Filed under: Dave Clarke, Soccer Coaching, Soccer Fitness, Soccer News, Soccer Refereeing, Soccer Skills, Soccer Team Management, Soccer Training | Tags: AC Milan, brazil, hulk, Inter Milan, Jairzinho, lucas moura, Manchester United, pato, World Cup, youtube
Are you Jairzinho in disguise?
Brazil have a team that could win the next world cup not just because it’s on home soil but because they are beginning to put together a fabulous young team that will give Spain and Germany a run for their money.
They play a fast passing game 4-3-3 or 4-2-3-1 and at the top of the formation is a young striker called Lucas Moura – and finally it seems Brazil have a player to match the Brazil great Jairzinho.
Like Jairzinho, Lucas, aged 19, can play as a quick forward or winger and will hope to emulate his fellow countryman. Jairzinho was part of the legendary Brazil team that won the 1970 World Cup – he became one of only three players to have scored in every game his team played in the tournament.
Lucas has a low centre of gravity and runs with speed at defenders, dribbling past them or using skills to beat them. He has also been compared with Porto’s Hulk and AC Milan’s Alexandre Pato, but I like to think of him as Jairzinho.
He’s being chased by Inter Milan and Manchester United both of whom hope to prise him away from Sao Paulo but it’ll take a lot of Euros.
Lucas also wears Jairzinho’s number seven shirt for the national team.
Watch him in action in the clip below:
See also The English playmaker
See also The German defender
Filed under: Dave Clarke, Soccer Coaching, Soccer Fitness, Soccer News, Soccer Refereeing, Soccer Skills, Soccer Team Management, Soccer Training | Tags: AC Milan, jmoonwalk, Kevin prince-boateng, michael jackson, victory, win
Dave Clarke
Last season one of my players was the lead role in Billy Elliot: The Musical at our local theatre and he stood up and sang one of the songs from it. It made it a special occasion and one that everyone enjoyed. Hopefully this season someone will be able to do something similar.
I was reminded of this when I saw that AC Milan’s Kevin Prince-Boateng had kept a promise to do a Michael Jackson routine if his side won the Serie A title in Italy.
The Italian giants won their first league championship in seven years with a 0-0 draw at Roma last week, and they celebrated their title with a resounding 4-1 thrashing of Cagliari in front of their home fans on Saturday.
After the game Boateng, in his first season with the Rossoneri, stole the show by dressing up and performing Jackson’s dance moves, including the moonwalk.
what a great way to be part of a team experience and take winning in the spirit it should be taken – players showing their human side.
Filed under: Dave Clarke, Soccer Coaching, Soccer Fitness, Soccer News, Soccer Refereeing, Soccer Skills, Soccer Team Management, Soccer Training | Tags: AC Milan, ancelotti, autobiography, coaching books, ruud gullit, van basten
Chelsea manager Carlo Ancelotti has released a book called The Beautiful Games of an Ordinary Genius. It’s a good read and I can recommend it to any coach who wants entertainment and some coaching advice. In the book Ancelotti reveals that his predecessor Jose Mourinho left an archive of training exercises at Stamford Bridge from which Ancelotti says he has learned a lot.
Amazing that a coach of his experience still gets ideas from reading what others have written. Maybe I’ll introduce him to Better Soccer Coaching! But the point shows we all need information to help us be more creative with our own coaching.
“It is a sign of his considerable intelligence that he does not try to do everything himself,” writes Paolo Maldini, in the foreword of the book, and Ancelotti also explains what he learned from Arrigo Sacchi, Nils Liedholm and Sven-Goran Eriksson as well as the “teeny-weeny bit” he picked up from Fabio Capello.
He himself has been a very creative coach and has ideas to share with the rest of us. Ancelotti details with pride how he devised the Christmas Tree formation and responded to Berlusconi’s
He also reveals that he has kept meticulous files on matches, and as Sacchi’s assistant, he had to note down every single kick and run of every single Italy game.
Interstingly his one big remaining ambition is to coach an African team at the World Cup because, he explained at yesterday’s launch of the English edition of his book, “they have the physical and technical skills but do not yet produce teams worthy of their potential”. That’s what Ancelotti tends to do with the teams he takes over.
