Press as one unit off a single call. Recognise the trigger, call it early and loudly, and make sure every player reacts on the same word rather than each deciding for themselves.
In a 30x30 grid, one team keeps the ball and the other presses. Nominate one presser as the caller; only when he shouts go does the unit press, and then everyone goes. Coach the triggers: a slow square pass, a heavy touch, a ball played to a weak foot, a receiver facing his own goal. Insist on short, loud, early calls: go, press, man on, hold. Rotate the caller so everyone learns to make the decision.
A press rarely fails because players are unfit. It fails because four players started at four slightly different moments, and a press that is a second apart is not a press at all. It is a series of individual chases with a gap between each one.
Synchronising that is what the call is for. The voice is the only mechanism a team has for making several players act on the same instant, because no player can see all of his teammates and react to what they are doing. Somebody recognises the trigger, names it, and everyone moves on the word rather than on their own separate judgement.
Which means the call has to be early and it has to be loud. A call made as the ball arrives is already too late, because the distance the pressing players needed to cover was supposed to be covered while the ball was travelling. Coaches often correct the intensity of the press when the actual fault was the timing of the shout.
It also has to be short and shared. Go, hold, man on, time, drop. Five words the whole squad uses identically are worth more than a rich vocabulary half the team interprets differently, and they are worth agreeing on explicitly rather than assuming.
The failure to watch for is the half-hearted presser. One player who goes at eighty per cent leaves an open passing lane, and the opposition escapes through the exact gap the trap was built to close. That is more damaging than nobody pressing at all, because the rest of the team has already committed. Name it when you see it.
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.