Warm-up: Winning your battles

WHY USE IT

Develops ball manipulation against live opposition.

SET UP

Players create their own ‘arenas’ of varying size and shape. Both players need a ball and choose a tagger and an evader. Area size can be flexible, based on intended outcomes and player ability.

HOW TO PLAY

Staying in control of the ball, the tagger must tag the evader, who is trying to manipulate the ball around the arena to avoid being tagged. If tagged, the game then reverses and the evader becomes the tagger.

Alternatives/progressions:

• Timed rounds: Each player has 30 seconds to get the most tags; then reverse it, so the other player has 30 seconds to beat the target.
• Directional: Play as a bulldog-style game.
• Overloaded: Progress so areas have either two taggers versus one evader, or vice versa.

COACHING POINTS

• Encourage players to use body feints in order to create space and evade the tagger.
• Encourage players to use any 1v1 skills they may have, to help evade the attacker.
• Encourage players to use deception to hide their intentions of where in the arena they want to attack by using either of the above.