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Hello coaches. Welcome back. Coach KW here with another video for you. Sorry it's been a little bit, but it is the meat of the season for me right now
between uh two club players and coaching. Uh it's a 7 day a week affair and uh well time is at a premium. But I appreciate all the likes, shares, and
subscribers. We've been climbing uh really fantastically since the last video, which I love. And uh you've been sharing it with lots and lots of your fellow coaches. And that's really what
I'm here for is to help anybody who might need some of this information. So, if you've got a buddy or a teammate, or uh you know, members on your team, your
town, your club that could use us, share away. Uh we're all welcome here. What I'm going to do in this video set is actually going to be a three-part set
because I tried to record it in one big one. It was just too long. I tried to record myself actually coaching with audio on the field of me coaching,
playing out of the back with 99. had some audio issues and so it took me a little bit to figure out what to do with the video. Uh, but I figured it out and
I think what we're going to do here is I'm going to break this up into three separate videos. When I like to coach playing out of the back, I like to coach
it and I relate it to my players based on how many players the other team is pressing up against the goal line. So, with most of the common formations in
99, that means that either teams are going to be pressing with one, two, or three players. And when I coach with my teams, we actually talk about not only
what we do in each of those situations, but what the formations are behind that pressing player because it's important for your team to understand where the strengths and weaknesses are based on
what we are doing and the other team are doing so that we can exploit that difference. So, since we're going to be dealing with this first video pressing
with one, the most common formations that we see uh in 99 against me is this one here is the 431 where one striker, three midfielders, and a back four of
some sort. That's the most common. Now, sometimes we'll see the formation that I like to play, which is the 341, or normally it's a 4-31. I have a whole
video on all the different formations, including some pretty avancuard ones that are out there. Uh, I'll put a link in the description here and such. You can go back and watch that one. But it's
really important, I think, for your teams to understand what other teams are doing. I actually have a video way back in 7v7 talking about uh the three things
your team should really understand. And one of them was at 7v7 I was having my third and fourth graders figure out what the formation we were playing against
within the first five minutes of the game. And trust me, they can do it. 99 it's a little harder because there are more variations. It's a bigger field,
more moving parts. But you'll see in the video I will talk about what we're playing against and then what that means for my team when we do the video. So I
hope you enjoy this. I hope that you like the new layout I'm using for this video uh in the in the in the demonstration section. I worked kind of
hard to find a new piece of software to be able to make this three grid zone so you can see the diagram plus the video and me speaking. So if it works well,
I'd love to hear about it in the comments just because it took a lot of effort. I had to find a different piece of software. It actually took me some
time to set the whole thing up. So if you find it useful, I'd love to know because then I could perhaps use it in some other videos. Let's go take a look
at my team pressing with one in this first video.
Okay, so let's try this out. So, this is a little bit complicated here as you can see, but what I've got going here is uh my ugly face in one corner. Obviously,
I'm going to have some graphics in the bottom right corner that's going to go along with the video that's going up at the top. So, we're playing out of
playing out uh we're working on playing out of the back here 9v9. Uh I have uh approximately nine or 10 of my players here. So, what you see in the far end of
the field is another practice going on.
And when I play the videos, you hear some of the, you know, field noise as well. And sometimes I'll refer to that.
But when we coach 99 and we're coaching playing out of the back, one of the things we feel it's really important for our kids is to start to become a little
bit more tactically aware. We do this even at 77 where we challenge the kids to try and figure out what formation the other team is playing. And then 77 it's
a little bit easier because there's less players. There's a few fewer options and it tends to be a little bit more apparent right off the bat. Whereas 99
bigger field it's a little bit more flexible. It can be more difficult. But we do talk about it as a team all the time. So when we do playing out of the
back we first refer to what it is we might be seeing. So we always start with the number of players that are pressing.
So in these first uh four or five examples we're pressing with one. And when we're pressed with one, we then look at what might be behind them to say
what are the common formations we might see in a game. So in this case, most of the time when teams are pressing with one, we see the 431. Uh sometimes we see
the 341, which is the formation we play, but far less often than the 4-31. And we do talk about that, but since this is what we see played against us most
often, we start with there. So you can see on the diagram on the right, you can see the red team is set up in that 4-31.
the players that are not physically there. The back four are in that brownish color as well as that nine that doesn't exist right now. Um he's in a
light blue as you can see, blue gray. So the blue players are the team with the ball. The red players are the players on the field that have the red pennies that
are pressing. And so this is the first formation we work on. And we then talk about, okay, when they're pressing with one, how do we set up and what do we do?
