Last night with my U13 boys team, crossing was the aim of the session. However the session I had planned had to be adapted slightly with having only 8 players for the session. It still went very well and the players enjoyed the different challenges. I am curious to see if we manage to get many crosses completed in our pre-season friendly on Saturday.
2 teams 4v4
- Playing inside blue cones
- No goalkeepers
1 Attacker inside channel
- 1 Attacker can go inside the channel – with the ball or to receive the ball
- Run to put in a cross
- Encourage different types of crosses
- Ask players who are attacking the goal to think about timing of the run
At this point I asked the players if I had said they could not score normally . . . to which they answered no, but they liked being able to cross and then finish.
Progression: 1 Defender in channel
- 1 Defender can now go in the channel
- Encourage defender to make it difficult for attacker – game realistic
- 1v1 – to get a cross in
- Encourage fast play
Free Play – Leave in the channel
- Free play – up to yellow cones
- Players can go anywhere
- Leave the cones for the channels in so the players still have the visual aid
- Can do extra points for scoring from a cross
- Encourage positive play
A modification and what I saw on the Youth Module 2 course, was to have a player in each channel constantly and working for both teams. So that is another way to do a successful crossing session, would also be a good way to make sure each player gets a chance to cross the ball, as the way I ended up doing it a lot of the time the same player wanted to cross the ball. That was easy to rotate though, just encouraging them to play the ball forward in different ways. Also with enough players in the session, goalkeepers would be a must! I just did not think it was worth it only having 8 players!
Any thought’s on crossing?
Move Run Sports 
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