How to Elevate Your Soccer Game on Your Own
If you ask any coach or professional soccer player what you should be doing to improve your game, the answer will always be to do more outside of your team practices. Every time.
Athletes who restrict their soccer development to the two, maybe three, practices a week and games are not going to develop at the same rate as those who set aside extra time and take on more development outside of practice.
Now, what do we mean by “more development outside of practice?” Great question.
Best Soccer Training Outside of Team Practices
For on the ball work, there are two ideal paths to go down: the first is to maximize touches. Juggling and wall passing for an hour will get you about a thousand touches on the ball; over a year getting 365,000 more touches will undoubtedly make you better.
The second is more specific: say your coach wants you to work on turning outside with your weak foot and 1v1s. Finding a private coach (or a friend) to head to a park and work on a specific skill is a no-brainer, though it can be hard to do as you can’t do it on your own.
But developing as a soccer player is not restricted to the physical elements of the game – and it shouldn’t be. In an 11 v 11 game, you can’t expect to have the ball at your feet for more than 4.5% of the game (just over 4 minutes). This is why improving off-the-ball is exceedingly important.
In fact, soccer is often referred to as a “Mental Game.” Why? Because the speed in which you understand the game and can make game decisions will drastically impact your level of play.
4 Ways You Can Elevate Your Soccer Game Without Even Touching a Ball
Review Your Own Game Footage
When a game is still fresh in your mind, rewatching it and seeing how you handled a specific situation can show you not only what you can improve at, but also show you things you might have thought you didn’t do well but actually did. The reality is, doing this means you played the game (in your head) twice getting you 2x as many minutes.
Watch Professional Games
When you’re watching a game, watch the players in your position. See what they’re doing off the ball (as well as on it) and how they manage the game. THEN – think about what they are doing as if this was your game footage. Did they make the right decision? Is there something they could have done better?
Talk to a Mentor
One of the key ways Europe and South America are ahead of the United States in soccer is they have long-standing mentor-mentee relationships imparting knowledge gained from experience so that a player doesn’t have to reinvent the wheel. Having regular conversations with a mentor will put you a step ahead on understanding the game and getting to the next level.
Analyze Professional Game Footage
Done right, this is a combination of all three of the above options. Watching professionals play and getting analysis of what they’re doing from an experienced pro will elevate your game quicker than pretty much any other option.
This is exactly why we created BGTV: to go over all of the aspects of the game youth players should learn, teach you to play smarter, and make better decisions in the moment.
