FA Level 1

PROGRESSION 2

FA LEVEL 1 COACHING – MOVES IN TWOS WITH PROGRESSIONS

I recently oversaw a summer football camp in Somerset. There were a group of twenty four 10 and 11 year olds, including boys and girls. The players were of very mixed abilities. Some were very good players, whilst a number had very little experience. All of them had a lot of energy and enthusiasm.

The Football Association Level 1 course is the first rung in the football coach education ladder. It is a very good introduction for football coaches who have no or little experience of coaching, but want to develop and improve as coaches. The main focus of the course is to provide football coaches with an understanding of how to plan football coaching sessions and to make them safe, organised and fun.

That’s it then. England’s World Cup is over. The inquests and rumours have started. There is no doubt that England’s overall performance during the World Cup was very, very poor.

We continue to look at ways in which we can coach players to improve their techniques. Dribbling is one of the hardest techniques to master. It requires and understanding of when and where to dribble. Players need to be positive and brave, as the easy option is always to pass to a team mate, rather than take a chance. If the dribble goes wrong, too often the player attempting the dribble is blamed for being too greedy or not passing. As football coaches, we need to provide a positive environment where players are encouraged to dribble. But, we also need to ensure players have a good understanding of the techniques involved in dribbling and to have lots of opportunities to practice these basic techniques. So that when they are in a position to dribble in a game situation and they have all the basic technical tools to succeed.

Good players play with their heads up. They are aware of where the space is on the pitch, where their players are, where the opposition are. They know what they want to do next with the ball, they have pictures in their heads. They play one, sometimes two or three steps ahead of everyone else.

Being able to master basic football techniques is the foundation for improving players.