The primary week of preseason can simply change into overloaded.
There are gamers to evaluate, techniques to put in, bodily masses to handle, roles to contemplate, and a restricted period of time earlier than the primary competitors. That may create stress to cowl as a lot as potential as rapidly as potential.
I don’t suppose that’s one of the simplest ways to method it.
For me, the primary week of preseason has two important functions.
- Develop understanding of the place the crew presently is so I could make higher selections about the place future improvement work must go.
- Set up or reinforce the techniques, buildings, and methods of working that I count on to be foundational for the remainder of the season.
These two are intently linked. The method of putting in the best way we need to play helps reveal what the crew understands, what it might presently execute, and the place a very powerful gaps are.
Begin by understanding the crew you even have
It’s tempting to enter preseason with an in depth plan for the whole lot the crew wants to perform. Planning is an effective factor, however I’d warning about how detailed you get earlier than really seeing the crew on the court docket.
Even when you’ve got a big group of returning gamers, the crew isn’t the identical because it was on the finish of the earlier season. Gamers modified. Roles could have modified. Bodily readiness varies. You may have the very same squad, however they’re nonetheless a distinct crew.
The primary week, subsequently, wants to supply a helpful image of the crew’s present stage.
That doesn’t imply testing each ability or attempting to judge each participant in opposition to an extended guidelines, although. The purpose is to determine what is going to most strongly have an effect on the crew’s improvement and efficiency.
A few of the questions I sometimes need answered embrace:
- What can the crew already do reliably?
- The place does play break down?
- Which issues are primarily technical?
- Which issues are tactical or organizational?
- How properly do gamers coordinate with one another?
- How rapidly do they acknowledge and clear up issues?
- What seems prone to restrict the crew if we don’t tackle it?
The solutions to these questions ought to form the subsequent part of preseason.
Use precise volleyball for analysis
To know the crew, that you must see gamers taking part in volleyball. It’s that straightforward.
Remoted drills inform don’t actually inform us a complete lot about how gamers learn conditions, make selections, coordinate duties, and reply to stress. These parts matter as a result of crew efficiency isn’t merely the sum of particular person abilities.
A passer could look technically sound in a managed exercise, however battle to handle seams in precise serve obtain. A setter could ship correct balls from a predictable location however make poor decisions when the cross is off the web. Defenders could dig properly, however don’t really defend properly as a result of they fail to place themselves correctly.
The primary week ought to subsequently embrace consultant recreation conditions early in your apply planning. Which may imply small-sided video games, wash video games, constrained 6v6 play, or different buildings that repeatedly expose the conditions you need to consider.
The aim isn’t merely to make apply extra aggressive, nonetheless. It’s to provide higher data. The extra intently the exercise resembles the choices and relationships discovered within the recreation, the extra helpful the observations change into.
Set up the bottom offensive and defensive techniques
The primary week can be after I need to set up the essential means the crew will play. That usually means the bottom offensive and defensive techniques.
The purpose isn’t to put in each variation, adjustment, or particular scenario. As an alternative, the deal with the buildings that may set up the crew’s play all through the season.
On offense, which will embrace:
- Serve obtain formations
- Setter and hitter duties
- Primary assault patterns
- Transition expectations
- Hitter protection
- Communication round out-of-system play
On protection, it might embrace:
- Blocking duties
- Base protection positioning
- Seam and zone accountability
- Motion in response to the set
- Transition from protection to offense
- Communication earlier than and in the course of the rally
The precise particulars will depend upon the extent and the crew, however the precept is identical. Gamers want a shared framework. With out that framework, you may spend numerous time correcting particular person actions which are really signs of unclear crew group.
Don’t confuse publicity with set up
Introducing a system isn’t the identical as putting in it. Gamers could perceive a diagram or walk-through and nonetheless be unable to use the system throughout dwell play. They might carry out it accurately in a managed sequence after which abandon it in dwell play.
Set up requires repeated publicity in consultant conditions. It additionally requires suggestions that helps gamers perceive not solely what they need to do, however why the accountability exists and what data ought to information the motion.
That’s why the diagnostic and set up functions of the primary week work properly collectively. As gamers attempt to execute the crew system, the employees will get to see:
- What they perceive
- What they misinterpret
- The place duties are unclear
- Which habits are already established
- How properly gamers modify after suggestions
- Which components of the system require extra time
The system turns into each a taking part in framework and an evaluation device.
Set up methods of working
The primary week additionally units expectations for a way the crew will work. That is broader than crew guidelines or requirements posted on a wall. Gamers are studying how issues work in apply.
They’re studying how rapidly they’re anticipated to maneuver between actions, how suggestions will probably be delivered, how a lot accountability they’ve for fixing issues, how teammates talk, and what good coaching habits appears to be like like.
They’re additionally studying what the coaches persistently discover and reinforce.
➡️ If coaches say communication issues however hardly ever tackle it, what message do you suppose the gamers obtain?
➡️ If coaches cease each error and supply each answer, do gamers be taught to search out options or do they await instruction?
➡️ If the employees values aggressive intent however buildings apply in ways in which hardly ever require significant selections, when will gamers develop decision-making abilities?
Methods of working ought to subsequently be constructed into apply moderately than handled as a separate preseason discuss.
They’ll embrace expectations round:
- Communication
- Consideration and readiness
- Response to suggestions
- Aggressive intent
- Drawback-solving
- Teammate accountability
- Transitions between actions
- Possession of requirements
- How the group responds after errors
The primary week gives an early alternative to determine these patterns. That doesn’t imply the whole lot will probably be good instantly. It means the crew begins to know how it’s anticipated to function.
Use every precedence to tell the others
These three priorities shouldn’t be handled as separate blocks. Understanding the crew, putting in techniques, and establishing methods of working ought to occur collectively.
A 6v6 serve obtain recreation, for instance, could enable the employees to judge passing, reinforce offensive group, make clear seam accountability, observe communication, and set up expectations for a way the crew responds after a breakdown. That’s extra invaluable than working one exercise for analysis, one other for system set up, and one other for crew requirements.
Good apply design permits a number of aims to overlap. The vital level is that the coach stays clear about what’s being noticed and strengthened. With out that readability, recreation play can change into exercise with out helpful studying. With it, the identical recreation can present data, improvement, and system repetition on the similar time.
Keep away from attempting to resolve the whole lot within the first week
The primary week ought to create course, not completion.
There will probably be technical points that require longer-term improvement. Some tactical parts have to attend till the bottom construction is safer. Sure roles could stay unclear. Some gamers will want extra repetitions earlier than you can also make assured selections.
That’s regular. The purpose isn’t to go away the primary week with a completed crew. It’s to have:
- A clearer image of the crew’s present strengths and limitations
- A shared understanding of the bottom offensive and defensive techniques
- Established expectations for a way the crew works
- Higher data for planning the subsequent stage of preseason
The primary week ought to make the whole lot that follows extra purposeful.
A sensible planning query
When planning the opening week, I might start with three questions:
- What will we most have to study this crew?
- What should we set up about how we intend to play?
- What methods of working do we would like gamers to expertise from the beginning?
These questions assist preserve the plan targeted. Additionally they scale back the temptation to measure progress by how a lot materials you’ve lined.
The worth of the primary week isn’t within the variety of drills accomplished or techniques launched. It’s in how a lot clearer the trail ahead turns into.
I’ve put collectively a pattern first-week preseason construction exhibiting how these priorities can match throughout a number of practices. It’s obtainable within the Teaching Volleyball Group.
Should you’re working with novices, this put up could also be helpful: Newbie Volleyball Observe Plan: Your First 2 Weeks.