So the obvious thing is when they're pressing with one is can we play out to our center backs who then can have an option of where to play whether they
play wide or inside to the eights or even to the six as we'll take a look here. So in this situation if you look at the video itself you can see that the
red players are pressed up hard against the widest players in the middle and then there's a player at the top of the D which is that one pressing. Hard to
see there. Uh maybe I can let me see if I can highlight that. Uh right here.
Yeah, right here. That player is actually the pressing player. And this player here is the six. Here's one of the midfield two and three. Now, this center midfielder is not a U a U8 play.
Uh, sorry, is not a U12 player. That's my U16 son. My MLS next player. Very fast. So, he's going to make it challenging for these kids. But that's a
good thing. Uh, because that's all we had today was just that number of players. Um, we make do, right? We do what we can to get the practice going
here. I also have a new keeper. So, this is really important here is we're reviewing a lot of stuff we did last year for my new keeper who's new to the
team to help them understand that we do also have some new field players as well, but uh we're integrating them as we go. So, you'll see here in this
option here, what we're going to do is we've taken our center backs, we've pushed them wide since we have one pressing player, we want that pressing player to have to make some distance to
get to the ball. And now we're taking a look at what's presented in front of us.
And in this case, it's clear that the eights on either side, or especially the one on the left, as you see, is wide open. They're right in between that
pocket of players, while the other eight happens to be just talking to my son before the thing goes. So, let's play this. And you can see and hear the video
uh hopefully as we go through because you're going to hear the eight rece who's received the ball actually calling for the ball pretty loudly. So, here here we go.
>> as he plays out, that's not the best And then that eight turns against his big brother who's coming down to tackle him and takes it out to the eight. So
very simple, straightforward process there of playing out from the back, playing what's given to you when they're pressing with one. Play out wide to the center backs if the middle midfield
three has spread out too much. Can you find a pocket of space right up the middle and just cut through to one of the eights? Now for this second example,
we're going to do the same thing. We're going to play out to the right, but let's take a look at where the eight is in comparison to the pressing player in
the middle. Again, we saw earlier he was kind of chatting with my son. So, his positioning is being covered right here versus when we go out to the left,
right? So, when we went out to the left side, when that ball went to this center back here, that pass was on straight into the eight. But, it's not available
on this other side, as you can see, because this play this player right here is standing on top of each other. Sorry, I'm still figuring out my keystrokes. So
when this ball comes out, this play is not on. So we're going to see what they do and how they do it.
>> See the eight is moved in, but now they've played into the six who then plays up and through the middle. You can see that I let the play when they do
this, I let it go for a few seconds to really kind of reinforce them just moving the ball around in space, taking those options before we get it back to
the keeper. I think it's an important phase to let them continue on as we go through. So, in this case, as you can see by the diagram, the ball went out
right to the center back who didn't take a great first touch. The pressing player really started to close down, but the eight up the field reacted, came inside,
but he had pressure on him. And so they were able to make that triangle in the back and basically play 3v1 against that pressing player. And that's really an
important part of when we're playing out of the back and we're pressing with one.
It's pretty easy to show to the kids like, hey, if they're pressing with one in the at the base of the organization, we're 4v1. We have one pressing player,
a keeper, two center backs, and our six standing at the top of the box. We should be able to move the ball around playing one 4v1. at that point in the
midfield because they're pressing with three, we have in effect five players in there. So, we're 5v3 in the middle. So, we're making them make choices at that
point. If they press the inside eights, it leaves the wings open. If they press the wide wingers, usually one or two of the eights is open, and that's where we
play the ball. So, it's not always playing that ball up and out and down the line. It's finding the weakness in their pattern and trying to exploit it
based on what we have going on. So, in this next example, we're going to show the importance of the six in this play, even when it's just one pressing player.
It's really important for the six if there's not a direct move with the ball to them, that they get in a supportive position quickly and aggressively. And
most of the time that means them driving actually into the box diagonal towards the keeper and the ball that the player that has the ball to provide an outlet
if the wide ball or the straight ball is taken away by the pressing player. So that movement of the six really opens up another layer in that middle area.
