The effect of small-sided games with different levels of opposition on the tactical behaviour of young footballers with different levels of sport expertise.

Alba Práxedes,Fernando Del Villar,Alberto Moreno,Alexander Gil-Arias,Fernando Claver,Alessandro Zagatto

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0190157

Alba Práxedes, Fernando Del Villar + Show 4 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0190157

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Journal: PloS one	Publication Date: Jan 10, 2018
Citations: 46	License type: CC BY 4.0

Affiliation: University of Extremadura, King Juan Carlos University

Abstract

To optimize players' tactical abilities, coaches need to design training sessions with representative learning tasks, such as, small-sided games. Moreover, it is necessary to adapt the complexity of the tasks to the skill level of the athletes to maximally improve their perceptual, visual and attentive abilities. The objective of this study was to analyze the effect of two teaching programs, each utilizing modified games with varied levels of opposition, on decision-making and action execution in young players with different levels of sports expertise. 19 football players (U12), separated into two ability groups (Average versus Low skill-level), participated in a series of training sessions that were spread over 4 phases: Pre-intervention 1, Intervention 1 (teaching program based on modified games with numerical superiority in attack), Pre-intervention 2 and Intervention 2 (teaching program based on modified games with numerical equality). Each intervention phase lasted 14 sessions. Decision-making and the execution of pass action during league matches over the same period were evaluated using the Game Performance Evaluation Tool (GPET). The Average skill-level group showed significant differences after the first intervention in decision-making and execution of the pass action (decision-making, p = .015; execution, p = .031), but not after the second intervention (decision-making, p = 1.000; execution, p = 1.000). For the Low skill-level group, significant differences were only observed in the execution of passing between the first and last phases (p = .014). These findings seem to indicate that for groups with an average level of expertise, training with numerical superiority in attack provides players with more time to make better decisions and to better execute actions. However, for lower-level groups programs may take longer to facilitate improvement. Nevertheless, numerical equality did not result in improvement for either group.

Highlights

The behaviour of football players in a competitive match depends on the action of their opponents [1]
From the perspective of ecological dynamics, decision-making is based on the interaction that an athlete maintains with the game environment [6]
For the Low skill-level group (Table 6), the only significant difference observed was for the execution variable between the Pre-intervention 1 and Intervention 2 phases

Summary

Introduction

The behaviour of football players in a competitive match depends on the action of their opponents [1]. To optimize players’ tactical abilities, coaches need to design training sessions with representative learning tasks, i.e. tasks that ensure that practice has similar perceptual-action relationships to competitive matches [12] Toward this goal, Small-Sided and Conditioned Games (SSCG; commonly used modified games that take place in tight spaces, involving small numbers of players and with modified rules of the game) have been proposed to be an effective methodological tool for optimizing the tactical behaviour of athletes [13, 14]. These games promote the development of technical actions such as passing, dribbling and shooting [15], and have been shown to result in a higher level of sporting expertise in athletes since they simultaneously work on two components of action; the decision-making process and the technical execution [16, 17]

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