UEFA B

Jurgen Klopp enjoyed tremendous success at Borussia Dortmund with his high profile tactics of Gegenpressing or as Jurgen Klinsmann called it “immediate ball recovery". So what is it and how can grassroots football coaches use it?

On a UEFA football coaching course from a couple of years ago, Alan Walker the then lead Tutor of Kent Football Association, coached a functional session on combination play to finish.

Counter attacking is a very effective attacking tactic. Once the ball is won, the counter attack has to be quick  to advance down the pitch and attack the opposition, whilst the opposition team still have players going forward and who are then caught out of position and briefly the wrong side of the ball and out of the play.

A fast moving, exciting pass and move football coaching game. There are two teams. One team defends the three mini goals and one team defends the central triangle goal. Play lots of games and reverse the roles of the teams.

This is a phase of play practice to work on attack v defence with a focus on coaching forwards to play in the hole between the defence and midfield.

This is a rotating game designed to help midfield players combine with their strikers in the attacking third. The midfield have to work together for an agreed number of passes, before they can break out and look to combine with and support their forward and try and score. If the opposition win it, they can immediately break out and counter attack by playing through their midfield.

Statistically, a single cross has on average a greater goal threat than does a single final third pass. Crosses are a high risk, high reward skill compared to a ground based passing strategy that is low risk, but also low reward for each individual pass.