Defending

Our picks

Try these sessions selected by our coaching team if you're not sure where to start. Or scroll down to browse all the sessions in this section

Antonio Conte

Back three tactics

Give players the opportunity to defend the box as a three, and move the ball forward, either by playing through the midfielders, passing ...

José Mourinho

Defensive organisation

This exclusive session from José Mourinho is about defensive organisation, and speciﬁcally two points: depth control and double marking.

David Moyes

Improving defending

This session is all about establishing and improving defensive principles. It is essential that players know how to defend in all ...

Jesse Marsch

Pressing principles

When we press, we need to think not just about winning the ball but about how to turn it into chances and ultimately into goals.

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Mauricio Pochettino

Pressing initiation

This session coaches players on understanding defensive pressing. It’s important to practise the key elements to identify how, when and w...

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Derek Egan

Emergency defending with a back three

This training session is focused on making the three centre backs understand the four D’s – that they should delay, deny, dictate and def...

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Dean Austin

Transition from attack to defence

Create game situations at training that will help your team in trying to regain the ball as quickly as possible after losing possession w...

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Nathan Jones

When to press and when to drop

This session is all about teaching players when to press and when to drop as a defensive unit and it encourages them to identify and resp...

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Manuel Pellegrini

Deadly transitions

This session examines how we condition a player technically, tactically, physiologically and psychologically when attacking and defending...

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Gus Poyet

Transitioning to defence

This is a session we use to train our players to transition to defence after losing the ball. In doing so, we encourage them to react qui...

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Graham Potter

Defending in a mid block

This session is all about defending in a mid block and making a team hard to play through. It will teach players to work as a block and i...

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Roberto Martinez

Compact team movement

This session is about movement of the team in attack and defence to ensure we remain compact with good distances between players. It also...

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Graham Westley

Defending set plays

A high percentage of goals are scored from set plays. For that reason, it is vitally important to create a skill set in players which max...

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Danny Wilson

Defending from the front in a 4-3-3 situation

Coach players on understanding defensive positioning. Show them how to channel opposition passes into areas of strength, where they can a...

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Sam Allardyce

Defending the box

The session looks at the core ideal of defending the box, and with it, the goal. It uses 1v1, 2v2 and 3v3 systems working in a unit, high...

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Christopher Evans

Compact defending

This session is all about learning how to defend in our own half, while tactically forcing the opposition into wide areas and encouraging...

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Aidy Boothroyd

Defending 1v1

If players can take the ball off their opponent anywhere on the pitch, the team is better equipped to deal with an attacking overload, so...

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Mark Sampson

Defensive transition

With this session, we are looking to develop the player’s decision-making ability and the execution of his/her actions in the moment that...

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Kolo Toure

Counter-pressing

When you counter-press, you allow yourself to win the ball back and play as quick as possible forward to create a goal opportunity, or yo...

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Sean Dyche

Simple pressing as a team

This session teaches players simple tactical understanding for pressing as a team. It’s important to practise this because pressing force...

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James McPike

Developing a determination and resilient mindset towards 1v1 duels

The session is about an individual’s ability to show determination and resilience when defending 1v1.

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Danny Cowley

Counter-pressing

This session is aimed at influencing player behaviour on the loss of possession. We work very hard to affect player behaviour in the tran...

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Darren Carter

Building the attack and third player runs

When in possession, this session is all about building from the back and receiving under pressure.

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Mark Bowen

Defending crosses

Use this session to develop the decision making and positional awareness of defenders when faced with a variety of dangerous balls crosse...

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Neil Warnock

Defensive team shape

The key with this session is to teach defenders when to mark the man and when to mark space, with the philosophy of ‘being in position wh...

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Ben Garner

Defending against counter-attacks

Defending against the counter-attack and reacting quickly to these transitions of play is important. That’s because in the modern era, on...

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Roy Hodgson

Pressing and screening

Get your players pressing and screening the ball with this dynamic session. It also rehearses when and where to chase, and looks at cover...

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Quinton Fortune

Sunflower positioning

The focus of this session is looking at the full-back - in this instance, the left-back’s - body position.

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Lee Carsley

Pressing within a shape

Pressing within a shape is a vital part of any team’s set-up. It ensures strength, control and organisation, and provides a crucial eleme...

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Alan Pardew

Defending crosses with a back three

This session is all about setting a team up in a 3-5-2 formation and coaching them to defend against crosses from wide areas. It initiall...

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Guus Hiddink

Reactions in the box

Work on improving penalty box anticipation and reactions, for both defensive and offensive players. This is crucially important because e...

