How come some players are caught offside all the time? Do they not know better or is the other team doing some tricks to get them there? Let’s do a complete analysis of how to set offside traps and how to avoid getting into one. We’ll talk about the types of an offside trap you can do as defenders, and soccer hacks on how to avoid getting caught into them.

What is offside?

When an attacking player who is involved in the play is closer to the opponent’s goal line than both the ball and the second-last defender at the moment the ball is passed to them, the referee gives a free kick against the attacking team at the spot where the player received the ball. Let’s unpack that a little bit. The line we are measuring is a straight line parallel to the goal, not the shortest distance. The second-last defender rule includes the goalkeeper, which means that if the goalkeeper has run out, then we need another defender between the attacker and the goal to be a legal position. Finally, the moment of decision is when the ball is passed, not when the ball is received.

Therefore, the player in offside has to be part of the play, meaning that if that player is not receiving the ball or interfering with the play, it is not an offside. Also, if the ball is ahead of the player that will receive it, then it cannot be offside because the offside line cannot be behind the ball. There are also several exceptions to the offside rules. A player is not offside if they are in their own half of the field at the moment of the pass being sent. Also, the player is not offside if the pass is sent from a goal kick, corner kick or throw-in. However, the offside rule holds when it is a pass from a free-kick because of a foul, for example.

What is an offside trap?

An offside trap is a defensive tactic used in soccer to catch opposing attackers offside. It involves the defenders working together to step forward in unison at the right moment, pushing the attacking players into an offside position.

What can be done by defenders to leverage the offside rule? When the defending team anticipates a pass, the last defenders can step up and move the imaginary line of offside up. That way the receiving player will be in an illegal position even if they don’t move. We are not talking about attackers being oblivious of being in offside or making a run way too early, but a deliberate plan to put an attacker in an offside position.

How to create an offside trap?

There are essentially three ways to create offside traps. Let’s start with the simplest one, because it depends only on one defender. However, that player has to be the last player on defense. Say we are in a 2v1 situation. The defender keeps giving up space and only slightly slowing down the player with the ball. The defender needs to make it look as if it is back enough for the player without the ball to be onside. Then the defender identifies that the dribbler kicked the ball too far and cannot make a quick pass. The defender sprints forward to create a pressing 1v1 situation with the ball playing attacker because a pass will be essentially an offside situation. The defender has to stay tight on them, because the time where this 1v1 situation will be available is small, as the other attacker will come back onside in the meantime. Similarly, if there is a pass back, the defender should step out to leave that player in offside.

Hold the line as a team

The second type of offside trap is when the entire team does this, usually coordinated by the back line of defenders. The anchors that define the offside line are the two central defenders in a backline of four. Or the middle central defender in a backline of three. As we talked in other videos about positionings, one player is always the aggressor and the other one is the cover. The aggressor often tries to stop the striker from receiving the ball to their feet. So the striker might want to make a run behind them. The cover drops deeper to anticipate any through pass and often that means that the striker will not be in offside. However, if the cover sees that a sprint forward will leave the striker in offside instead of dropping even deeper and allowing a 1v1 situation.

Offside traps from set pieces

The special case for offside traps is the set pieces. While coordinating the offside traps looked complicated in the previous examples, set pieces are usually simpler. The defenders form a line and the player closest to the ball is the anchor. When the ball is about the be crossed to the penalty area, the defenders often drop to make sure it’s safe. However, if well coordinated, the defenders can actually step up and leave most of the players in offside. We have seen that many times done by professional teams, often leaving over half of the other team in offside situation. However, they need to be very careful that somebody from the opponent team that was not in offside has not made a run.

Offside traps from corners

The extra special case is the corners. While there are no offsides from corners, once the ball is delivered, the defenders often need to step forward quickly, so that any danger from second ball or third ball will be considered offside. This might mean that from an initial 7v8 situation inside the penalty area, it will become a 4v8, which is much easier to defend.

How to beat an offside trap?

That is the fun part where a player is behind the offside line when the pass starts. But they receive the ball behind it, essentially moving the offside line forward. Firstly, we will give several scenarios about how you can beat it individually by doing the correct runs. Then we will talk about how you can help your teammates beat the offside trap without touching the ball. Finally, we will talk about genius team plays that we have seen to beat the offside traps.

Timed run to avoid the offside trap

The simple timed run is like this. The player makes an average run, then changes pace and direction and the ball is sent into space. It’s simple, it works when executed correctly, but that’s not always easy.

