3d skills while entering the d

Jon RoyceCoach, England

There are a number of factors here that are important. The first is that the posture of the player in possession needs to be good with the knees bent and the hands at the level of the knee caps: I suggest this will be a major issue and a start point.

Bent knees and hands well in front of the body will mean that the vision of the player is good allowing them to see an opportunity to lift the ball: once again, I suggest they probably don`t see or recognise the cues that will lead to the opportunity.

At a low level the mere act of lifting can cause chaos or a badly timed tackle but increasingly defenders are becoming adept at picking the ball off in the air.

To force a good opponent to lay a flat stick in the tackle (the very reason to lift the ball) you will need to force the defender to reach sideways. This requires the dribbler to move the ball laterally. This means the defender must recognise the space to be attacked.

Before the ball is moved laterally the defender must be "stood up" and forced to adopt a static tackling position, the way to create this opportunity is to run at and "freeze" the opponent. The lateral movement will iniate a reach with feet anchored to the ground a low stick and an opportunity to lift the ball into the space behind the defender.

All this requires planning. Planning is carried out before the ball is received: the plan is then executed without hesitation. What would you expect the success rate to be? What would the players expect the success rate to be? They probably think it should work almost all the time. No, this is high risk,high reward.

A good drill to practice this is to have five defenders against five attackers. The defenders must defend with their feet on the circle edge (they cannot either retreat or close down opponents) the five attackers must stay outside the circle until the ball enters the shooting circle. The result should be sharp passing round the circle, an isolated defender. A lateral move and lift. At this point everyone enters the circle and the fun begins!

This should help recognition of the build up to an opportunity as well as a technical challenge.