The Importance of Teaching a “Half a Touch” Mentality in Soccer

• Linking foot preparation, body position and mental preparation to the technique involved in making a decision leads us to a discussion on Half a touch brain centered thinking and its benefits.
• The Half a touch brain centered thinking process we use teaches the value of the player being able to take their eyes off the ball when keeping their eyes on the ball can be a disadvantage. To make this work, players need to have good teamwork and positional sense and therefore must work hard for each other to make the options obvious but ultimately to have the capacity to develop their “soccer intelligence” on and off the ball.
• Many players will mentally prepare to make a decision AFTER receiving the ball; we teach them to mentally prepare to make decisions BEFORE they receive the ball. This saves them time and space and can be the difference between maintaining possession and losing the ball. As the game gets faster, so is the need for players to master this VITAL innate ability because The game is getting faster using fewer touches on the ball, which creates the need for quicker thinking; quicker moving and better decision making players.
• PLEASE remember, one touch awareness training isn’t all just to teach One touch, it is to teach players the recognition of options of what to do and when and where to do it, before they receive the ball. WE OFTEN PLAY ONE TOUCH TO HELP DEVELOP THE HALF A TOUCH MENTALITY.
• But through this thinking process the decision could result in a pass, a dribble, a receive and turn and run; a run with the ball, a one touch pass, a short pass, a long pass; few touches, many touches on the ball as the next option; anything at all.
• The secret is they enabled themselves to save time and space; to play really “quickly”; or even play more “slowly”; based on the “Tempo of the Game” needed at that moment, due to that “half a touch mentality” training development.

Xavi Hernandez of Barcelona and Spain says:

When you arrive at Barcelona the first thing they teach is LOOK and THINK; LOOK and THINK; LOOK and THINK.

Speed is not necessarily the most important quality. When the ball moves quickly, you are a quick player.

Lift your head, move; LOOK / THINK; Look for spaces. Think quickly, Here? No. There? No. Here? Yes. There? Yes.

All BEFORE receiving the ball. Recognize: Space; Space; more Space… “Before receiving the ball”

I think, the defenders here, so play it there. I see the space and the pass.

Rondo, Rondo, Rondo (which is a major part of SAEA training): Every Single Day at Barcelona.

It’s the best exercise there is. You learn responsibility and not to lose the ball; always 1 touch, two touches at the most.

Ultimately our SAEA training is Teaching Players to play with “Intensity” and “Relaxation” at the same time; and to guide them to think for THEMSELVES to become self determining players through this model.

The Conscious and Sub Conscious Mind and Myelin Production

Every soccer player, like every human being, has two distinct parts of the mind whose primary role is thought and recollection. There is the conscious state and the sub-conscious state. As the names suggest, when you are completely aware of what you are doing, you are letting your "conscious state" guide you through the process.

On the other hand, when you react instinctively, or automatically even, your actions are being controlled by your sub-conscious mind. This isn't just true for soccer, by the way! Even when you are driving or cooking or swimming both these aspects come into the
picture.

Our natural tendency is to think that we are how we think! We tend to define ourselves by our conscious mind or thoughts, which is not completely accurate. When it comes to making a decision after thinking about it, the conscious mind is the king. However, everything that we do, using our conscious mind, only helps create a belief system or habit for our sub-conscious mind.

What does that mean? It means, as we keep making a particular kind of decision, based on a particular kind of thought process, we convince our mind about our thinking patterns, which slowly becomes a habit for us. To quote a simple example – say, you are asked to pick your favorite color between Red & Green, and you choose, say, Green. If this question is repeatedly asked to you, over and over again, there will come a point of time when you won't even need to think about the answer – you will just choose "Green" without blinking. It might even get to the point where you will speak out the answer even before the question is completed or earlier still. Basically, what you are doing is that you have trained your mind to handle that situation in a way where you know exactly what you are going to do. 

Being asked the same thing, over and over again, is just a way of reinforcing that idea into your sub-conscious mind. The decision, originally, was being made by the conscious segment of your mind. However, over time that role was slowly and gradually handed over to the sub-conscious mind, which made it instinctive. That is the exact same reason why you can apply the brakes quickly, when the car in front of you suddenly comes to a halt. That is also why you know how to instantly use a spoon or even how to tie your shoe-laces.

MAKING HABITS When you do something, anything, you trigger chemicals reactions that produce something called Myelin. This myelin forms a cover around your brain's neuron. That is the beginning of the formation of a habit. Every time you do that same thing again, your brain adds another layer of myelin to the existing layer – which makes it thicker. The thicker the myelin, the stronger the habit! The stronger the habit, the more instinctive you are! That means exactly what you already know – "practice makes perfect"! Well; permanent
more like.

