U7 Soccer Drills

Under-seven is not small football. It's a different job, and the coaches who do it well are doing something closer to teaching than managing.

Three rules and you'll be better than most. Every child has a ball. Nothing has a line. Everything has a name they can shout.

That's it. Sharks and minnows, pirate ship, ball tag, musical balls, traffic lights, fox tails. They sound like nonsense and they are the entire curriculum, because a six-year-old running around with a ball at her feet, laughing, is doing exactly the thing that makes a footballer. Close control, head up, changing direction, reacting to other people. She just doesn't know that's what it's called.

What doesn't work at this age: queues of any kind, drills with more than one instruction, anything requiring them to wait, and tactics. Formation does not matter. Position does not matter. If a child asks what position she plays, tell her all of them.

Sessions should be about forty-five minutes and should contain at least three different games, because attention goes and when it goes it's gone. When it starts to wobble, change the game rather than raising your voice.

The thing you're actually building is whether she comes back next year. Everything else is downstream of that. A U7 who loves it becomes a U12 you can coach. A U7 who spent the season being organised becomes a U8 who plays something else.

If you're a parent who got volunteered and has never played: you're fine. Turning up is most of the job, and you'll learn faster than the children will, because you're paying attention.