Rugby: Ladder Pass

• Players start in the bottom right corner and on the command sprint as a group before doing 5 press ups.
• They advance as a defensive line, moving as fast as the slowest player.
• They never leave a player behind.
• They then side step (push as a defensive line) left to the next set of cones to do 5 sit ups before sprinting to do press ups. The group follow this routine until the end before the next group go.

• The players behind start running around the circle in a clockwise direction.
• When the coach shouts ATTACK, each player must get back to their partner - staying outside the circle and moving clockwise.
• They must get through their partners legs before getting to the center of the circle and steeling a ball, then carrying it back and passing it to their partner.
• The team/group that does not get a ball is LEFT OUT!
• Make sure that you have something for the players that are out of the main game to do.
• Have the players return their ball to the center of the circle, but reduce the number of ball in the center of the circle by one. So if there are 7 groups left, there should only be 6 balls. The players swap roles in their groups, so the previous runner is now static.
• Start the game again.
• Experiment with the number of balls in the center of the circle - to make the game harder or easier.

Break your players down into groups of 3.

In each area there should be 1 player with a tackle shield, 1 player with a tackle bag, and one with nothing.

Tell players to do the following.....

1. One player stands five meters from the start of the channel holding up a tackle bag.
2. One player stands at the opposite end of the channel with a tackle shield.
3. One player will be running and making contact at any given time.
4. The Player with nothing in hand runs to the player with the pad and drives them across the grid.
5. On reaching the end they swap roles and the other player runs across the grid to the tackle bag, hits hard, and makes a tackle at the end of the grid. Following the tackle the players swap roles the new player runs across to the player with the pad and the exercise continues.

This is a great warm-up for defensive and evasion sessions, or it might even be a warm-up that helps you reinforce coaching points made during a previous session. The best bit is that it's fun and relevant to all ages. If you're coaching tag rugby, change the warm-up exercise from contact to tags.

One team runs clockwise round the inside of the circle with the other team running anti-clockwise around the outside of the circle. The circle in this case is marked out using blue cones, but you can use whatever colour you like.

When the coach shouts 'Jailbreak' the players inside the inner circle try to 'escape' to outside the 10m x 10m square (yellow cones). The size of the square and distance from the circle is a suggestion, play with it a little and let us know your variations!

The inside team scores a point for each 'jailbreaker' - swap over. If you have an odd number of players give the defenders the extra man.