My best-ever tackling session

Three dimensional tackling

This exercise promotes the three main tackles, front-on, side-on and rear, and rewards the skilful tackler who can steal the ball after the tackle.

Set up three adjacent 5m grids as shown in the picture below. The initial ball carrier (the player in white) begins at the corner of the right grid, with the initial defender (the player in red) on the middle cone as indicated.

The players start, entering the first grid around their cone. Red chases down white and tackles him from behind. Having completed the tackle, red regains his feet quickly and steals the ball. White uses good ball presentation to make this difficult.

Red, as the new ball carrier, then runs around the bottom cone and into the middle grid as shown. This recreates red’s game attack direction immediately after the tackle. White, meanwhile, gets up and enters the middle grid from the opposite cone. He then makes a front-on tackle, after which he claims the ball.

Finally white enters the last grid on the left, as shown. Red enters through the red coned gate to make a side-on tackle and reclaim the ball once more.

Start by permitting the tackler to always win the ball. As the players become better at this, make the post tackle contest a genuine one, with the ball winner continuing to the next grid and the ball loser acting as the appropriate defender.