Sleep is training: the part of a young soccer player's week that parents own
Sleep for young soccer players is part of training, not the gap between sessions. What a parent controls, what to count, and why we quote no number.
8 min readParentCoach
Blog
Blog
Methodology-first articles on individual soccer player development. Written for players, parents, coaches, and the broader football development community.
What the scoreboard leaves out about a young soccer player
How to tell if a young soccer player is improving when the score says nothing: four habits to watch from the sideline, and two drills that build them.
8 min readParentCoach
The cognitive capacity: how players think in football
Above a baseline of technique, the player who decides faster and better wins. What the cognitive capacity is, why it becomes the ceiling from early adolescence, and how to train it.
15 min readPlayerCoach
Creative dribbling drills: how constraints generate, and train, creativity
Constraints build creative dribblers. Here's the method for designing constrained dribbling drills that develop real technique under pressure.
10 min readCoachPlayer
How to dribble in tight spaces: the 1v1 commit window
Many 1v1s are lost to hesitation rather than to a skill gap. Here is how to train the commit window that beats defenders.
9 min readPlayer
On deselection: the next ten minutes, ten days, ten months
Your child has just been deselected. What the experience of long-term development says about the next ten minutes, the next ten days, and the next ten months, and the honest line we hold.
9 min readParentCoach
Perceptual capacity: what the game asks you to see
Perception is the first skill in football: reading the game before the ball arrives. What perceptual capacity is, why it decides everything downstream, and how to train it.
12 min readPlayerCoach
The space before the ball: what Rodri's positional intelligence teaches every player
What Rodri does in the seconds before receiving, and what every player can take from the scanning and spatial intelligence behind his game.
9 min readPlayerCoach
When scanning is the dribble: what Xavi's habit shows about ball-carrying
Elite players scan before and during the carry. What the research on Xavi's famous habit shows, and how to train scanning while dribbling in soccer.
9 min readPlayerCoach
Soccer dribbling drills: the complete guide to training the skill under real pressure
From tight-space drills to both-feet work: the complete guide to soccer dribbling drills, built for the player developing seriously over time.
17 min readPlayerGeneral
Weak foot dribbling drills: a progression that holds up under pressure
Weak foot dribbling drills that train the comfortable version leave the real gap alone. A corridor progression that takes the weak foot into real pressure.
9 min readPlayer
What Xhaka rebuilt, and what it teaches: communication, composure, and the capacities that develop latest
Xhaka went from stripped of the Arsenal captaincy to a central figure in Leverkusen's unbeaten season. The capacities behind that transformation are teachable, not innate.
10 min readPlayerCoach