Timed run with an overlap

What is often easier is to make this run on the flanks. The defenders tend to stay compact in the middle of the field. In fact, a typical overlapping or an underlapping run comes with a pass into space that essentially moves the offside line.

Run sideways until the pass is sent

Instead, what sometimes happens is that the player runs, but doesn’t get the ball on time. The player then has to keep the pace, but must not get into offside. So changing direction again until the right moment to sprint behind is needed. Note that the defenders will hold the line, so they will not be able to catch up.

Run back onside while defenders think the offside trap worked

However, sometimes it’s too late and the player passed the offside line. In the mind of the defenders they are often gone, but that’s not the case always. We have seen many players getting back onside just for a moment, but then with pace get back forward.

Drag your defender to move the offside line

Sometimes we see players making runs that will never get the ball for. It might look weird, but then you see that the offside line got moved just because of that run. That allows a player somewhere else close to the offside line to not be offside.

Be a decoy inside the offside trap

Another option is that the player will run too early into offside position. Then a ball will look like it’s coming towards them, which will make everybody think it’s a clear offside situation. Instead, the player doesn’t touch the ball and another runner comes and picks it up.

Stay inside the offside trap until a teammate beats it

Now, if we know that it is much easier to beat the offside trap in the wide areas, how can we use that in our advantage. We have seen the striker often lurks slightly into offside with the hope that they can jump onside in the right moment, then sprint forward. Or that the wide player can drag their defender and move the offside line. However, the top teams wouldn’t do that. Instead, what they do is that once the ball is passed into space on the wings to beat the offside, the striker is no longer offside, but is ahead of the opponents and an simple cross becomes an easy goal.

How to coach offside traps?

Coaching offside traps is not easy. It comes with lots of talking to the players throughout the years of their development. However, as the offside rule is not intuitive, we need to expose the players to it a lot. In addition to playing games, I recommend my players to also watch games. Watch the professional or more senior teams play, but only focus on the offside lines. In fact, what has worked very well for young players is when they are assistant referees because all they need to focus on is that offside line. Of course, they can combine that with playing soccer video games and offsides will become second nature to them.

Set a 2v1 plus goalkeeper to practice individual timing

The simplest thing is to set a 2v1 plus a goalkeeper. Just make sure you remind them that the offside rules hold. Alternatively, you can have a 3v2, but also with offside rules.

Set a 5v4 with one touch in the penalty area for a patient attacking option

A slightly more complex situation will be a 5v4 plus a goalkeeper with offside rules. However, limit the game to one touch inside the penalty area for the attackers. That way, the final step will almost always have to be a pass and not a shot.

Soccer Possession Drills to create a Tiki-Taka team.

We love rondos, but what is beyond that? I once had a new team that can do great rondos, but all the attacking was kick and run, or individual dribble. I had to do possession games to coach basic principles of soccer positioning and movement, not just technical skills. Here are my 3 favorite soccer possession drills for getting your team to play tiki-taka in a few short years. Stay tuned until the end where I discuss the tips on how to adjust any of these drills on the spot for maximum effectiveness.

7v4 Overloading Soccer Possession Drills

The basic drill is to have a 7v4 setup where the only goal is to keep possession. The attacking team should connect 20 passes to win, while the defending team needs to get the ball and have 5 passes for victory. If either team succeeds in their goal, then the other team does pushups. Often times the ball will go out of bounds, so give around 10 attempts for the team do accomplish the goal. After that rotate the players between offense and defense, so that everybody experiences playing both roles and nobody gets too frustrated by being outnumbered all the time.

If you need change the intensity because the defenders keep winning or the attackers keep winning, consider changing the number of players or modifying the field size. For example, instead of 7v4 you can change to 7v3 or 7v5. Similarly, if everything looks good but the players seem to have too much time, shrink the field a bit.

Coaching points for the attacking team

The coaching point for the attacking team is back to first principles of soccer. You want more space and time on the ball when your team is in possession. For that, you want to make the playing area as large as possible and that is defined by the distance between the players. The coaching points will be for players to stay wide and far from their opponents, then use the center of the field as helping functions to move the ball again to the edges of the playing area. However, the players on the periphery must open up so that either direct passes can get to them or at least one-touch passes from the central players can find them.

