Soccer Passing - Undoubtedly the most important soccer skill you'll need to posses

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A decent soccer passing skill is essential for any position on the pitch. It is undoubtedly the most important soccer skill you'll need to posses if you want to become a good player.

Passing is the exploitation of possession by transferring the ball from one teammate to another. Passes could be offensive or defensive in their nature. Regardless of their purpose, passes are always executed with the desire to keep possession of the ball. Therefore, passing is a skill that demands good technical ability not only from the distributor but from the receiver as well.




The Principles of Soccer Passing

Precision - The importance of pass precision should be pretty obvious and it's one of the skills you'll want to focus most during training. Before you go any further in this section, remember one important rule of soccer passing: look up and take mental notice of your teammates before executing a pass.

Soccer Passing is a tool with great creative potential and does not always have to be directed at a teammate's feet. Imaginative passers target the ball into spaces where same-team players can reach it before the enemy. A player may pass the ball either to a teammate's feet or in open space where it could be collected. Both methods are effective and applicable in particular situations. Passing ahead of a moving player is required when he is in the middle of a run. When a teammate is immobile, the ball can only be directed at his feet. It is way too often, that we see during matches, the mishandling of balls either because the receiver fails to move or the passer misinterprets the initiation of a run. Who's at fault is irrelevant in these cases, but we must be concerned of the situation and narrow our margin of error.

Time - Soccer players must learn how to execute accurate passes in the least amount of time possible. One way to save time is deciding what to do with the ball before actually getting it. To do this, you must scan for teammates prior to receiving the ball and track their movement mentally. This saves valuable time which you would otherwise waste by looking around while in possession of the ball.

Nature of the pass - The situation or play, which is consequently developed by the pass, gives its nature. Defensive passes are executed with the sole purpose of keeping possession and relieving enemy pressure. For example passing the ball wide and backward to ensure possession and slow the game. As for attacking passes, it must result in a more offensively advantageous situation. That means that the ball must be handed over to a player into a more dangerous position. In order to do so, players must analyze the current play and find the most reasonable way to distribute the ball. The player with the ball must decide whether to initiate a fast break forward or pass back into safely. The correctness of this decision must be based on the current strategic situation. For example, if the opposing team has been caught in a turnover in the middle of the pitch, then a quick but risky counter has greater chance of success.


The Different Types Soccer Passes

Passing to Another Player - This direct pass is the most commonly used in the game of soccer. It involves passing the ball straight to a teammate, it's also played safely so that it insure a good possession.

Passing Into Space - This type of passes is used frequently when the game is played at high speed, since you can't afford the precious seconds that you lose when receiving the ball in a static position. The player without the ball must initiate the pass by making a run into space. The ball carrier has to look around and keep verbal communication for tracking the movement and runs of his teammates.

Wall Passes (aka One-two passes) - These type of passes are combinations where one of the attacking players passes to a teammate who frees himself into space. The player receiving the ball lays it off, with one touch, into the space in front of the first attacker. The wall pass is probably the most effective type of pass, but also the hardest to pull off perfectly since it involves a great deal of precision and timing from both players.

Tunnel Passes (aka Piercing passes) - Piercing passes are usually executed without a preparation touch and require good timing. These type of passes can be very effective, if the pass succeeds, the attacker can create a dangerous opportunity. Even if the attacker doesn't necessarily end in a one-on-one position with the goalkeeper or in a good crossing position after a tunnel pass, a successful one always unbalances defenses and creates panic and havoc amongst man-markers.

There are two factors we must consider for tunnel passes - creating space in front of the enemy defense, or if there already is, exploiting that space. Generating the space can be done with a decoy attacker who drags his marker away from play. During the same time another player looms into the middle where he receives the ball and lays down a piercing pass, if hopefully the enemy defense hasn't predicted the combination. Here comes in the tricky part, which is the reading of play by the other attacker. At the time when the distributor in the middle of the field is about to receive the ball, they need to initiate penetrating runs. Keep in mind that all of this is highly theoretical and requires proficient levels of skill and midfield to attack collaboration.

Long Ball - The long ball has several advantages, including being able to skip an entire line of your enemy's defense (the midfielders) and the attacker's pressure. A long ball is also a great way to initiate a counter attack, since the receiver will be left with fewer defenders to handle. However, long balls can also be easily deflected and cleared, the receiver of the long ball has to perform a tricky trapping of the ball and he usually becomes cornered by the time he manages to put the ball on ground level. Besides, long passes are also harder to hit with precision so unless you base your strategy on counter attacks or unless you have full confidence in your strikers' ability to control long balls, you should base your soccer passing strategy on short, direct passes.