by Craig Lansing

This last season I gave both my 2005 teams what I though was a simple task to be able to improve their juggling of a soccer ball to 20 or more by the end of the season (12 weeks).  About two-thirds of my players could already do between 3 and 10 prior to this assignment and the rest were able to do over 10.   This was part of their homework each week with follow-up testing periodically throughout the season.  We did a tracking card to help them see where everyone was at and reward them for their achievements for each 10 juggles they did in testing.  As a coach of 10 years I often like to think I had put some deep thought into the entire reason and knew what the outcome would be - most of the time it is a lesson learned and when I evaluate it as something to include or remove from future seasons.  I believe this season I grew in my understanding of Why Juggling is important to my teams development and I wanted to share my LESSONS LEARNED with you.

The first comment most novice parents and players say is "I have never seen anyone juggle a soccer ball during a soccer game".  And to that I would say you are partially correct and will not argue that you do NOT see players standing on the field juggling the game ball as a skill or tactic while the game is going on.  In fact, I would assume most of us coaches would see it as a correctional moment if a player was doing just that.  So again you may ask "Why is Juggling important if you don't use it in a game?"

Juggling abilities are used in soccer games in the skill to take a ball out of the air from a chip or goal kick, in the coordination to handle a bouncing ball pass and in the overall touch you have on the ball.  Just because you can Juggle a soccer ball it does not mean you will be a good soccer player.  Juggling does not mean you have composure, awareness, athleticism, speed, field vision, work ethic, finishing skills or so many other traits that are required to play the game.

HOW WILL JUGGLING MAKE YOU A BETTER SOCCER PLAYER?

• FIRST TOUCH - in my opinion this is the most important skill in soccer today.  Without a quality First Touch the rest of the game falls apart at the higher levels
• RECEIVING THE BALL IN THE AIR OR ON A BOUNCE - in soccer we always talk about control and speed of play.  This point includes both as the faster you can gain control the faster you can do something with it
• PASS A BOUNCING BALL - this is the combination of the two above points in that it is the ability to 'one touch' a bouncing ball (or poor pass) and be able to redirect it to a teammate in a usable fashion.
• VOLLEY SHOTS - players who juggle have trained their leg muscles to adjust the touch to control different angles and speeds so that the foot-to-ball contact has good timing
• CONFIDENCE - when you can juggle to consistent numbers you have feels of pride and confidence from the accomplishments.