 In this video I'm going to teach you how to become a better defender by understanding your positioning, defending your man out of the game knowing when to press, when to cover, and what to do when your team is in possession of the ball. Although this video is specifically for defenders, if you're a midfielder or forward and you want to become a complete player, watch this video because it's only going to help you. You can learn from analyzing and understanding other positions. Plus, if you're a real team player and you're working back to cover your teammates, you're probably going to find yourself in defensive positions. So you need to know what to do when you're in those situations. Today's tutorial, we're focusing on defending. So I've put a back four and two defensive midfielders and just a few red attackers to demonstrate some situations. So this first tip, it's not actually a tactic. This is a mentality, but it's very important to understand and play with this mentality every time you step on the field. I always say good defending usually comes down to two things. Number one, positioning and number two, passion. Be passionate about your defending. Don't let your man score or don't even let your man create a chance. Even more so if you can, don't let your teammates man score or create a chance. Take pride in your defending. Be passionate about stopping attackers. Don't let someone jog past you. If that's your man, stick with them and get in front of them. Don't let someone dribble past you. Don't let someone get across into your box and definitely do not let your man get a shot off on your net. When you're in a one-on-one situation, have the mentality that there is no way that this guy is getting past me. If the ball comes into the striker's feet and he's trying to turn, there is no way that he's going to get a shot off on my net. You need to take pride in your defending and that happens all over the field. You're going to learn and develop the defensive skills necessary to be a good defender. You're going to understand when to press and when to tackle and when not to. But it all starts with this mentality. You need to be passionate about your defending. No one gets past you. No one puts a cross into your box. No one beats you in a one-on-one situation. No one scores a goal on your net. This is your field. This is your ball. This is your game. So if he's going to try to score against you, he's really going to have a difficult time today. Most players get caught out of position because they are ball-watching. They're only watching the ball. They're not aware of where their teammates are. They're not aware of where the man they're marking is. And they're only focusing on the ball. They're not aware of what's going on around them. And that's a recipe for defensive disaster. Whenever your team is defending, you should always be focusing on your positioning, asking yourself, where should I be, and adjusting as the play moves. Now there's three things you need to think about. Number one is the ball. Where is the ball? Number two, where are your teammates? And number three, where is the man that I am responsible for? When defending, you want to get behind the ball as quickly as possible. So if we lost the ball, how do we need to get behind the ball as quickly as possible? You want to get close to your teammates. You don't want to have big gaps like this. You want to get close to your teammates, and you want to get in your defensive shape. So however your team was set up on the team sheet, that's the shape that you want to look like when you're defending on the field. You also want to be aware of where the man that you're marking is. So when that ball comes to him, you can get to him closely. So get ball side, get into good team shape, nice and close together, and get goal side inside of your man. So if this is my man, I want to be goal side of him, closer to my goal. If he's here and I'm here, he's goal side on me. I need to be goal side of him. I want to be inside of him. If this is my man, now I'm goal side inside of him. This is my goal, I'm closer, I'm inside on the goal. If he's here and I'm there, he's inside of me. So I want to be somewhere like this. So ball side, goal side inside in your team defensive shape, nice and tight moving together. Now as the ball moves, we are going to move as a unit. So the ball gets shifted out here. If it goes to the right, we're all going to move as a unit to the right. If the ball gets shifted and it comes to the left, we're quickly going to move as a unit to the left. Everyone moves together, keeping good defensive shape. If the ball goes up the field, we have to get up and we have to keep in a line. You don't want to be staying back and then suddenly you're keeping everyone offside and they just play a little ball over the top. So you need to get up, move as a unit. You should be keeping your shape as you move around the field. If the ball gets shifted down, everyone needs to get back behind the ball in good defensive shape. So we're always moving left, right, up and down together. When you do this, you're protecting yourself. You are protecting your net. You're protecting a ball over the top because we're in good shape and we're keeping a good line. We can defend that. We can get there quicker than the attacker. You are protecting your teammates if they get beaten. So because we're close together, if he gets beaten, we're here to protect each other. If there's big gaps, we can't protect each other if he gets beat. And you're protecting yourself in one-on-one situations because you know where your man is and you can get there quickly if the ball gets to him. It requires everyone to focus on their positioning for the entire game but it makes it extremely difficult for the opposition to get through this well-structured defense. When there are large gaps in the team and players lose their concentration, especially when you start to get tired, you get out of position and then suddenly our shape doesn't look so good. We have big gaps like this. Now it's easy to play through and the other team is going to create lots of goal-scoring chances. So always focus on your positioning in relation to where the ball is, to where your teammates are, and to where the man that you're marking is. Ballside, goal-side, inside. Always focus moving together as the ball moves around the field. The further the ball is away from the man that you're marking, the more space you can afford him. So if I'm supposed to be marking this man, I'm responsible for him, and the ball is on this side of the field, I can give him