Upscale 4 v 2 with 4 Goals
June 19, 2008
4 v 2 is a common warm-up game for challenging your possession capabilities and control on the ball. It is a great game to get the blood flowing and the mind sharp but, what I love so much about football is how much you can adapt and build upon simple games like 4 v 2.
For instance, what I have diagrammed above is a 4 v 2 game that increases the intensity, forces the orange team to focus on shape, transition, width and making smart attacking and defending decisions. Playing in this situation with 2 wingers, 2 field players and 4 goals presents players options to learn beyond what a simple 4 v 2 game of possession play represents.
As you can see in the diagram above we have illustrated a narrow field of play where you have a 2 v 2 situation and these players are restricted to this area of play. Whereas the wingers are support players to provide shape and quick outlets for transition play. The wingers are to remain outside the lines (or cones could be used) and should stay in this respective area of play. Other restrictions could be placed on these players like 1 or 2 touches or not having the capability to shoot and score.
But enough about restrictions. To play in short man situations and how players are able to cope with and make smart decisions in an intense environment like this make the best use of creating a game related environment. The great thing about a game like this is that all players are involved, active and are able to learn. Typically you might want to play 5 to 10 min short games to keep up the intensity and having the wing players serve as neutral players. The outside support players could easily replace two players in the middle every 5-10 minutes to really shake things up and thus provide mutli-dimensional learning opportunities.
What I think is really great with a game like this is that it forces players to move very quickly, allows for many touches on the ball and creates an opportunity to really test a players mental or tactical thought process. With that I am really interested to what you think about a game like this and what you might add?
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