The more you practice, the more you know how to do something better. However, if you believe, that a habit cannot be undone, you are right! There is no way of undoing what you have learnt – so you might ask then, how do we get rid of a habit? The answer is, but obviously, putting in more practice to learn something else than you did into learning the habit you are trying to undo. It's just that simple!

HENCE WHY THE YOUNGER WE GET PLAYERS TO OUR TRAINING THE BETTER WITH FEWER BAD HABITS TO BREAK / CHANGE.

If you put in enough hours, more than what you have done before, you will put on more and more myelin on your neurons for a second habit and your second habit will become stronger, pushing the first behind in the pecking order. Basically, your habits are instilled in your sub-conscious mind, allowing your body to respond to environmental triggers a particular kind of reaction, instinctively. Get the right kind of triggers for your mind and you will have the right kind of Myelin layers forming in the right place and the reaction becomes ANTICIPATION..

Back to Barcelona; the first thing they teach is LOOK and THINK; LOOK and THINK; LOOK and THINK.

When you see Xavi Hernandez of Barcelona threading an inch-perfect pass through 4-opposition players, finding a teammate, commentators & fans call it vision. 

However, what they don't realize is that the reason a player can pick out a pass like that is because they have practiced it, studied it, run through that same routine over and over and over again, in practice!

The game is so fast, it is almost impossible to stop the ball, look up and think about what you are going to do, assess your options and then make a decision. 

Instead, training helps players understand patterns of play, patterns of runs and patterns of passes that they should make or
expect.

OUR SAEA Training model focus almost “Conditions the mind” to develop the LOOK and THINK.

What is the LOOK and THINK?

The Continuums “Look and Think” Model of Development

Word Association combining thought and deed

“Look and Think” MUST come first before everything else; decision making in advance of the ball.

• LOOK / OBSERVE / THINK (ALWAYS BEFORE receiving the ball; assessing all options in “Anticipation” not as a Reaction)
• SKILL: THE DECISION (How, why; when and where of Technique; plus its success or not; and why?)
• FOOT PREPARATION (flat footed, off balance?)
• BODY POSITION (open or closed?)
• COMMUNICATION (Verbal and visual)
• CONTROL (If not a one touch pass on, the 1st touch control)
• TECHNIQUE (the pass, the run, the dribble, the turn, the shot; etc)
• TACTICAL MOBILITY (Movement off the ball, finding space; 90% of the game)
• MENTAL and PHYSICAL TRANSITION (Possession changes, Player tunes in immediately?)

Relating Word Association with Actions to identify the Strengths and Areas of Improvement needed in players.

Focusing particularly on teaching a HALF TOUCH MENTALITY.

1. Most players will mentally prepare to make a decision AFTER receiving the ball; we teach them to mentally prepare to make decisions BEFORE they receive the ball. This saves them time and space and can be the difference between maintaining possession and losing the ball. As the game gets faster, so is the need for players to master this VITAL innate ability.

2. Half Touch Mental Development: We ask Players at our training to THINK with a “Half Touch Mentality”, like every time the ball is coming to them they imagine they only have a half touch to play the ball with. 

This will literally FORCE them to LOOK around and THINK of their options before receiving the ball.

On deciding the best option thru a “half touch thought process” it could result in a pass, a dribble, a receive and turn and run; a run with the ball, a one touch pass, a short pass, a long pass;, few touches, many touches on the ball as the next option;
anything at all. 

The secret is they enabled themselves to save time and space; to play really “quickly”; or even play more “slowly”; based on the “Tempo of the Game” needed at that moment.

3. In the Zone: Training your mind as well as your body

Being in the zone generally means being in a state in which your mind and body are working in harmony. You're calm yet energized, challenged yet confident, focused yet instinctive.

4. Mental training: Keep your focus

Training your mind is an important step toward getting in the zone. Aspects of mental training for sports include increasing concentration and focus, controlling emotions, trying to feel relaxed but energized, being calm and positive, and aiming to feel challenged and confident. 

Soccer is played in the mind and preparing the mind for the game is an extremely scientific and sequential process. By breaking things down, sequentially arranging and explaining them, and through incredible amounts of repetition, you create a team that knows exactly what team-mates are up to and what they need to do next.

Hence why playing a specific system and STYLE of play consistently is so important.

