Why You Should Juggle

The Importance of Juggling in Soccer

Juggling is a key training element which is often overlooked. Juggling allows the players to use all parts of their body to gain a feel for the ball. These touches build confidence and makes players aware of parts of their body used to control or pass the ball. With a larger range of comfort with the ball, imagination is often sparked in game play. A good juggler does not guarantee the player will be a good game player, as there is no substitute for match play. Juggling should become a daily routine that only takes a few minutes a day. Coaches should encourage players to develop good juggling technique. When juggling, coaches should stress the following points:

1. Use all parts of the body (head, chest, thighs, and feet) and alternate feet. Don’t get caught only juggling with your dominant foot!
2. Focus on good controlled touch to realize the full potential of juggling. If a player does not have good body control this will lead to bad touches.
3. Be able to control the ball in different situations. So if a player has a bad touch, they should try to recover it rather than starting over.
4. Be able to maintain good body position.
5. Find rhythm and harmony between the player and the ball.
6. Practice while standing still, then progress to walking slowly and then with some pressure by either time or opponents.

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Development of juggling skill in training provides four important benefits that money can't buy, these being: touch, balance, agility, soccer specific fitness

Touch
Top level players feel the ball through the shoe, and know at every moment what part of the ball and what parts of the foot are in contact. The player learns to project, mentally, down to the surface touching the ball, foot, thigh, chest, or head, and learns to feel where the ball will go next based on the last touch. For example, it's easy for you to toss a basketball back and forth between your right and left hands, even with your eyes closed. Your mind is in your fingertips. Why shouldn't practice make it easy for a player to "toss" a soccer ball between feet?
You must encourage juggling in order to develop touch, because touch translates into better results in matches. With good touch, players will weight their passes more accurately, have an easier time beating opponents with attacking moves, and be more successful at holding the ball against pressure, all because of improved touch gained by juggling.

Balance
When you juggle, touch on the ball is half the battle, the other is in controlling your body. Being able to make rapid, quick, micro adjustments with all the large and small muscles is a requirement for successful juggling, and players with better balance are the ones who can move to their right but keep their balance to shoot the ball to the left, just inside the post. (There's no kidding about the value of balance. I have a player this year who trains 4-5 hours a day as a competitive figure skater, and she's finished in the top ten nationally the last two years. She has incredible balance and agility, and in this year's state cup final, she took on two defenders and beat each with a quick lateral move to the right, then finished with a goal to the left post. The keeper had nochance to go back the other way.)

Agility
Balance's natural partner, like balance in motion. The ability to change directions quickly. As juggling increases balance, it does improve agility somewhat, especially for those players who work in group juggling exercises where movement and control mix together. Like this one:
Groups of two, juggle four touches, loft a pass half height (chest high) to partner and move to new location 6 feet away and prepare to get ball back. Partner does likewise.

Soccer Specific Fitness
Sure your players can run a long way in the Cooper test, but do they have the leg development, balance, abdominal and lower back development to check back to the ball, kill a hard pass, turn and make an attacking move to goal, and repeat this 50 times a match ? After they do this 20 times, do they still have both the fitness and the touch to be successful ? Juggling is fairly aerobic, especially if you do it in a group with movement, and helps accomplish development of those little muscles that wear out quickly in matches if not conditioned, like hip flexors and lower back muscles. Kids with underdeveloped hip flexors have absolutely no speed at all late in a game.