Wednesday, December 24, 2008

Split Training: Two Sides of The Same Coin

Ladies' and Juniors' training started off with a refreshing one-round run outside PBSM then progressed to a more lighthearted, haven't-seen-since-last-year 'Monkey in The Middle'. This drill started with two monkeys and one ball and finally ended with four monkeys and two balls. It was indeed very confusing and entertaining at the same time, especially if two balls came to the same person at once.

The next drill was a simple lobbing exercise. The players were divided into two lines; one line to lob and the other to replace all the balls that had been lobbed. It was all a little strange, and finally Coach Jason decided to keep Julian, Sachin and Tristan as the replace-ers and let the others lob. Not that the first three enjoyed themselves any less, as they raced against the clock to see how fast they could replace all the balls. Kyle stood out, as almost all of his balls ended up inside the goal.

Now that all the players had lobbed to their satisfaction, Coach Jason revealed that, if they were successful at lobbing, then they would be successfuly at shooting. The only trick was to press harder. So he divided the players into three lines, and at the first blow of his whistle, the first line would have to step up and shoot into the empty goal up ahead. And so on, and so forth.

After each line had shot twenty times (imagine blowing the whistle sixty times...), Coach Jason gathered the players and asked how many balls had entered the goal, telling the players that their score this week would be the benchmark for the weeks to come.

Coach Jason then decided to have game time, with 20 minutes left. Since there were three ladies and six juniors, it meant that the sides would be uneven, to the dismay of some of the players. They grumbled a little, but in the end ran out 1-0 winners in a nonstop game that could have had so many more goals.

It was a little hard for the ladies to adjust to the lower level of play introduced this week, but both ladies and juniors certainly enjoyed themselves in the low-pressure, relaxed environment.

As for the men's first split training, the goalies started their training at 9am to 10am. Technical training for them. Real training began at 10am, with jogging and THE DRAGON RUN. Some were worn out from the running and some even continued running even though injured. Semangat ni.

After that, all got in the hall and as usual, the players were instructed to find a partner and to practise their passing without looking down. Coach Kuan Yang's first drill of the day was the 2-on-1 and the second wan was the snake drill. One of Coach Kuan Yang's favourite drills, the TRIANGLE PMS. (PMS=Passing, Movement, Shooting).

The drill was supposed to train players to attack during a game. Coach Kuan Yang said that if the seniors were fast enough to catch the drills, there would be more ahead.

It was game time. Everyone was pumped up and played with all their might. Noise could be heard from everyone's stomachs. Training ended at 1pm.

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