The sub-conscious mind is the most important weapon on the soccer pitch. It gives you the speed of thought you need to survive and excel. The more natural you are at reading a situation and picking up cues, the better you will be at soccer.

The more you train, the better you will be able to visualize everything and the better you can visualize, the more trained your subconscious mind will be.

You will then be a step ahead of everyone else.

You will hit those perfect passes or strike the top-corner nearly every time till it comes to a point where making split-second decisions will come naturally to you, and also look magical !

THIS is EXACTLY what we will teach your child where their game will become “automatic” but it takes a lot of time and training, it’s a marathon not a sprint.

Most players play CONSCIOUSLY because they haven’t been trained to play beyond that thought process.

Our training teaches them to think SUBCONSCIOUSLY and in advance of the ball.

The process is:

a) Playing Consciously and making decisions but NOT before receiving the ball (often the norm), and then;
b) Playing consciously and making decisions before receiving the ball, and then;
c) Playing subconsciously and the decision is already made without thinking, the player just “knows”.

When a player is consistently acting and performing at stage c) then that player sees the field in slow motion, is relaxed, everything comes easy (as long as they put the work rate in); and off the ball they have intensity and desire.

And the more the players train in the right way the better they will become, it doesn’t suddenly happen and its done, it is a constant work in progress to maintain this level of thought and action. The players who think they have it made and don’t need to work as hard anymore invariably fail; but add the work rate and they give themselves the best chance to succeed and us the best chance to help them get there.

A BALANCE BETWEEN RELAXATION ON THE BALL AND INTENSITY OFF THE BALL IS THE GOAL

Coaching the Right System

When I joined San Diego Surf SC, I knew that this was a club with a reputation and history of success, and there was the great potential to build on that. One thing that great international youth academies like Barcelona and Ajax have in common is a standard system of play throughout their teams. This is one of our goals at Surf – to bring a standard system to the club.

We will use the 4-2-3-1 system of play, the most popular system at professional level throughout the world now. This system, which was used by Spain to win the 2008 and 2012 European Championships and the 2010 FIFA World Cup, is a fluid, attack-minded system also used by Arsenal, Real Madrid, Inter Milan and many others. With this in mind, we will also teach the players alternate systems of play to suit particular moments in game, all developing from the 4-2-3-1.

The first step in establishing this is showing the coaches what needs to be done to make this successful. To that end, we have introduced a Coach Education program at Surf, with the objective of establishing a standard methodology of playing throughout all the teams. This is also a U.S. Soccer Federation requirement now.

Everywhere I have coached at the youth level I have done the same.

With Blackpool Professional Football Club in England as their Academy Director we had regular coaching education Clinics with the coaches in the late 1990s. When I came to the USA in 2000 I was the Director of Coaching at Eden Prairie Soccer Club in Minnesota, and over my nine years in charge I did 117 coach education clinics for the 130 coaches I had to teach there. I documented every session and created diagrams and information that the coaches could take away and review and then practice with their teams.

We all played a 4-3-1-2 system of play there then. I immediately put in place a flat-back four system of play, which no teams were doing at that time in the club. I believe we were the first club in Minnesota to do so, and this proved very successful over the years. It eventually proved very popular with our coaches, despite some minor early resistance, because everyone understood the value of it.

I then moved to the United Arab Emirates with the Al Ain Football Club, THE most famous professional club in the whole of the Middle East. The Manchester United of the Middle East, one might say. There, as the Youth Academy Director, I introduced the 4-2-3-1 to all the teams.

Marco Monte on Wayne Harrison’s Work at Al Ain:

“The Al Ain club fully represents the model and the philosophy of junior soccer and can become a beacon for the other Abu Dhabi clubs. The club’s current status with respect to ‘Technical Affairs’ can be stated as the one closest to the standards of the best Professional European clubs. The consultant has noticed that the club management has decided to invest the time and resources required to create an important group of coaches. They are well managed and organized by an excellent Director of Coaching (Wayne Harrison), whose objective is to improve work on the pitch as well as to help the boys grow and develop without the anxiety of achieving results. "

All my coaches were Arabic, mainly ex-professional players, and quite a number were ex-internationals for their countries and so were very experienced individuals. They were from many countries, including the UAE, Sudan, Morocco, Egypt, Iraq, Iran, Tunisia, Algeria, and so I thought I would be in for a real challenge to establish a new program.

As it turned out the coaches were incredibly supportive of the changes and embraced my work; it was an incredible time there for me. Not only did they learn from me, I learned a lot from them, too. I will be eternally grateful for the experiences I had.

