights might not have been the best thing for our eyesight but it kept us playing soccer and that kept us interested and warm on the cold Scottish winter nights.

Here in America it would be suicidal to attempt to play soccer in streets that are almost always busy with traffic and there are enough floodlit parks, school gymnasiums and playgrounds to accommodate any parties interested in playing a game or practicing their soccer skills.

Also, whereas I was more comfortable playing in the streets, American players even with the schoolyard, garage and gymnasium availability appear to be more comfortable playing in the parks. With this in mind I will combine a larger amount of practices for open spaces like half a soccer field with a few for tight spaces such as garages, gymnasiums or back yards.

My intentions in designing this program are not aimed at contradicting any of the methods used by personal team coaches because a huge part of a player’s soccer education is developed in the playing of games whether they be full scale tournament games 4 or conditioned practice games.

What I intend is to give the players a method of individual training that will allow them to polish their technical skills while making them fitter, faster and more explosive.

Like everyone who coaches soccer most of my drills have come from personal experiences either in doing the drill as a player or in learning about the drill from a coaching buddy while discussing methods of training.

Jimmy Ryan who coached the Man Utd reserve team gave me the information on the Manchester United run and the Southampton and Everton runs came from the personal experience of playing in their programs and coaching in the Everton program.

Many of the other training runs with and without the ball come from coaches attempts to give their players an inside route to success by providing them with an advantage over their opponents.

Some of them I’ve invented myself or I’ve tinkered with someone else’s ideas to get the desired effect from their drills.

I say this openly so that people will understand that there are no secrets in soccer coaching and coaches should be encouraged to spread their knowledge of this great game to other coaches.