more space. As that ball comes, then I'll adjust and I'll get there quickly because it will take time to get there in the air or take time to get shifted around the back. But I need to anticipate and as I realize that the ball is getting potentially closer to the man that I'm marking, I am giving him less and less space because as he receives that ball, I want to be very close to him and also everyone else has to be anticipating where the ball is going. So we're all close in a nice tight unit. Anticipate rather than react. You're already getting good at reading the play because you're watching the ball, you know where your teammates are, and you know where the man that you're responsible for is. Now you want to get in the habit of reading the player on the ball. Look at his eyes, look at his body shape. Most of the time you can tell where he's going to play the pass before he even does. You want to anticipate when this pass is being played to the man that you're marking or when it might be played into the space that you're responsible for. When you can do this, you can either read the pass and intercept it before your opponent gets to it or worst case, you can arrive as the man that you're marking receives the ball and force him to go backwards. When you give your opponents lots of time and space, that's when they can hurt you. If you don't give them this luxury, you become in control of the situation. If every time your opponent receives the ball, they can't get their head up, they can't dribble into the space that they want to dribble, they can't play the way they want to play and they always have to go backwards, they're going to get frustrated and you're quickly on your way to defending them out of the game. As the ball is coming to your man, anticipate that and get there right as he receives it. Force him to panic, force him to have a bad touch and then our midfielder can win it and we'll gain possession of the ball. Worst case, he does have a good touch and our midfielder can come and double up and hopefully will win the ball and keep possession. Or he's forced to go backwards and that's fine as well because we're still doing a good job of defending our net, defending our defensive zone. If you can get good at this and you can anticipate that the ball is coming and you catch him waiting for the ball, you can even jump in and win possession of that ball. However, you need to be cautious and really pick your spots. Only do that if you know that you're going to win the ball. The same principles apply whether you're playing center back or full back. You are the player closest to the ball. You want to press. If you're worried about getting beat, you just want to slow this player down and force him to go sideways or backwards. If you are not the player pressing the ball closest to the ball, you want to cover the space in behind because if we get multiple players going to the same ball, we create space for other attackers to get into. We leave gaps and we compromise our team's defensive shape. As the player closest to the ball goes to press, you want to keep your shape and you want to protect the space in behind him because if he does get beat, for example, let's say he gets beat and this player is in this space, you'll be there to cover his position. Now, if you do get beat, you are this player that went to press and you do get beat, make sure you quickly turn. Don't waste a second complaining. Quickly turn and get back into your team shape. Now, what you may have to do is cover the position of the player who went to cover you. One more important example I want to illustrate is what happens if you press your opponent when he's on the ball and he plays a pass and then makes a forward run. In this situation, what happens is most players go to press the ball and as this ball is passed, they make the mistake of watching the ball and they move towards the ball rather than worrying about their man who is making the dangerous run. What I want you to do in this situation instead is, yes, close the man who's on the ball, go to press him, but as that ball is being passed into here, you need to track the run of the man that you are marking. Let this player worry about him. Unless you know you can win this pass because he made a bad pass or this player had a really heavy touch, so say that ball is played into here and he plays it into there. If you know you can win it, then yes, go for it. But if he quickly plays that pass and then he's making a forward run, drop off immediately and try to stay goal-side inside of this player. Let this defender handle this, let the mid-feelers come to double up. You need to mark the dangerous run that this player can make because if he plays that pass and gets in behind, so he gets the ball here, you go to press, you close, he plays that pass, you go here, he comes in behind, now he's in a very dangerous position all by himself. I've made an individual defending technique video that I want to share with you and I'll post that link in the description of this video. But I just want to give you a few ideas about individual defending and some tips that will help you be more successful. Number one, don't give up your goal-side position because you're trying to win the ball. So let's say you're defending this player. What you don't want to do is try to win the ball on this side of him, being overambitious and lunging in on this side of the player. Worst case, you force him to go backwards, but you don't want to give up your goal-side position because if he turns you, then he's in behind and there's no one there to protect the space. So keep your goal-side position when you're defending. Don't dive in or approach the attacker with too much speed because all it takes is a little touch and he's going to get past you. Yes, you do want to jockey to a certain degree. You need to realize that there's a big difference between jockeying, staying with your man and giving him too much space so he can put a cross into the box or make a dangerous forward pass. So I want you to close down quickly. Yes, be cautious and don't dive in, but close down that space. Be confident in your ability to defend and your ability to move laterally quickly. Stay light on your toes and if he does try to take you on, be ready to move with him. So close down that space, don't dive in, but if this player has a heavy touch, he shows too much of the ball to you, don't feel like you always have to jockey. Sometimes the best move is just to stick a hard tackle and win possession for your team. When you're on the ball, keep things simple, but don't