Produce a Written Soccer Football Training plan.
19th June 2011

A well-produced training plan is essential for the success of any session, and is as important as having equipment such as cones and bibs. Creating a plan does take a bit of effort and time to put together, though the job of producing a plan does get quicker and easier with experience.

You must have a written plan for each session you deliver. This might appear to be unnecessary to most coaches, though having a plan in writing has many benefits which makes having no plan at all unthinkable.

A written plan helps you focus your mind on giving your players a properly structured and thought out session. By writing down how your session will be put together, you will ensure the elements of your session will be joined together and make sense, developing a specific technique or phase as the session develops. 

The sad truth is that very few coaches take the time to write out a plan. A coach spends time considering what they will do in their session but does not use that time to produce a proper written plan.  

A coach should have a structure for training planned out, though the plan should not be too rigid, allowing for things that are picked up during recent matches to be worked on, though the plan should be followed as closely as possible. 

When producing a plane the drills need to be demanding on the players, though equally there must be an element of fun. If the drills are too easy or too difficult to understand the players quickly lose interest and switch off.  

Each training session should contain the following elements,

• Warm-up

• Drills

• Match practice

• Warm-down

Further Reading:

• Coaching Young Children

• Never Criticize team mates

• Why do children play football?

• The Youth Football Coach