Sandringham Soccer Club and Director of Coaching Eugene Lawrenz are committed to providing coaches with as much guidance and assistance as possible, and so we have put together the content on this page to help coaches. You will find various downloads and links, as well as information on workshops, courses and programs.
Eugene is also available to visit your training sessions and/or matches on any night/day except Mondays. Ideally you will still run the session while Eugene will provides advice and assists, however he can also run the session if desired.
If you would like to have Eugene attend one of your training sessions or if you just want some ideas or advice, email Eugene
To find information on available coaching courses, including dates and locations, please follow the link below. Sandringham SC is a strong believer and supporter of coach education and development and will gladly pay for club coaches to undertake accredited coaching courses.
http://www.footballaustralia.com.au/getinvolved/coaching/communitycourses
Those already familiar with the National Curriculum may find this link to FFA Practice Content useful for some more training ideas. It has many variations for passing practices, positioning games and game training suitable for junior players aged U12 and up.
http://www.sportingpulse.com/get_file.cgi?id=2217250
Great articles with videos on Barcelona academy teams, how they play, and the culture of the club at this level including parent behaviour.
http://theworldgame.sbs.com.au/craig-foster/blog/1122269/Junior-lessons-from-Barca-Part-1 http://theworldgame.sbs.com.au/craig-foster/blog/1122271/Junior-lessons-from-Barca-Part-2
But not only Barcelona, here is an example of a Greek junior side, proving that good football is a worldwide concept.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fVqGbWjoidM
And at senior level you will find countless examples of Spain, Barcelona, Arsenal, Argentina, Brazil, Holland, Germany etc, and here is just one: look for high technical quality, special players, quality positioning play, strong desire to keep possession under pressure no matter what, playing out of defence and using goalkeeper, and always creating diagonal angles/diamonds/triangles - you will see all the same things with the Barca juniors and Greek juniors (relative to their age), but the intention is what matters, because in all of the videos players end up in risky situations, but instead of booting it away they look for solutions because the coaches and players all believe in the philosophy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oag_bzjmnII
A good example of courage, the risks involved but the reasons why teams like this persist.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2011/dec/12/victor-valdes-barcelona-real-madrid
What about fitness? Don't they need to be fit? Yes, but what matters is how to get fit.
http://au.fourfourtwo.com/features/7326,Raymond%20Verheijen.aspx
So the next question becomes how? How to get our players to play like this? The answer is game based training. Junior players to work on playing out, effective possession, combination play etc in the actual situations from the weekend game recreated in training. Sub-junior players to work on technique such as first touch, passing, running with the ball and 1v1 in more simple game scenarios so the technique is linked to solving problems on a basic level. For both, you can freeze any of the videos and highlight a particular area of the pitch to see a 3v2, 4v2, 5v3, 4v4, 6v6 etc. That is how to recreate game based situations. Then just add some rule and objectives to the game. Here is a good article explaining the benefits of free play with no pressure, as well as good stats on SSG creating opportunities to solve various problems while developing technique.
http://www.soccercoachinginternational.com/newsletter/sci82/freearticlePDF.pdf
See the following link for a good explanation on why game training is the most effective way of getting realistic transfer of practice at training into matches. The author Ron Smith has been a professional coach his whole life, has worked with the Socceroos for a long time, and is one of my mentors. Have a read when you can.
http://www.thefootballcentre.com.au/blog/view/transfer-of-training
Stuck for ideas? Here are 64 of them! Consider what is suitable for your players, and what fits within your session topic. But most of these examples are really good and you can see how they can easily be modified and applied to work on so many different skills and concepts.
http://www.cgsaclub.com/Portals/1275/docs/Director%20of%20Coaching/64%20Small%20Sided%20Games.pdf
Sandringham Soccer Club is committed to providing goalkeepers with a specialised development program to compliment the training goalkeepers will have with their teams. This program aims to have a position specific focus while also considering the important part goalkeepers play in modern football (which is very relevant to the club’s new playing philosophy), including their involvement in playing out of defence, supporting the defence in possession, and methods of distribution. At the same time, modern training methods and exercises will be a focus to ensure fun, maximum participation and game relevance to all parts of the training sessions.
The program has been designed by Director of Coaching Eugene Lawrenz.
For more information please email coaching@sandringhamsoccerclub.org.au
Miniroos and Team Visits Arrangements can be made for Goalkeeper training in your normal team training time. This will be coordinated by team coaches on request to work with their goalkeepers and back 4 (and strikers to make it game based), either separate to other players or at same time as the team coach is working with them. Please contact Director of Coaching Eugene Lawrenz to arrange a team visit on one of these nights coaching@sandringhamsoccerclub.org.au