Edition 9

Welcome to the Soccer Newsletter.  One of my purposes in starting this newsletter was to give people the opportunity to write in and either express their views or to ask questions that might be pertinent to a larger audience.  While the number of members of the Soccer Newsletter is not large, they are quite diverse with membership ranging from the US to the UK to Australia.  Also, of the few that I know, they range from the parent of a 10 year old to a number of college coaches.  The reason I am writing this is simply to let you know that if you have a question or comment, chances are a lot of other people are wondering this same thing.  Please do not hesitate to send them in to comments@finesoccer.com

Today's subject was suggested by a college coach.  He wrote in asking me to take the last subject of types of runs up front with two forwards and continue with this same subject but with three front runners.

I am going to start talking about this with the assumption that the ball is with the left midfielder and she is out wide.  Now, if the three frontrunnners are working together and making various types of crossing runs (instead of the traditional two wingers and a center forward) then chance are the forward on the left side will make the checking run.   The forward in the middle will probably make a run toward the left corner flag.   This run will be done for two purposes.  The first one is to clear the space in the middle of the field for the third runner.  The second purpose is to try to receive the ball on the sideline in order to get a ball served across the field.  As this second runner is making her run, she must quickly realize where the defender is.   If the defender is right on her back, then she will continue this run with the hope of receiving the ball toward the sideline with her body shielding the defender from the ball.  Then when she receives the ball, it will be her responsibility to get it turned and served.  If she has lost her defender, then she will bend her run toward the sideline and then in so that the ball could be played to her left foot in front of her and toward the goal allowing her to receive the ball going straight toward goal.  The third runner will work to take the space abandoned by both the first and second runners making a bent run toward the middle of the field.  She actually would be the first option for the outside midfielder to play the ball to since she will closest to the goal.   This is a prime example of where the player with the ball should look far first, then medium and then short (note I am not talking about just kicking the ball down field aimlessly).  If the ball is played to the second runner, third runner would make the near post run for the ball to be served and either a central midfielder of the opposite outside midfielder would make the far post run.

If the first checking run is made by the central forward, then the other two forward would make bent away runs (the one on the right would make a counter clockwise bent run and the one on the left would make a clockwise bent run.  The midfielders would then fill in the spaces abandoned by these runners.

Please do not infer from this that these runs have to be made every time, or that these are the only runs that are available to make.  All that I have done is to show some of the logical runs given this formation.

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Have a great day.

Lawrence