Defending is an essential part of football, so as a coach, it’s our duty to make sure players know how to properly defend.

Good defending takes strong discipline and a committed attitude. It takes time and patience to develop these positive qualities. Too often, defenders choose to take the easy way out, over-committing to 1 v 1 challenges.

In this video you’ll learn the three main parts to defending in a 1v1 situation.

1- ℂ𝕝𝕠𝕤𝕖 𝕋𝕙𝕖 𝔾𝕒𝕡

Close down the space between you and your opponent as fast as possible.  Make your opponent “feel” your pressure quickly without over-committing to the ball.

2- 𝔻𝕖𝕝𝕒𝕪 | 𝔹𝕖 ℙ𝕒𝕥𝕚𝕖𝕟𝕥

Once you get close enough to the attacking player, you’ll force him/her to look down – to look only at the ball. This distance will vary depending upon the quality of the attacking player. Once the attacking player’s head goes down, his/her ability to look around, evaluate game pictures and make tactical decisions becomes limited. Be patient and delay, this will give them the impression that they have time to do whatever they want to do.

3- 𝔸𝕔𝕥

Once you realize that the attacker’s main focus is the ball, pick and choose when to act without over committing.

Catch them by surprise by poking the ball away and/or taking it from him/her.

Share this podcast to help your teammates and friends defend better, and don’t forget to visit my website for more. l2cb.com

This episode is also available as a blog post: http://l2cb.com/2021/08/20/the-art-of-defending-in-soccer/

CHOICE?

Yes! Choice is an illusion. We all think we have an infinite amount of choices and that is why we don’t succeed often.

Every goal we set for ourselves and family comes with a price, and we often pay this price with the choices we make. Obviously, bad choices result in failure, and good choices often result in success.

This is not a cheap price to pay. This is more expensive than you could imagine.

Developing the habit of making “good” or “better” choices is a mental skill.

This is why learning to be mentally tough is one of the greatest assets to become a better choice maker.

The beauty of working with L2CB is that you get to learn how to be a better choice maker with a soccer ball.

This episode is also available as a blog post: http://l2cb.com/2020/10/27/choice-is-an-illusion/

Confidence is defined by most psychotherapists as the feeling, belief or trust in one’s self and one’s ability, quality or judgement to succeed at any particular moment.

We’ve all seen it, a player who is immensely talented with fantastic ability, yet their confidence seems to have all but disappeared. It can look like they are a totally different player who is even struggling to run!

Some players can go through long periods of playing where they just seem to be flying high, with confidence in abundance. Others can go through periods of months on end, terrified of making another mistake.

Lacking confidence is one of the most worrying aspects of the game for a player and, unfortunately, a drop in confidence can come at any time. A player might lose confidence for various reasons:

Once a player loses their confidence, even the most simple of technical skills can be difficult to perform.

Alternatively, a confident player feels like he can achieve anything within their true potential.

So, how do we develop and maintain confidence? Is it something that we, as coaches and players, can have more control over?

This episode is also available as a blog post: http://l2cb.com/2021/09/09/what-does-a-confident-soccer-player-look-like/

This episode features Coach B giving tips on how to improve your balance, coordination, and agility on your own.

Visit L2CB.COM for more!

This episode is also available as a blog post. Check out l2cb.com for more!