Coaching points for the defending team

The defenders will get the inverse coaching points. They want to make the playing area as small as possible, so they would want to limit the passing options and try to convert the playing area from full field of 7v4 to maybe half the field and playing 4v4. Forcing the attacking team to do extra touches on the ball, slow down the ball movement and narrow down the passing options is the key in accomplishing their goal.

2 Endzones Possession Drills

The two endzones game is simple and structured. Overall, we play something like 7v5, but we create some resemblance of a formation. We create two endzones on the opposite side of the field, where we put two attackers and one defender, and we restrict their movement only to that area. The attacking team need to move the ball from one endzone to the other while retaining possession. If they manage to do that, then the defending team does pushups. You should give them 10 tries and if they fail to do that, then they do pushups.

It’s a natural evolution of the previous soccer possession drills where your players keep the ball at 7v3 or 7v4. However, we give the players direction and intention in this drill. Both teams know which direction the game is going. If they struggle to keep any structure in the previous drill, then it is ok to start with this drill, but maybe keep 3v2 in the middle if the attacking team fails to keep possession. If the attacking team feels too comfortable at 7v5, then allow the defending team to move anywhere. It will increase the intensity significantly.

Coaching points for the attacking team

The attacking team will get coaching points about space and options. They need to understand that if the space is tight where the ball is, that means that somewhere else there is more space. For example, in the middle of the field, it’s almost always hard to get time on the ball. There we are playing 3v3, but together with the endzone becomes 5v4. However, we already told the players that the endzone is always a safe space for them to pass back to, so they should use that.

Coaching points for the defending team

The coaching points for the defense is that this time they are defending a goal, not just possession. Their aim is to prevent the opponent from achieving their goal. We have given them the direction of how the opponent will attack, so the defense should actually recreate the playing area to make it much smaller and make the game 5v4 on half the field or less instead of 7v5 on full field. They should even position themselves on the same side of the players, so that it is harder for player 7 to receive a pass the playing area ends up being 4v4. In the video we saw that even after the attacking team occupied one of the endzones, the defending team kept playing high press and chasing the defenders, which was a mistake. Only when a bad touch or intense pressure is created, they should press to obtain the ball. In the meantime, they should develop a bit more comfort of being patient but still work hard while not in possession.

Striker pressing coaching point

One more quick coaching point, specifically for the defender in the endzone. The simplest help we can give them is to tell them to cut the pass to the other defender. If they do that and increase pressure, then effectively they have converted 2v1 into a 1v1 and have pinned down the player into a tight area. The player in possession will have restricted movement from 3 sides by out lines, so it’s the prefect setup for the defender to press, but only if they block the pass to the other attacker. This will help them understand how high press should work which is to limit the options for passing, then put pressure on the player. When most of the time the defenders play with numerical disadvantage, creating 1v1 in a tight space is worth a lot.

4 Endzones Soccer Possession Drills

Possession with 4 endzones. We set a 7v7 game, roughly at half of the field. We carve out areas at all 4 edges to be endzones and the goal is to retain possession while moving them from one endzone to the other. If all 4 endzones have been occupied, then we have a winner. If possession is lost, then the other team tries to do the same. This is my favorite drill because it is continuous, equal for both teams and it naturally increases intensity by shrinking the playing area which makes players think about their intention, individually and as a team. Note that there is no real attacking vs. defending team assigned before the game, because the possession keeps switching, same as a real soccer game.

Note that the game looks the same in theory, but it totally changes as the endzones are visited. At the beginning it is a high press game where the only goal for defenders is to recover possession for their team. Then, once the team has conquered one of the zones, the defenders don’t need to guard that zone and the playing area should shrink. Usually, the attacking team is able to occupy the adjacent endzones and then the game looks a lot like soccer where the goal is the direction is clear to get to the other endzone. The risk for the attackers to lose the ball is large at that point because if they do, they will need to start all over again by firstly winning the ball and then with no occupied endzones. The risk for the defenders is that if they don’t defend the endzone, they will simply lose.

Coaching points for the attacking team

Attackers, you have to figure out the game you are playing, is it intention or ball retention? When you are under pressure, it is often just ball retention. When you are off the ball, then it’s about intention and figuring out where the free teammate is and how you can position yourself to receive the ball and progress it to your teammate. Once you are missing only one endzone, if you can quickly attack it, then it will make it easier for you. If you attack slowly and allow all opponents to come back to the zone, it will make it much harder.

