In rugby, footwork and evasion skills are the “fine arts” – ways to run with the ball and beat players with skill, pace and panache. These articles include ways to coach players to have “rugby speed” not just pace, and evade contact with nifty “rugby footwork”. Try one of the footwork and evasion drills below at your next session and see how you get on.
Use this conditioning game to help your players develop better footspeed, evasive skills and stop/ start skills. It comes from basketball, and is easy to set up and certainly fun for the players.
With thanks to Chris Oliver of BasketballImmersion.com, this is a conditioning exercises that the players will love. First, it’s competitive. Second, it has a risk/reward element which makes the players think tactically about their actions. Finally, it has some great rugby outcomes. MORE
Scoring tries is too often a given skill. This session makes a virtue of good body positions. It creates a hard session which the players will enjoy because of the obvious potential outcomes, scoring tries. Your team will also learn how to protect the ball close to line and how to coordinate a last ditch defence. MORE
Develop the idea that if the ball carrier runs an S-line, they can draw in defenders and release support players to attack a flat, organised defence.
The out-in-out nature of the run forces defenders to make decisions which creates enough disruption to pull them out of position. MORE
If a player can attack the ball at an angle the defence is not expecting, there’s a better chance of breaking the defensive line. Here’s how it works and how to practise it.
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Push the ball carrier to change his angles of running and your support runners to react so defences are not faced with easy patterns to defend.
This session works on “off-the-cuff” movements of players, so tests their recognition of space and reactions to their own team mates. MORE
A fun game to help work on defensive footwork as well as evasion skills from attackers.
Develops evasion skills, plus defensive footwork and communication. MORE
How often do you despair that your players can’t score when there’s an overlap? Why is it players drift out in attack and play into the hands of the drift defence? Here are my simple solutions. MORE
Use this activity to improve players’ ability to scan what’s in front of them. It will allow the players to develop their footwork options before contact or in open play.
All the targets are in front of the ball carrier, so they will need to go forward but still avoid the defender. MORE
Play a game of six versus six and give the attacking team two balls. Strategically the attack should split themselves into two groups as should the defence, the decision making and spatial awareness will become apparent as the game develops. Once a try is scored everyone focuses on the remaining ball. Start with touch rugby before developing into full contact. MORE
Nic Dolly, from Build U Fitness, gives us a bodyweight leg workout that your players can do at home, which will help strength and endurance. HOW TO TRAIN One set is: one jump squat, one jump lunge left, one right. Complete 100 of this set of exercises and record the time. See if you... MORE
