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With these pictures probably going viral in the football community whilst Tuchel having success (?) at Chelsea, it's also equally important to reflect over why you - and maybe even a great coach like Tuchel - SHOULDN'T use small balls in practice. A thread: https://twitter.com/CFCIntegral/status/1355248043176697862
Research has shown that external focus of attention (focusing on something in the environment) usually is more beneficial than an internal focus (focusing on body parts and -movements) when learning motor skills (i.e. Wulf & Prinze, 2001).
Football is a sport where ability is determined by a player’s ability to communicate (verbally and non-verbally) with one’s surroundings, making decisions and executing that decision.
An integral part of communication is orientation, which is enhanced by an effective visual exploration. This makes it also logical to make players focus on something OTHER than the ball. In fact, it’s necessary.
So, what happens when you throw in a small ball to “challenge” your players? In a study by Santos et al. (2020), playing with other type of balls than the players normally did (i.e. an American football or a handball) was detrimental to their spatial exploration and creativity.
"As so, it seems that when playing with the rugby ball, the players may be focused on more individual skills required to perform the task, such as how to control and pass the ball, rather than in the exploration of novel behaviours or more environmental information, such as ...
teammates and opponents positioning. However, this higher focus on ball mastery may also constrain the players’ ability to capture the surrounding relevant information. In accordance, it was found lower individual space exploration, the distance between teammates and effective...
... playing space" (Santos et al., 2020, p.180). A smaller ball, or a ball with another geometrical form than a player is used to, will most likely draw the player’s gaze to the ball.
Therefore, the player will not be able to see what happens around him as he must focus his attention to his technique: Receiving the ball is much harder and requires more of his attention.
Then, the question is: Is it worth sacrificing the development of communication and subsequently decision making for the development of execution?
In my opinion, coaches in general should be careful of implementing variation to their practices by changing the size of the ball on a regular basis, especially before the players have reached a certain level (as the Chelsea players have).
And, based on what is written above, I think it’s important that youth coaches in particular are cautious of varying elements of their practices just for the sake of variation.
Food for thought: Could coaches enhance player’s execution (technique) by adding variety in another way than changing the balls? The shape of the playing field or changing the playing surface could be more efficient, I think.
Still, my advice to fellow coaches would be to approach this with a critical mind. And to not fall for the Halo effect – just because a coach has had success or is famous, we shouldn’t see everything he does as the Holy grail.
Recommend listening to this episode of the Perception and Action podcast (link below). Would also love to hear your opinion on this, @ShakeyWeights. Also: Register for a course with @raymondverheije and FC Evolution. As soon as possible.
https://perceptionaction.com/312/
https://perceptionaction.com/312/
And, just to be clear: The point is not if it's right or wrong to manipulate practices by using other types of balls (as an example). My point is that we as coaches should critically reflect on both positive and negative effects a certain constraint might have.