In short, the Arabic way of playing is very individual. They are fantastic individuals, but their team play needed a lot of development and improvement, and that was my key area of work. The coaches played that way themselves when they were players, so their training mirrored that style.

One-touch training to train the Mind and improve the Thinking Processes was not a part of their training. I brought in many new ideas on how to get the players to think more quickly, play more quickly and play in a different way, without losing that magical ability to beat players 1v1 which they had in abundance.

To this we added improved team shape development and a better team play mentality in the players’ mindsets. Because of all this, we played very differently than most of the other professional academies we played against. In two years we won seven National Professional Youth Championships and were the most successful academy in the UAE.

From U8 to U12 our focus was purely development, but from the developmental training we were able to have great winning percentages without losing the focus on development. If teams lost games, my focus was on how they played and not that they lost. That relaxed the coaches and put less pressure on them. I believe this produced better training and less anxiety that could be passed onto the players, so they were more relaxed themselves. It made for better development all around.

What we did at Al Ain clearly succeeded in improving the club. The Abu Dhabi Sports Council (ADSC) voted Al Ain the top Academy in the Emirate, based on the achievement of key performance indicators. At the time, Marco Monte, an ADSC consultant from Inter Milan, stated that the Al Ain club “fully represents the model and the philosophy of junior soccer and can become a beacon for the other Abu Dhabi clubs. The club’s current status with respect to ‘Technical Affairs’ can be stated as the one closest to the standards of the best Professional European clubs.”

Monte went on to write:

“The consultant has noticed that the club management has decided to invest the time and resources required to creae an important group of coaches. They are well managed and organized by an excellent Director of Coaching (Wayne Harrison), whose objective is to improve work on the pitch as well as to help the boys grow and develop without the anxiety of achieving results.”

In all, I did 27 Coaching Clinics with the coaches at Al Ain. We had 42 full-time coaching staff at youth level, which meant the coaches were the demonstrators in the clinics themselves; it was a very successful formula for coach education.

As at Eden Prarie, I gave them all the session plans to go with the training, and I got it all translated into Arabic for them. From all this information I created a book – Coaching the 4-2-3-1 – and an Arabic book version too. This book, and others devoted to the 4-2-3-1 system, provides detailed insights into both coaching and playing.

Over the years I have done many presentations on the field at various Symposiums around the country for State Organizations and in the UAE. I have also presented three times now for the National Soccer Coaches Association of America (NSCAA) Annual Convention, most recently in January in Indianapolis.

I have a long history of working this way to educate coaches and have had positive results in youth soccer through it. Director of Coaching Colin Chesters and Club President Jeremy McDonald have made it clear to me that this is one of the most important parts of my job at Surf. It is a very exciting time.

We have done one clinic already on how the 4-2-3-1 works, but it will take time to embed this in all the teams. In some instances I expect the short term will see one step back before taking three steps forward until we fully establish it. In the long run, I have complete confidence that the excellent coaches we have at Surf will make it a great success, continuing and expanding on the previous successes everyone has had.

Next month we begin an Eight Clinic Coaching Program for the coaches to attend, with one clinic a week using various Surf youth teams as the demonstrators. In this way the teams themselves get training out of it as well.

For those interested in the content of the clinics, this is what we will be doing in short. All are based around important training we need to teach the players. Some are more pertinent to particular age groups, but all should be attended by everyone.

1. Using the Ten themes of Development for 4-2-3-1 and 4-3-3 and the Five Phases of Development

Examples:

• Keep Possession
• Develop Play from the back
• Attacking Fullbacks using Width in Attack
• Forming triangles and diamonds of support all over the field

2. Back Four Defending:

• One / two Word Commands to aid Team Organization
• When to drop; when to hold; when to press using various formats
• Defending with the ball in front of the back four
• Defending with the ball behind the back four and making adjustments based on the position of ball and the opponents

3. Awareness One- and Two-Touch Training: Developing Peripheral Vision. Various sessions on this to establish the psychological advanced thinking players need to develop as early as possible

4. Transition: Target and Possession Games: for everyday training using Conditions to set the various themes

5. Functional Training Sessions: (Various) in specific parts of the field; then one example of taking a Function into a Phase of Play

Examples are: Center backs defending; Full backs defending; Strikers defending; Full backs attacking; Central Strikers attacking

6. Teaching Striker Movement: How to get into a “sideways on / or facing forward” position for the striker

Includes the three main “very simple but effective” movements a striker should know

7. Quick and Imaginative Play in and Around the Penalty Area in a Function then Phase of play

8. Counter Attacking and Quick Break: building up to an 11 v 11