Coaching points for the defending team

Defenders, you must understand the context of the soccer possession drills as a team. If you keep pressing while your team doesn’t, then you will get tired. Similarly, if your team is pressing and you are the only one that is not, then you are letting them down as if the other team plays with an extra player. However, if you are defending with only one zone left, you need to change your mindset and show some patience. Defending as a team means that everybody on the team has the same intention and their movement reflects that. Coming back late to help your team means that you allow the opponents multiple opportunities, not just one.

Tips, Tricks and Advice for Successful Soccer Possession Drills

I intertwined some advice, but let’s lay them all out here. The hardest thing in these drills is to figure out how to get the right level of intensity. Too much intensity and players might give up, but at too little they are either goofing off or simply not giving full effort. You want the success rate of the drill objective, for example 20 passes, to be at around 50%. That means that if they have 10 tries, they will be able to complete 20 passes half of that time. The other times they might be able to complete around 10 passes. You shouldn’t fix this by increasing the number of tries, but the difficulty of each try. Let’s talk about size of the field, players on the teams, player groupings, restrictions we can put, and the incentives to win.

Field size, number of players, types of players and restrictions

The size of the field and the number of players are things you can fix on the spot. Very often the endzones are too large or too little. You should just fix them on the spot, don’t even tell the players and just move the cones to do that. They will figure it out.

The number of players can be a bit trickier. For example, you have designed the drill for 7v4, but you have 12 players at practice, so you have an extra player. Do you make them sit on the side and wait? Or you make it 7v5 or 8v4? Or you make it 8v5 with you jumping in on the other team? All of these are valid solutions, but you need to figure out what works best in the moment.

Another interesting one is the types of players that randomly grouped. For example, the top 4 players started playing on defense in a 7v4 setup and you think you hit the right level of difficulty. Then you rotate the players and all of a sudden you get the wrong balance and success rate. Instead, you pick the players on defense and plan for a balanced teams with similar work rate.

One more tweak I would suggest is to limit the number of touches. This is a common one to increase the speed of play. I sometimes give the players in middle, between the endzones, only two touches. After few times they practice the drill I don’t have to give them this restriction because they figure out that the two touches limit is what they need to do to improve their effectiveness most of the time.

Likely you will need to combine all of these to get to the magical target of around 50% success rate. Don’t be scared to improvise and adjust all the time. However, you need to plan for it by balancing the teams, size and players.

The power of incentives

Finally, the incentives are the least technical, but can be the most effective knob to turn. Some players just want to win every single time in every single thing against every single opponent. If you have players like that, then consider yourself lucky. Society forces people to not want that, and that’s the only way we can have civil society. However, soccer is a competitive game and we need to switch the brain of the players to want to win at everything within the rules of the game the moment they step on the field. You need to see what motivates the players. I often let my players play on one big goal vs two small goals. Everybody wants to play on the big goal, so the rule is that if the team playing on the small goals score, they switch. That motivates both teams, one to attack the best they can, the other team to defend at their maximum. In the soccer possession drills, we said that the losing team does pushups. I’ve sometimes let the players choose the prize and that has worked out great because I learn what motivates them. There was one time that we did a drill where the two winners got to make the teams for scrimmage, simple and easy way for me to give authority to the players.

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Link to the complete article to guide you through choosing the right youth soccer formations.

Wouldn’t it be great if there is a simple way to set any team for success? Every coach around talks about “having majority of possession”, playing “tiki-taka with intention” and “dominate the opponents”. You would also hear mentions of “exploit the half spaces” and “I want my full-backs to invert“. When two teams with coaches like these meet, you will get a battle of over-coached teams trying to get 51%, more like 75%, of the ball possession and no shots on goal. Then they play against another team with a 3-4-3 soccer formation and they don’t know how to respond to the seemingly outdated formation.

Don’t trust me? How else can we explain that the mighty Manchester City lost against the inferior Chelsea in the UCL 2021 Final? It was a simplicity of countering as a team, while pound for pound Chelsea’s players were simply not as good as their opponents. Now, it is easy to claim that Tuchel, Chelsea’s coach, was genius and Guardiola, Man City’s coach, was wrong and should have known better. Of course, even with 3-4-3, the probability of Chelsea winning was low. However, it was all about how to put themselves in a position to have a chance to win, despite City’s dominant possession.

What makes the 3-4-3 soccer formation the best counter formation?

