Finishing football drills, page 3

Holding the ball with your back to goal is physical before it is technical. Accept the contact, stay side on, refuse to be moved.

The same start produces a finish through the middle, on the right or on the left. Practising the choice matters more than practising any one of the three.

Beating a man and finishing are two different skills, and most players only practise one. This joins them into a single repetition.

In a shooting circuit the set is harder than the shot. A bad lay-off ruins a repetition for two players and nobody blames the setter.

Killing the pace on a dropping ball is the whole exercise. Get that touch right and the shot becomes the easy part of the repetition.

The turn is won before the ball arrives. Move the marker, show at an angle, take the first touch away from him, then finish low.

A combination finishing drill: play it wide, into the centre, set it back, then a through ball for a timed curved run across the mannequins and a finish.

Most lay-off practices contain one bounce. Chaining several means holding the shape through a longer sequence and still arriving with the shot on.

Most sessions rehearse phases in isolation. This joins four of them, because in a match they arrive with no reset in between.

Striking a dropping ball is a distinct technique and it barely appears in normal finishing sessions. This narrow lane forces every ball to be dealt with in the air.

Three runners arriving together is one runner. Stagger them and a pull-back anywhere across the face finds somebody unmarked.

Three short passes buy the space and the fourth one uses it. The skill being trained is recognising which of the four you are playing.