High-ball pressure skills

One reason why some players drop high balls is because they have so much time to think about them.

They seem to tense up at the prospect of dropping the catch. Experts appear at ease in comparison – and that explains why they catch the most difficult kicks more often.

We all know that if you pepper a player who has dropped the first ’bomb’ of the match, he or she is likely to continue to do so. Stress is a real skill-killer.

This high-ball session works from technique development through to pressure being applied.

Pressure is essential to help players find out if their technical expertise is rock solid. Research shows that the best players are able to cut out all distractions when they perform. Can your players?

The important coaching takeaway is that we should push players to make mistakes. That means we expect them to drop the ball. 

How we deal with those mistakes will determine how the player progresses. Encouragement, fault correction and direction all play a part.

However, when fielding high kicks, it’s often the case that players will continue to struggle, once they have made a series of errors. 

They may be able to shrug off the first failure. But, mentally, they can become more anxious, and so lose the relaxed state to complete the skill accurately. 

They will have moved away from the state we might call ’subconsciously unconscious’, and will instead have become fixated on the detail and the potential to fail.

There are several approaches when you reach that stage.

With elite players, you might want to tough it out and they will eventually become successful in that session. With developing players, it can be better to leave the skill and return to it at another time. 

When doing so, play down, in the next session, the significance of the previous failings and just gently build up the pressure.

Your own skill is to read each player during the session. You could dial back the difficulty, but that might make the player feel worse. 

To deal with that, I suggest you ask what they want to do and then adjust. Good questions might be:

• Do you want to carry on, or try something different?
• It’s not working out at the moment, shall we try a shorter distance again?

Yet, I do think it’s important not to add in any more advice. This is the time to reiterate what you have covered and see if you can enhance a technique you have worked on. 

That is because, if the new technique you have just suggested also leads to failure, then everyone becomes despondent. 

The new idea or adjustment should be held back until another occasion.