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Training Drills

After numerous questions over the last month I have decided to do a section on training drills. Training a goalkeeper or being a goalkeeper can sometimes be challenging to think of new drills to do at training so I am going to try to assist you.

One of the most important things that you need to do to keep variety is to make sure that you are creative and if you have a mental block for new ideas, you need to ask other coaches and players for some of their ideas.

The following drills are to be done with goalkeepers in individual session or small group sessions. This often helps when you need to watch what a player is doing or just need a help with drills that involve more than one person to get the best out of the goalkeeper.

Drill 1: Reflex Work
The balls need to be at the top of the circle, have a hitter hitting the balls at the tyres or wooden boards on an angle so that the ball comes off in a different direction.

Objectives of this drill are: Make the save. Try to clear the 1st save wide. Clear the ball wide if not on 1st save.

Drill 2: Wide Clearances, Fatigue and High Lobs
Coach or player is at the top of the circle with a heap of balls. The balls are thrown in bouncing no higher than knee height. Balls should be at the goalkeeper and slightly wider.

The objective is for the goalkeeper to become fatigued and make quality hard saves clearing the ball wide.

Setting up in the same way you can also practice saving high balls that have been flicked on corners or in general play.

Objective: Keeper needs to get back as quick as possible and when making the save if the ball is high enough get it back over the net.

Drill 3: Rebounding
The balls are hit in towards the goalkeeper. Two players are set near the keeper picking up any rebounds, playing the ball out until it is out of play. The coach / hitter may also lob balls in slowly so that the keeper is forced to make a save or meet the ball before the player does.

This drill will help making the second and third save if necessary. Players are encouraged to clear the ball wide and strong on the first save.

Drill 4: Making a Hard Shot Save after Quick Movement
The coach / player calls “go” and the keeper leaves the cone to sprint across, set and make the save. This drill needs to be done with a walk back recovery.

Objective: To get across the goal as quick as possible and make a good quality save with a wide clearance.

Drill 5: Interceptions
The coach / player passes the ball into the circle in-between the keeper and the player. The goalkeeper is required to try and beat the player to the ball and clear it, or meet the player as they are receiving the ball. This is directly related to being an attacking keeper and making life difficult for your opponents. Again a walk back recovery.

Drill 6 : Turn and Save
This drill is very straight forward. The keeper stands facing the net with their back to the top of the circle. When the coach / player calls “go” the keeper turns quickly and makes a reflex save. Balls can be pushed, flicked or hit.

Drill 7: Warming up two Keepers
To many times coaches are faced with warming up more than one keeper. As a keeper I appreciate how boring it is to kick balls at each other, so I thought I would share an idea of one of my coaches, Kath Partridge.

Both keepers stand in the goal, closer to the post than the penalty spot. When the keepers receive the ball they put it back to the hitter. Communication is vital during this drill, as you don’t want to have keepers going for the same ball. After a few minutes you may suggest to the keepers that they swap sides.

Drill 8: Repetition Sliding
The keepers starts in the middle of the goal and sprints and slides into A, gets up quickly and sprints backwards to goal line, this is then repeated to B and C. This is very taxing and it is a good idea to give generous recovery time so that the maximum benefit can be achieved.

If the keeper is having trouble sliding at cones, get a player to be moving to the spot of the cone so it is a little more realistic.

Good luck with the drills and remember that you need to be creative when thinking about drills. I hope that you get some ideas from these and share them with other keepers and coaches. If you have a good drill that is a little different please let me know as I am always after new drills.

Good luck with the keeping

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