Compete in a realistic small-sided game: keep the ball to progress, win it back quickly when you lose it, and punish the transition by attacking the end zone the opponent has just left open.
Mark a 25x18 yard pitch with an end zone at each end. Two teams of four. Score by dribbling the ball under control into the opponent's end zone. On losing the ball, react immediately: counter-press to win it back or recover your shape. Play short games of three to four minutes and keep score. Add small goals or a target player as variations.
Four against four is the format research keeps returning to, because it produces more touches, more decisions and more one against one situations per player than anything larger. In a 25x18 yard box nobody can hide, and no player goes more than a few seconds without being directly involved.
Scoring by dribbling into an end zone rather than into goals is a deliberate choice and it changes the game entirely. Goals pull every player towards two fixed points and reward the long hopeful ball. End zones are wide, so the pitch stays used across its full width, defenders have to hold a line rather than collapse, and progress has to be earned by moving the opponent rather than by hitting a target.
The moment that decides these games is the turnover, and it decides them in about five seconds. A team that reacts instantly, either counter-pressing the ball or recovering into shape, usually survives. A team that spends two seconds complaining about losing it concedes, because in a box this size two seconds is the whole length of the pitch.
What coaches most often get wrong is intervening too much. The format is the coaching. Stopping a 4v4 every ninety seconds to explain something removes the repetition that makes it valuable in the first place. Set the constraint, let it run, and coach in the natural breaks.
Save it to your private drills, then change the animation, adjust positions, swap equipment, or drop it into a session block. Or start from a blank pitch and build your own.