Football Drills & Plays

Coming up with new ideas for drills for youth football can sometimes be a challenge.  Here’s a football linebacker drill and a football coaching tip that work well! Give them a try.

From Danny…
This is a football drill that my kids ages 8-11 love to do. We call it the linebacker drill.

You take two cones and put them 10 yards apart.Then take 4 more and line them up as holes,1,2,3,4. Make 2 lines,One on each cone.

One side runs the ball,the other line has to slide down the line read the hole, keep his head on the runner’s inside shoulder and attack the ball carrier.

This teaches them to tackle correct, read correct and not to over play the  ball carrier. This also helps the runners vision. My kids love the one on one contact  football drills.

From Brent…
This may be pretty basic but I coach football to 5-8 year olds and the 1 thing that changed my whole practice was SPRAY CHALK. For a couple bucks you can get this stuff and put it on the ground anywhere. The best part that it goes away fast.Spray dots, lines or short pass routes and the kids know where they got to run.  After a few plays its gone.

Technorati Tags: drills for youth football, football linebacker drill, football coaching tip, football drill, football

Karl wrote to me and sent these football agility drills that he uses with his team. I’ve included them here for you to try with your team.  Keep ‘em coming!

From Karl,
Football Drill - Linebackers:

I have a tarp spread out with 2 players (or coaches) holding either end tight  (depending on the height of the player it should be about an two inches higher than the linebacker in “read” position - legs shoulder width, bent knees)
I have a football player under the tarp in his “read” position and stutter step for 30 seconds.  (I increase to 45 seconds then 1 minute in successive weeks, particularly during training camp and spring).  The player must be in the ‘read” position and not have the helmet touch the tarp or another 10 seconds will be added for each touch.
The purpose of this football agility drill is to have the linebackers accustomed to playing always in that position on the balls of their feet so they can react quickly without getting caught flat footed.

Tip
For me, I put a very big emphasis on footwork no matter the position.  From receivers who need to make their breaks, corners who need to make their cuts, linebackers who need to react, running backs who need to make their cuts, linemen who need to get off the ball quickly and QB she need to have quick feet to ensure they get back in the pocket quickly to have that extra read time.  I put at least one footwork football drill every practice on getting quicker feet (whether using speed ladders or agility bars).

Technorati Tags: football agility drills, football, football agility drill, football drill

Special thanks to Jim, one of my subscribers, for sending this one in.  If you’ve searching for drills to coach flag football, you must try this out!

From Jim…
Here’s our flag football drill.

Since its flag football, our league is made up for 5 players. The defense must rush from ten yards back after the snap.

Anyway, I line up a wr far right, the other four guys are tightly together with a running back that stands next to the qb. After the ball is snapped the four guys stand without moving but the wr takes off. The four guys yell out his name like it a muffed play. The wr pauses in mid field then runs off again. Let me tell you, the defense was completely frozen, no one moved, even the defendender that was covering the wr stopped dead in his tracks since the rest of his football team wasn’t moving. Peer pressure I guess!

The next football play do the same play, exactly, draw as much attention to wr verbally, the qb hands off to the rb running in opposite direction of wr. The rb has an open field as we have all the defense looking at our wr on the other side of the field.

This was so effective, the ref blew the whistle thinking that the play was dead. After speaking with the ref on the sidelines, we ran it again for a touchdown. We ran it many times the same game for long yards.

Technorati Tags: coach flag football, flag football drill, flag football, football, football play

This idea for a football conditioning drill for high school football was sent to me by one of my subscribers. Creative adaptation of a basketball drill used for football that is effective and fun!

From Mike
I adapted some old basketball drills along with the routine football drills. It is good for conditioning, hand off skills and hand eye coordination skills.

You divide the football team equal as possible with skilled positions and lineman on each team.

A cone is place 20 yds down field in front of each team. The first runner goes around the cone but on the way back he must put the ball between his legs three times stopped or running pending on his ability. If he drops the ball, he must go back to the cone and start over. Once he gets the three leg passes done, he returns to the next guy who takes the hand off, but he doesn’t run. He passes the ball over his shoulder to the next man and this continues down the line until the last man in line gets the ball. He then runs and repeats the same sequence until the last hand off to the last guy who now must run to the cone and then finish; however, now every step the ball must pass between his legs. Of course you want a receiver. RB or QB as your last guy.

You can also make this football conditioning drill work by making the players do every other (over shoulder under the crotch) until the last guy in line gets the ball and starts to run. This will add a little more difficulty. If the ball ever touches the ground whatever the skill is started again . If the ball is dropped half way back over the shoulder the ball goes back to the front of the line and the over under is started again. If the hand off is fumbled the player must go back to the cone take 3 under the leg passes and run to the handoff spot again.

As stated before, this drill works on great hand eye coordination, hand off skills, and conditioning. The kids have fun as they love to compete against each other.

Technorati Tags: football conditioning drill, high school football, football, football drills

I received these suggestions on football tips from George and from Joel. Keep em coming!

From George,
My quick football tip seems rather obvious but a lot of teams don’t do it:

On punt and kick teams, always kick the ball to the side. Never kick it down the middle. This effectively makes the field smaller, and I have found you frequently will get a recovery, on kickoff, as most little league teams do not spread out to cover the field on return teams.

Also you avoid the return teams “best back,” as he is typically sitting in the middle of the field waiting for the ball.

From Joel,
The purpose of this football drill is for “Line Get-Offs”. Its called Tag.

Pair football linemen together. One Defense and One Offense. The Offensive player stands at the depth of an offensive guard or tackle.
The defensive player is in his stance (Take Charge or Jet).
At the simulated snap the Offensive player back pedals as fast as he can and the defense player explodes of the snap, shooting hands and grasps the offensive player as quickly as possible.

Technorati Tags: football tips, football tip, football drill, football