Football coaches need to understand football because it’s what they intend to coach.

In every other profession, those practising it can describe exactly what it is because it is what they are taught first. An example:

When you study science, you start by defining what is science to get an idea.

The same will happen for Geography, Medicine, Biology, Art and many others

What is football?

Football is a highly tactical team sport that is based on teamwork, and opposition and involves social (working together and involves respecting hierarchy) and motor (movement of the limbs) skills.

There are currently three forms of football recognized by FIFA and have a World Cup format.

These are Football (eleven-a side), futsal and beach soccer.

Football is a competitive sport played by two teams which creates opposition and the competitiveness that continues to grow in the form of playing for a trophy, playing for a position, and playing to get into a team/squad.

Football has objectives. The first objective of any football match is to win the match by attacking to score goals and defending not to concede goals. Any football match will take on that as the main objective the moment the match kicks off.

Football has laws and regulations to be followed. The laws of the game are in place for the game to be played within the laws of the game that are updated by IFAB annually and competition regulations guide what and how to do for situations that will happen during a competition.

Football is a free-flowing and multi-directional sport with fewer stoppages. The game is free-flowing in the sense that when the referee starts the match, it hardly stops and keeps going on until the permitted breaks according to the laws of the game or regulations.

It’s also free-flowing in the sense that both teams can have/not have possession of the ball without having to stop the game and players are not restricted to certain areas of the pitch.

Football is multi-directional the play goes on in all directions without restrictions. A goal can be scored/conceded on any part of the pitch. A player can be dispossessed in any direction.

Football presents problems (technical, tactical, physical, mental and social) to the players and those problems are solved by the players.

During a football match, players will be presented with the following problems;

Technically; How do they dispossess an opponent? How do they pass to a teammate that is 60 metres away? How does the goalkeeper handle a high cross?

Tactically; How do they shoot while in a tight angle? How do they defend when they are 1v1? How does the goalkeeper distribute to a teammate that is 5 metres away or 60 metres away?

Physically (condition) Are they able to change direction quickly? Are they able to leap on time? Is the goalkeeper able to get down and up in the shortest time possible? Can they perform the same tasks in the 90^th minute?

Mentally; Can they concentrate on the task at hand? Can they take in information from the game, teammates and opponents? Can they control positive and negative emotions? Are they committed to high standards whatever the outcome of the match?

Socially; Are they willing to work for each other? Do they place the team ahead of themselves? Do they understand the team’s goal and think that ahead of personal interests?

As a football coach, if your training session doesn’t reflect one or all of the highlighted areas then you aren’t coaching football.

A common example for us in Uganda is with the ball in and out of play, during training sessions, the ball is hardly out of play because it’s treated as a “hot cake” but during football matches the referee will clearly signal when the ball is out of play and that is one of the main complaints about referees because we carry the “hot cake” mentality from training to matches.

We also have the challenge of coaching players by wanting to solve their problems like telling them where to pass, alerting them about their opponents and many other instructions that we give players based on what to do and not to do. This kind of coaching leads to players’ inability to solve problems presented to them in a more challenging environment like the game being played at a high tempo or in a nosy stadium.

Now that we know what football is, let’s work on coaching football.