He was also a good goalscorer – watch the clip below when he played for AC Milan with Ruud Gullit and Marco van Basten
Filed under: Dave Clarke, Soccer Coaching, Soccer Fitness, Soccer News, Soccer Refereeing, Soccer Skills, Soccer Team Management, Soccer Training | Tags: 2005, AC Milan, Champions League, Gerrard, half-time, Liverpool, team talk
I was reminded of how crucial a half-time team talk is this week… when I didn’t give one. It was a friendly match and at half time I was collared by a parent trying to sort out his child’s registration in the team.
By the time I had sorted him out half time was over and we were back on the pitch. I had done nothing with my team. This resulted in an early goal for the opposition and me trying to reorganise and get messages to my players – essentially the half-time team talk.
The half-time period in a match is not just about refuelling and physical therapy. It’s a crucial time for the coach and team to gather their thoughts and prepare mentally for the challenges of the second half.
Looking back to half-time in the 2005 European Champions League final, with Liverpool 3-0 down to AC Milan, according to his Liverpool colleagues, captain Steven Gerrard was distraught and was ready to concede defeat. Afterwards, all he could remember of half-time was the manager getting his pen out, writing down the changes he wanted on the board and telling the team to try and get an early goal, as that could make the opposition nervous. But Gerrard said he just couldn’t concentrate – but that one thought stuck in his mind.
And they got that early goal and Liverpool went on to draw the game and win on penalties.
Because you only get a very short amount of time tell your players one or two things that can help influence the second half – just like Gerrard and the early goal, and is the only direct opportunity the coach will have to speak to all the players and to influence the second-half performance and result.
What you tell them will, of course, depend on the score and the coach’s perspective of the match. You must also take in other factors, such as the context of the game – eg is it a cup match in which the loser gets knocked out? Is it a league game and what are the league positions of the teams contesting the game? Is one team an overwhelming favourite to win the game? Is the team winning but not performing well?
These will help you decide what to say to your team, just make sure it’s positive. A coach I know once said: “Don’t get too carried away, this lot you’re playing aren’t very good.” His team were winning 4-0 at half time and went on to lose!
Here’s the hightlights from the 2005 European final
Filed under: Dave Clarke, Soccer Coaching, Soccer Fitness, Soccer News, Soccer Refereeing, Soccer Skills, Soccer Team Management | Tags: AC Milan, goals, how to score goals, inzaghi, score more goals, striker
A big part of being a striker is being in the right place at the right time, following up shots to put any rebounds in the back of the net. In a youth game spectacular goals are a rarity – but rebounds are plentiful.
When I think about players following up to put away rebounds I think of Pippo Inzaghi when he was in his pomp at AC Milan. He was always in the right place at the right time to pop the ball into the back of the net when it had been parried by a goalkeeper.
I like my strikers to follow any shots however feeble they are because young goalkeepers often push the ball away rather than risk catching it giving predatory strikers a second chance to score a goal.
So when you are coaching strikers make sure they keep on their toes once the shot has been sent goalwards and are ready for any rebounds coming their way.
Watch this clip of Inzaghi and see how he is always in the right place at the right time.
Filed under: Dave Clarke, Soccer Coaching, Soccer Fitness, Soccer Skills, Soccer Training | Tags: AC Milan, blindfold, juggling, Kaka, keepy uppy, Real Madrid
Here’s a great piece of fun you can have with your players – never mind pin the tail on the donkey, in this game you’ve got to see who can keep the ball in the air the longest (the most kick ups) while blindfolded.
Young and old can try this, it isn’t easy but you’ll have a lot of fun doing it. Keep a list of who can do the most and try to beat it for 10 minutes at the start of your training sessions. You’ll be amazed how many turn up early just to try to beat the record
Watch Kaka below doing it blindfold and copy his style!
Filed under: Dave Clarke, Soccer Coaching, Soccer Skills, Soccer Training | Tags: AC Milan, Barcelona, close down, defender, Italy, nesta, puyol, spain
One of the problems for defenders is that when they are closing down players a clever attacker can break away with the ball into goal scoring positions. The best defenders will stay with the attacker and get a block on the shot or a last second tackle to poke the ball away.