Admitting inferiority is not settling for defeat. In fact, it is battling for victory in spite of the circumstances. While we all want to have perfection of dozens of accurate passes before “walking the ball in the net”, we should live in reality. We claim that the four pillars of player development are technical, tactical, physical and psychological. While these virtues are dynamic and can range depending on many factors, including the team that a player plays in, we have seen teams with inferior players win against dominant teams. The 3-4-3 soccer formation is the best counter formation not because it solves for this issue, but because it gives us flexibility to counter the opponents and ask different questions.

The most important aspect of the formation is the discipline and tactical awareness. This is not a formation where the team will have the majority of the ball. In fact, it is likely that the team will need to yield possession and make the opponents believe that they control the game by having the ball. However, the team will need to prevent chances in their own defensive third. So, the simple formula is to invite opponents to occupy the middle third and even send players forward, only to create space for the two attackers to strike back. The secret to counter attacking is the dynamic advantage that is the one of the principles of soccer domination that is often overlooked.

What does the 3-4-3 soccer formation look like?

For comparison, let us take a 4-3-3 formation and see how it naturally changes between attacking and defending. We have seen the fullbacks overlap with the wingers, that are often playing as inverted wingers. Great way to attack with numbers. We have seen the striker dropping deep to create numerical advantage and dominate possession. We have even seen the holding midfielder dropping as an extra center back to strengthen a low-block defense. However, it often puts players in unnatural positions and creates uneasiness.

Compare a 3-4-3 formation with players barely moving outside of comfort. When defending a lead in the last moments of a game, the winger-backs naturally drop back in a back five. When chasing a goal, they become wingers and create overload. On top of that, this formation allows for having a true counter attacking options with two strikers. We all know that naturally you cannot have two target attackers, but when they work together, it can lead to very difficult counter attacking to handle. Overall, this flexibility makes the 3-4-3 the deadly option for disciplined teams.

Defenders – the Backbone

The defense is the place where you can’t get creative in this formation. Having 3 players in the last line is a given and really the only aspect that changes is the width of it. In general, when attacking they spread out, while defending they come close to each other. However, when trying to keep the result as-is, the wide midfielders essentially become wingbacks and the defenders stay in the middle. It might look boring, but on the bright side, it is easy to coach.

The opponents will either play with 2 attackers or a single striker and two wingers. When playing against 2 attackers, the wide defenders mark them while the central defender covers. When playing against 1 attacker, we will have two options. If we have attacking wide players, then we will ask a holding midfielder to press the striker, while the central defender provides cover for him and the wide defenders can push up. Alternatively, we can let one of the wide defenders push up or even invert in the midfield, while the other one stays back to form a 1v2 defensive setup. Either way, the attacking option for the wide defenders is there only in a patient attacking plan.

Midfielders – the Heart

The midfielders are not only the most numerous, but also the most influental in the 3-4-3 formation. When set in a diamond shape, they can provide both the stability and the creativity to dominate the opponents. Playing with with one holding midfielder, 6, and one attacking midfielder, 10, might look like a recipe for disaster. The thinness in the middle of the field is evident. However, the wide midfielders can look more like mezzalas or they can play as a double pivot, all at the same time. They need to be tactically aware to anticipate the soccer context. When the ball is on their side, play wide and do an overlapping run. When the ball is on the other side, tuck in and provide support. The change of roles should become second nature for midfielders and this is a great formation to use tactically aware players.

Attackers – the Creativity

This is not too different from the 4-3-3 formation, with the main difference that we have a more classic 10 in the midfield. That influences the options that we have in the attack, because we create a formation with 4 attacking players. Think about it – the moment we win the ball, we have 4 players that need to move the ball as fast as possible for a counter. Yes, the wingers can be out wide, or invert inside as they see needed. The striker can come and help the midfield or push up as a target man to hold up the ball. Either way, the key is that the 10 can decide that they need to play as a shadow striker or they can drop deep and distribute the ball. Either way, it unsettles the opponents, as they don’t know how to defend the unpredictability of all of these variables.

Disadvantages of the 3-4-3

As any other formation, the 3-4-3 has the disadvantages. While we can drop to 5 defenders more easily when we need to defend, that transition takes time. When there is a time to regroup, the defensive line can get the two wide midfielders dropping deep into 5-3-1-1. Alternatively the wide midfielders tuck in and we form a 4-3-3 defensive line. However, by default, the standard 3-4-3 defensive setup might look fine at first. But if the opponents are actually counterattacking team, it will leave the last line playing 3v3 very quickly. That is why the 3-4-3 is more often played as a counter attacking formation. Or at least as a formation where the tempo of the opposition is lower than ours.