I need help! I coach a U-14 girls team and have a goalkeeper who is now pretty tall (almost 6 feet).. She is unfortunately getting torched on the ground with low shots.. Shots near her ankles, within grasp etc., are going in the net.. Can someone help? What extra activities can she work on (we are outdoors in two weeks)?
i have the same problem atm with our 6 foot goalie. basically she needs to get comfortable diving and getting to the ground quickly. Start sitting on the ground and diving back and forth, then go to your knees. When your keeper is comfortable then stand. I never played keeper so i had to learn from videos, but this guy is really great imo. [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ay5GdZ-30XM"]YouTube- diving beginning technique (part 1 of 2)[/ame] [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=blz9_M1sqhU"]YouTube- diving beginning technique part 2 0001[/ame] [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPJRhCFh2cA"]YouTube- Diving drills for beginning goalkeepers part 1 of 2[/ame] [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_C20hSMniE"]YouTube- diving drills for beginning goalkeepers part 2 of 2[/ame]
Hard to say without seeing. First, make sure her knees are bent, or more bent, when set. And have the hands set lower. I think shots down by the ankle are one of the hardest for goalies to handle. The goalie has to make a quick decision on how to make that save. She needs to know her feet are an option to make the save. I think these saves are more reflex saves than your traditional shot. A drill I'd suggest is to have the goalie face the goal, yell shot, then shoot from about 12 yards out, she turns around and the shot is coming at her. Mix up the shots, but make the majority of them near her ankles. She'll get the hang of it.
Check out my site, JB Goalkeeping, for tips and training sessions. One common thing I see with low balls is the keeper starts up high in their stance, then moves their hands diagonally down towards the ball on the ground. It is actually much more effective to get low first, using the knees, then shoot the hand sideways (almost along the ground) towards the ball. If the ball is low, the keeper needs to be low. Also check out the "windmill" or rotation dive (clip on my site under "advanced diving"). It's another technique for getting the hands to those low close-to-the-ankle shots.
Benji's JB goalkeeping website, and the St. Louis GK videos on youtube are great places to start for technical help. As always, with keeper technique, start by analyzing her footwork before working on diving. Two or three quick steps might get her in front of a ball better than a dive can. After that, you can adapt the situations at practice. * Stop using the big goal at the field for practice. * Go to Home Depot and pick up 4 good size orange traffic cones (2-3 feet tall). Use those as your goalposts. * Make players play the ball under cone height to score, and force the goalkeeper to get low and make saves with her hands - no kick saves. Apart from that, refer her to a good keeper trainer in the area. Buffalo, NY has a few very solid GK trainers. Ask your DOC if he knows one. If not, phone a friend.
As a sub 6 foot rec.keeper I need to remind myself to keep low. I try to mimic a 1/2-1/4 squat stance. It's pretty easy to tell if your watching from the side line. If my back is vertical it's a lot harder to save low shots.
I was a keeper for a long time and this was key to quick reactions on the ground -- start out on the ground. It makes the keeper comfortable with landing technique with very little impact before moving up. A great warm-up activity for keepers is for two to start out sitting on the ground, legs out in front of them. Toss the ball back and forth, easy stuff first and then further out to the sides forcing side dives off the butt. Then move up to the knees, moving a bit further apart and do the same. In addition, drill the proper stance and being on the balls of her feet all the time, ready to react with the hands out and open. I actually do some quick breathing to boost my reaction speed when I see the other team getting close to a goal-scoring opportunity. Keep the feet moving and be in the proper position wherever the ball goes. The keeper wants to be along a straight line from the ball to the center of the goal. You can move forward or back along that line to cut down the angle, but being on the line creates the shortest distance to cover to any corner of the goal. The last point I'll make is one that far too many keepers do poorly -- dive at a slightly forward angle. This cuts off the angle a bit and makes it easier to reach the corners. Far too many keepers go slightly backward when diving and this opens up the angle of the goal, making it more difficult to reach the outer angles - more distance to cover with a small time advantage.
Thanks for the quick responses everyone. It's just frustrating being stuck in a gym setting during the early spring.
For keeper training in a gym, try to get some mats to work on and set it up so that your keepers have a wall to work off of. I spent a great deal of winter/spring training on my own working on diving with mats and a wall -- bounce the ball off the wall in various ways and catch it. This is a great way to build up repetitions to improve/training catching technique for high, low and bouncing balls. I could get well over 100 catches in a short amount of time. In general this does little to improve reaction time and positioning, but those can be worked on with indoor games where they are critical for a keeper. Note: a good trick I use with positioning is to glance across the field. The opposite goal (if set-up correctly) will give you a fair indication of your position respective to your goal. This makes it so that I don't have to look back and take my eyes away from the action.
You can work on low balls on a hardwood floor. Wear long sleeves & pants, padded if possible. If the technique is good, it shouldn't be too harsh on the body. Don't do it for an hour, but if they can make low saves without killing themselves on the hard floor, their technique is good.
These are great techniques for teaching. I've been using these with my two goalies and they are able to dive with much greater effect as a result. Thanks,
sorry for the delay in a response....just found this page. I am 6'2" and always had problems with low shots. Other than working on them consistenly, which should be done, I changed the postioning of my hands when I setup for a shot. Most keepers are taught to keep their hands a little above waist level and fingers pointed up. when I am anticipating a shot I drop my hands down to the side at about knee level and fingers pointed down. It helped tremendously getting my hands down to low balls faster.....I still do it today, 25+ years later.