be afraid to join in the attack and start attacks from the back. First of all, get your width. Yes, when we are defending, we want to be nice and compact. We don't want to give them space to play through us, but when we're attacking, we want to do the opposite. We want to get really wide to force the opposition to chase the ball. So the full backs are going to get nice and wide. Center backs are going to spread. Then we're just going to move the ball around the back, mostly to touch, moving the ball quickly, forcing the opposition to chase, keeping that ball and using a lot of pace on your passes to ensure that that ball moves quickly. Now, as a defender, you need to know your role. It's not your job to dribble up the whole field, beat six guys, and get a shot in the top corner. You'll get your chances to attack and you'll get your chances to score, but you need to know your role and you need to play the ball to the attackers and let the attackers attack. However, that doesn't mean you can't support the attack, especially as a full back. You need to be getting forward all of the time. Play the ball into your attackers, let them do the attacking, but give them supporting options. And if you're a full back, as I say, get into those four positions and encourage them to play you the ball. Specifically as a center back, always think about creating angles of support. So as any player on the field, whenever my teammate has the ball, I should always be thinking about creating passing angles, places where he can get me the ball rather than hiding behind defenders. But especially as a center back, you always want to think about giving good supportive angles. So if the ball goes into my full back and he gets closed down, this is not a good supporting angle. I want to be somewhere like here. If the ball goes into my central midfielder and he's getting closed down, or even if he's not getting closed down, I still want to give good supporting angles from both center backs. You want to give options. If the ball goes into my goalkeeper, I want to give those options right away and give opportunities for people to give us passes. If your team is on the ball and our center backs aren't giving supportive angles for a pass, we're forced to play the ball forward either by dribbling when we shouldn't be dribbling or just clipping the ball over the top. So when your team has the ball, always think about where should I be to support this play. And as this other center back, you can already anticipate that that ball is going to come to him and then it's going to come to me and then I'm already in a position. I'm already in a supportive angle and I can switch the play and start the attack. As a full back, you also want to be creating angles for your teammates to pass you the ball and help them get out of trouble. If the ball goes into defensive midfielder, again, you want to support and give an angle so he can get out of trouble. You do, however, have more license to get forward. So let's say that ball went into my winger. If he's going inside, I'm going to take that as an invitation to overlap and get on the outside. And when you do get into these good attacking areas, make sure you take a deep breath and you focus on your quality, whether that's whipping a good ball into the back post for someone to attack or just putting a ball across the face of goal inviting someone to come and score. If my winger does get on the ball and he's attacking and he gets closed down, again, I want to be a supporting the attack, creating an angle for pass to get the ball so we can quickly switch it or I can even dribble into this space and start attacking. You can also dribble out from the back if there's no options. However, you need to be very cautious when you're doing this because losing the ball in this situation can be extremely dangerous. So dribble into this space. If that's your option, be confident, dribble into this space, then release a pass and again, focus on creating those supporting angles. Everyone gets up the field. You can also play more forward passes, whether you're playing center back or full back. If the options aren't on and you aren't able to play out of the back you just have your head up and you notice that someone is wide. You can play a nice diagonal ball to get the ball to the feet of your winger and start an attack or you can notice the run of a striker whether that's coming to the ball and then spinning, trying to clip a ball in behind or just anticipating his run in behind the last defender. So don't be afraid to play these passes. You don't always have to play nice little passes on the ground out of the back. In fact, it's good to vary your play because it keeps the opposition honest. Most importantly, take care of the ball. I encourage you to play out of the back, move the ball around the back quickly and keep possession of the ball as a defender. Be confident with the ball at your feet but realize that losing the ball as a defender is extremely dangerous. So be cautious when it comes to losing possession. Don't be afraid to play backwards and to even play to your goalkeeper. As long as when you do, you're quickly giving those supporting options and allowing the keeper a way to play out from the back. I just want to give you one little bonus tip that will be helpful whenever you're defending whether you're playing center back or full back or even as a midfielder. When you're going to attack a goal kick or a long ball, you're trying to win a header, just one helpful tip that will help you win way more headers. Instead of this ball being played and we're both jumping from a standstill what you want to do is take a few steps back even one or two steps back and then attack the ball. So instead of jumping flat footed trying to get as high as you can what you want to do is take a few steps back and then as that ball is coming you're moving towards the ball and this forward momentum will allow you to jump higher and attack the ball better than your opponent who's jumping from a standstill or trying to make a shuffle step backwards and then jump. So take that little tip and apply it whenever you're defending goal kicks or long balls take two steps back two steps forward use that forward momentum to come and win the header. Thanks for watching this video please like this video with a thumbs up before you leave if you have any questions on this topic or any topic comment below share this video with your friends and teammates and come back tomorrow because we're going to keep improving and keep moving towards your goals I'll talk to you guys real soon