Developing soccer skills: pressing

SCW: What do younger age groups need to know about pressing? How do we introduce it? How does it present itself in a game? And how does it evolve as players get older and more advanced?

MK: I would very much encourage coaches to try to get their players to press quite aggressively because I think the tendency of the modern game is moving towards more of these aggressive pressing strategies.

Players get into the game because they love playing with the ball and, so, for a young player, the most organic thing to do is to try to get the ball back as quickly as possible, in order to prevent the opponent from having it. It is such a natural thought, to do things with the ball.

No one at U8s or U7s gets into the game because they want to shift in a low block, so I think it’s a very logical thing to try to press the ball high up the field.

It is obviously not expected that young kids, who have more of a individualistic mindset, are going to see a brilliant collective action towards the ball. I think it is more [about] encouraging individual elements, such as sprinting and closing down the opponent as much as possible. 

The key is to move your feet while you are pressing so that you are in an agile position and able to react very quickly towards the opponent trying to dribble past us.

This very raw element of individual ball hunting at the highest possible speed with a high level of energy and a good amount of foot movement is a great place to start [with young players].

Sell it to the players by saying: "If we’re going to do it, let’s do it very intensively" and use a metaphor like: "If we want to work like Usain Bolt, who works for 10 seconds, then we also have to do it at a very high speed. But if we are not going to do that, then we might have to run a marathon", which is done at a, relatively speaking, lower speed but you are also running for a lot longer.

I think that just starting with this raw individual desire of hunting the ball and wanting to play with the ball yourself is a great starting point.

As we go towards U12s, U13s, U14s and then towards the later stages of youth development, it obviously becomes much more crucial to become more collective in our approach towards a pressing strategy.

Being flexible and able to employ differing pressing strategies, according to what the game and opponent presents us, is perhaps the latest stage of youth development in this aspect of the game. 

SCW: How do you go about coaching pressing?

MK: A very interesting thought someone shared with me many years ago is that the characteristic of the coach is a very important consideration in how their team plays.

"If I want to coach pressing effectively, I have got to coach with a lot of energy..."

When I’m coaching pressing in a training session, it is obvious I want high intensity and a lot of sprinting towards the ball. It’s obvious that it is quite a high-risk strategy.

So, if I want to coach pressing effectively, I’ve got to coach with a lot of energy. I have got to be quite present as a coach and I have sometimes got to be quite loud. 

I think someone like Jurgen Klopp at Liverpool is the perfect example of a coach whose on-field personality is very closely related to how they coach their team to play.

I think you need these elements of energy and perhaps even aggression in a session that gets players to effectively hunt the ball and press towards the ball.

Obviously, if we are wanting to do a pressing session, we want these sprints - but sprints are also actions that players aren’t going to be able to carry out for an indefinite amount of time.

If we have a pressing focus, we have got to play games and practices where we play short durations with relatively long breaks - but in these short durations of practices, we are training and pressing at the highest possible intensity.

SCW: Any final thoughts on pressing?

MK: I think an underrated aspect to pressing is to do the work while the ball is travelling.

It is obvious that an interception is an easier and perhaps more desirable way of winning the ball because it means we are immediately able to progress the ball towards the opponents’ goal if we are able to intercept.

A lot of players will start pressing the opponent after they [the opponent] has received the ball. Ideally, however, we would be pressing and sprinting while the ball is travelling from one opposition team-mate to the other - because then we might be able to intercept or immediately put pressure on while the opponent is still receiving the ball.

In order to do this successfully, we need to get a feeling for distances. That is where a slightly bigger playing area comes in. 

Julian Nagelsmann, the former FC Bayern coach, has a very good principle that the pressing distance can be, more or less, half the passing distance.

"Ideally, we’d press while the ball travels from one opposition player to the other..."

The ball obviously travels faster than the player can run. So if the opponent passes the ball 10 metres, it is unrealistic to expect me to press the [receiving] opponent as they receive it if I am 10 metres away. However, if I’m half the distance that the ball is travelling - so let’s say I’m five metres away - then it is very realistic that I could intercept the ball or perhaps be there on the touch.

This is obviously a rule of thumb - it’s not something we’re going to bring out a ruler for and measure. But this principle can help our players to develop a feel for distances and access to opponent players when we are defending and pressing.