Pete Sturgess, our early years specialist, has added an extra blog to the skilful players series. In this blog, he discusses player's perception skills, their decision making and the non-perfect pass as part of being skilful. 

When we think about skilful play our minds can immediately be drawn towards dribblers, attacking players and goal scorers yet skilful play can appear in all areas of the pitch. It can be part of every player’s “toolbox” regardless of their position. 

In this clip, a more defensively minded player displays some of the skilful traits that we have been bringing to coaches’ attention, when observing their young players. 

 
The skills of anticipation and interception are vital in any invasion game. The ability to do this successfully begins with being able to take in information from your surroundings to inform your next actions and decisions. As a defensive player, you might scan the pitch to ascertain your own position, opponents and teammates in relation to the ball. You may be looking at the player's (in possession) body shape with the ball in case they give you a clue as to what their next action might be.  Having looked you may see a free player who could be the recipient of the next pass and you are ready and in position to intercept. 
 
We can never be sure about exactly what each player’s thought processes are but as coaches we need to help our players understand how a visual search could help with the decisions that are made. The player in our clip has been able to intercept the pass and it is great that his first thought or intention is to be positive and attack. Even though he is travelling quickly with the ball, he takes some quick glances to further assess the changing situation. 
 
Having a greater mastery over the ball gives players more time to look around when the ball is at their feet, so this must be a priority for our youngest players. By looking around our player sees that he is now confronted by a recovering defender and he appears to react in the moment with some quick and effective manipulation of the ball. Was it reactive or had his previous scans informed his decision? We will never know for sure but he is able to act in the moment, avoid the defender and open up the opportunity to pass to a teammate. 
 
You will see that the pass is not your standard, textbook pass. The game requires many adjustments to the “perfect pass” or the “perfect dribble or turn” and skilful players can adjust and adapt their technique for more successful outcomes. This is where playing lots of carefully designed practices and games can help players develop their skill. No two situations will be exactly the same so constant adjustment is necessary and this kind of flexibility in technique and decision-making sets players on the route to becoming more skilful, and more influential in the games that they play. 
 
It was great that this skilful play resulted in a goal as this is the outcome we obviously want the most. 

I hope this “deeper dive” series into developing more skilful players has been enjoyable for you to read and useful for your development as a coach. 
 
If you want to ask Pete a question or have any further thoughts about any of the clips, please comment below. Let’s keep the conversation going about skilful players.