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Valerien Ismael

Counter-pressing

This session is all about counter-pressing and it encourages a high intensity style of play and instant reactions from the players.

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Chris Butler

Defending the goal and goal area

This session is designed around the decision-making of when, how and why to use the spread technique in 1v1 situations.

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Lee Johnson

Problem v problem

This session is all about solving problems as a defending team.

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Joe Montemurro

Collective defending principles

This session is all about collective defending principles, focusing on team organisation when pressing from the front and defensive organ...

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Graham Alexander

Defending in the final third

This session is all about defending in the final third. It’s a practice that we use regularly as it replicates situations that defenders ...

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Cameron Toshack

Defensive transition into effective possession

This session is focused on two main themes: defensive transition (against the ball) and regaining to build effective possession (with the...

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Alex Bruce

Attacking and defending in wide and central areas

In this session two teams work on attacking and defending in wide and central areas of the pitch

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Rob Edwards

Pressing triggers when out of possession

This session focuses on pressing triggers and shows players how and when to press in certain scenarios from a compact shape.

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Gary Rowett

Defending the danger zone

This session is designed to work on defending in the ‘danger zone’, but it also works on attacking in the danger zone too. Studies have s...

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Paul Mcguinness

Win the ball and break

This session is about winning the ball back and breaking quickly to score – it’s based in the middle third of the pitch but the skills le...

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Darrell Clarke

Out of possession match preparation

The session is based around an out of possession practice when concentrating on preparing for a league fixture against a 3-5-2 formation.

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David Kemp

Defensive headers

This session examines the skill and art of defensive headers. It’s a simple exercise, but practice makes permanent.

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Chris Hutchings

Defending against wingers

This session is about denying attacking teams opportunities to get in behind the defence by pressing early. It is important to practise t...

Attack and defend: wide and central

As well as encouraging attacking angles, movement, link-up play and positivity in front of goal, this session also gives defenders practice ...

1v1 attacking and defending

The philosophy behind this session is that the game can be broken down into lots of 1v1 situations all over the pitch, so it’s important ...

Adopting a high back four

This session is about defending as a group or unit. It looks at the relationships between players and teaches them how to use recovery ...

Attack against defence

In this session, because the defending team is facing an overload, it is important for them to work together in the best ways possible. It ...

Attacking & defending

This session focuses on the techniques of attacking and defending in and around the penalty area, giving players the opportunity to ...

Attacking and defending in counter-attack situations

Examine the principles behind attacking and defending counter-attack situations quickly – It’s important to practise this because counter-...

Attacking and defending transitions

This session is about attacking and defending transitions, focusing on the key moments when the ball changes hands. We work on how we can ...

Back four protocols

The purpose of this session is to assess and coach the specific roles of the defensive unit, to include defensive protocols, communication ...

Back four understanding

This overview session is about the responsibilities of the back four, and how they use distance, movement and angles in order to produce a ...

Balancing the back four

This session is about the back four working as a unit. It looks for them to clear the ball past a target when dealing with a range of ...

Banks of four compact

The session is based around being compact and difficult to play through in both our defensive and midfield units.

Centrally defending

This session focuses on defending in the first third to protect the goal by preventing central attacks. It emphasises the press-cover-...

Clearing defensive danger

This session is about the reactions and movements of defensive players. It looks primarily at the role of the back four in squeezing up and ...

Controlling the switch

This session is about controlling the opposition’s switch. It’s designed to support players to face a team who are very good in possession, ...

Creating and denying space

This session reflects my belief that individual domination in duels – both with and without the ball – is a key part of our identity.

Creating and exploiting overloads

This session is focused on creating and exploiting overloads and specifically 2v1s, both in defence and attack. The drills within the ...

Dealing with crosses

Get your players dealing with crosses that are played both into and outside of the 18-yard box. Heading, clearances, blocks and ...

Decisive defending

Use this exclusive session to focus on showing the opposition outside from the front, incorporating solid formation play and effective ...

Defending - individual, unit and team

This session is a straight competition between defenders and attackers. It takes the principles of defending as individuals, in units and ...

Defending against a switch of play

This session is designed to work on a team’s defensive balance, shape and its covering positions when defending against switches of play.

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Defending

Our picks

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Coaches' Testimonials

Alan Pardew

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Jürgen Klopp

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Sir Alex Ferguson

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Join the world's leading coaches and managers and discover for yourself one of the best kept secrets in coaching. No other training tool on the planet is written or read by the calibre of names you’ll find in Elite Soccer.

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