This situation is quite likely in youth soccer when young players lose concentration at the back and an attacker gets free with the ball. Rather than stand and watch the drama unfold they should be running to get back and cover the attacking player.
There will always be opportunities for a defender to recover when they have made a mistake or the attacker has worked their way free from the covering defence.
As coach you should be encouraging your players never to give up when they have lost the ball and work hard to win it back and stop the opposition scoring.
Check out the clips below of two of the world’s best attackers making last ditch tackles and blocks to save their team losing a goal – Alessandro Nesta of Italy and Carles Puyol of Spain show how giving up just isn’t in their vocabulary.
Soccer drill to coach the block tackle
Filed under: Dave Clarke, Soccer Coaching, Soccer Skills, Soccer Training | Tags: AC Milan, Champions League, goals, Marseille, passing, Ronaldinho, skills, space
Ronaldinho gave a timely reminder to the Brazil coach Dunga that he is back on form. In the recent Champions league match playing for AC Milan against Olympic Marseille.
There’s been a lot written about how poor Ronaldinho’s form has been over the last couple of seasons but seeing that game is a pretty mouthwatering preview of what we can expect in the World Cup, if he gets picked by his international coach, but if he keeps this form up I can’t see him being left out.
How his team mates didn’t score from some of the passes he made I don’t know. What I lke is the way he creates space by skillful turns and skillful passes. When I write about passing the ball into space for players to run on to it is sometimes hard to get the point across, Ronaldinho does it for me in this game.
Show your players how Ronaldinho uses skill to create space for himself and then he plays the ball cleverly into space for players to run on to rather than to the player. He will often target an area to pass into where there are no players but where one of his team mates can be first to the ball.
It’s a masterclass in how a player can make a team play exciting attacking soccer. Watch this clip of him in the game:
Filed under: Dave Clarke, Soccer Coaching, Soccer News, Soccer Skills | Tags: AC Milan, best defenders, defender, famous number 3 shirt, paolo maldini, raul
The official website of AC Milan has run a simple tribute to one of the best defenders I have had the good fortune to see in my lifetime. The message simply reads – 25 SEASONS. 900 GAMES. ALWAYS AND ONLY MILAN. GRAZIE PAOLO.
His is a career to savour. Aged 41 he wore the number 3 shirt for the last time at the weekend. He first pulled it on in 1985 25 seasons ago when aged 16 he made his debut in the Italian Serie A against Udinese.
He is the son of Cesare Maldini, a former European cup winner with Milan who captained the club and went on to manage Italy.
It is a phenomenal career to have played so long at the top – over 1,000 professional games for Milan and Italy, only Milan and Italy since the age of 10. He has won five European Cup medals and seven Serie A titles along the way probably a career record that will never be matched. Not even Real Madrid’s Raül can think about matching that.
He has done this at one of the world’s best clubs, the best left back for all that time. Amazing. He was skilful and powerful, a master of his art.
But the Maldini line and links with AC Milan are not yet broken. Milan plans to retire his number 3 shirt, but it will be bequeathed to one of his sons if one makes the club’s senior side. The third generation of Milan’s Maldini dynasty is Paolo’s 13 year old son Christian who plays for the Milan youth team.
We may yet get the chance to watch another Maldini grace the San Siro for years to come.
Here are two clips to watch, one of the great Paolo Maldini in action, and one of his youngest son Daniel dispossessing Clarence Seedorf at the Champions League celebrations in 2007.
Filed under: Dave Clarke, Soccer Coaching, Soccer Skills | Tags: AC Milan, defence splitting pass, Kaka
A pass can split a defence in two – even at youth level the killer pass is the through ball that makes a goal scoring chance for your attackers.
It’s the ball you are always looking for whether you are playing in the top leagues or the bottom leagues, the ball that splits the defence is the one that brings you goals.
If you watch an expert like Kaka do it, then maybe you can get your players to copy it, It isn’t easy and nine times out of ten it gets cleared away. But when it works, boy does it work.
Watch Kaka’s guide to passing and see him hitting defence splitting passes…
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