Whereas a lot of times you'll see sixes just standing at the top of the box and they get cut off by that pressing player's path and they get taken out of
the play and it isolates that center back with the ball. So in this option, you're going to see this player do a better job getting down into a passing
position so that he can receive the ball from the center back as the pressure comes in. So let's take a look at this So, here comes the press. The press is
coming straight across and the angle that he comes at. Now, my six does not come down as well as I'd like it. But he takes that ball turns and just looks up
the field and imagine there was a nine even further up the field. So even if that eight missed the ball, but again the idea there is really want to see
that six drop in and get a good angle so that there's a path on either side of that pressing player if they don't take a good curved run to receive that ball
and just play through the middle. So in this example, we're going to show the effects of being able to use that eight and use them as sort of a way to bounce
the ball back towards the six. So we almost do a third man up back and through situation here or a second ball situation. You're going to see also the
results of passes not being on the ground, making it much more difficult.
You're going to see the center back's going to pop this ball up as it goes forward, which then makes it difficult for the eight to receive. They do a
pretty good job of dropping it down and then playing it to the six. So again, it's one of these examples of playing the way you're facing. The eight is not
going to have an opportunity to turn with the type of ball that comes to them. So they're just simply laying the ball off to a player that they can see
in front of them, which happens to be the six, who by this point is facing up the field and then can play the ball up.
And that's what you see here in this diagram. So let's watch the video example here. So when they play out to the left here, they got good pressure.
He's trying to play it through that gap, but he puts it in the air. It makes it difficult to handle. Now, that's a fantastic ball cuz it switches the field
and the direction of what's going on to play out wide there. But again, it's that bounce pass from the eight back to the six who is now turned and faced up
the field that allows him to then see those options and play those balls in those directions. Okay. in this last pressing with one example. Uh again, here's an option where my players are
taking a chance to read. So, we're going to play this ball out to the right and the way the press comes over, everybody kind of shifts really quickly over and
makes a very easy lane back to the six.
And the six when he sees the pressure has gone by him, he realizes there's nobody on the left side of the field.
So, instead of just taking that ball and trying to play it back into pressure, he's literally switching the field to a wideopen pass to the wide player. You'll
notice in none of these examples, we've played the ball out to the wide to the center back and straight out to the wide player because during this practice, my
pressing players for the most part stayed out wide and took that pass away.
And we do we talk about that during our practice, but it's an important piece to say, hey, you don't force the ball into situations. You have to look at what the
other team is giving you and play the obvious option when it presents itself.
So, let's take a look at this video clip. You see here the ball goes out wide and all the pressure starts to slide over including now that eight
comes in I mean that pressing player came aggressively into the six who left that wide area completely wide open. So now that six could have had an easy pass
either down to the other center back or did what he did. He took the ball sprayed that ball wide because everybody who we knew was on that pressing side
had abandoned that side of the field and it was a good a good idea and a good pass there. So really important to make sure your players understand you have to
play what's given to you and have the confidence to do that. My players again have been playing out of the back since third grade in 77 and so they're okay
with letting the pressure come in close to them and then using that to find new Okay. Well, I hope you enjoyed watching my team struggle through the routine of
them pressing with one. Again, it's real world. It's not always pretty. And I hope that with the diagrams plus the videos, you get a sense of the options
that become available to you and the thinking behind what's going on behind that one pressing player that you can relay to your players so they can start
to understand and make decisions. My team is really great about they're now starting to call out whatever a team is doing and making sure that everybody's on the same page before the first or
second goal kick, which is incredibly incredibly satisfying. Good soccer players are good decision makers. And if you give them the tools to stop making some of those decisions on their own,
when they get to 11 v11 and it's hard for you to direct things going on, it'll just be that much better. So, I hope you enjoyed this. Look out for part two and
part three where we look at when teams press with two and then finally when teams press with three. Because I think if I cut this up into smaller chunks,
it'll be easier for you to go to a practice, focus on one at a time, get your teams to understand each one, and then you can start to do reviews like I
do where literally in 15, 20 minutes, we loop through one, two, and three just to refresh the option. So until next time, I hope you're having a great season.
We'll see you out in the fields.
