Box Defending In Futsal – Week 19 At Manor CE Academy
With the start of a new half term we decided it was about time we really got down to specific Futsal drills and coaching. Inspired by watching a lot of the UEFA Futsal tournament, the coaches decided that tonight’s session would be about about box defending.
This is the idea where you have 2 banks of 2 players when defending, with the main aim to stop the ball being played between the lines and into the middle of the court. The ball is allowed to go outside and down the lines but the ball through the middle is closed off as soon as possible.
Click here to see more images from tonight’s session.
We started working with the girls on passing the ball around a square, into the corners to get them to realise where the space in Futsal usually is. At first, the passes were quite short and had little power, but after some observations and conversation they started to make the longest pass they could. We then moved on the defending and again at first, the girls started by chasing the ball all over the court and forgetting the ‘box’ idea. We simplified the task by asking the attackers to make sure the ball travelled around the outside of the defenders and visited each corner. The girls got better as the session went on but there is still plenty to do.
With the boys we played on a three-quarter court, and had attack Vs defence, where the defenders if they won the ball only had to clear it past the opposition’s goal. Each team had 10 goes at trying to score as many goals as possible, and Coach Chris always played for the attackers creating a 6v5 overload. The defenders were asked to play the ‘box’ and special mention goes to Joel who was brilliant at this, he was patient and did not dive in or chase the ball but waited until the right time to try to win it. Best defending to date.
Both sets of players found the new tactics hard work but very enjoyable. It was something new to everyone. The coaches were very impressed by everyone’s work rate and really enjoyed coaching tonight’s session.
Final mention goes to Gavin Forster, a good friend of Coaches Chris and Suzy, who is a professional photographer from Newcastle. As he was in the area, he kindly came down tonight and took some photos that we will be using for some new flyers and posters that are currently being designed. Gavin is available for all types of photography and you can see his work here:
