Dribbling

[Bothan Spy]

Why can't a player additionally focus on practicing his dribbling? I dont get it...

[HUNT3R]

Just now, Bothan Spy said:

Why can't a player additionally focus on practicing his dribbling? I dont get it...

Because he would need to be dribbling at an opponent and it's an individual focus, meaning he's alone while practicing.

[swansongs]

3 minutes ago, HUNT3R said:

Because he would need to be dribbling at an opponent and it's an individual focus, meaning he's alone while practicing.

We used cones for that.

[HUNT3R]

4 minutes ago, swansongs said:

We used cones for that.

Cones tend to have slow reaction times to you trying to go past. 

 

Point is, you're learning very little by trying to go around a static object. In a match, players are not static. There's a lot more skill involved when trying to beat a player compared to a cone.

[enigmatic]

tbf I also struggle to see how players improve their final third decision making skills without opponents or defensive positioning without teammates, and am totally baffled by the idea that goalkeepers can only practice their handling skills if a team session is devoted to it...

[swansongs]

The Dribbling attribute isn't a player's ability to beat a live human man (or men) one on one, that's a combination of Anticipation, Decisions, Flair, Technique, Balance, Agility etc.

Dribbling is the accuracy and speed at which chosen dribbling actions can be performed. Which can surely be replicated with an elaborate enough arrangement of cones.

[HUNT3R]

1 minute ago, enigmatic said:

tbf I also struggle to see how players improve their final third decision making skills without opponents or defensive positioning without teammates, and am totally baffled by the idea that goalkeepers can only practice their handling skills if a team session is devoted to it...

I can answer the keeper part easily at least. To improve your handling, you'd need a coach or player to throw or shoot the ball toward you so you can practice this.

[enigmatic]

Just now, HUNT3R said:

I can answer the keeper part easily at least. To improve your handling, you'd need a coach or player to throw or shoot the ball toward you so you can practice this.

And outfield players also need at least one other staff member to do extra passing training, a goalkeeper to practice penalty taking properly etc, the game just assumes there's someone there for them which realistically there always will be. Much like support for a goalie that is being asked to do extra handling work...

Just feels very strange design that everyone chooses their individual skills groups to work on except goalkeepers, who must dictate the entire training session if they want to improve their goalkeeping skills. I can buy the argument that professional football teams don't really do specialist dribbling or heading or tackling training focuses for individuals because they're really only learned in competitive whole team sessions, but the idea that goalkeepers don't do individual extra sessions devoted to their own handling and shot stopping seems a bit barmy...

[Bothan Spy]

Cones, staff & other players, I absolutely believe you can improve your dribbling as a footballer.

Its frustrating and just plain wrong to not be able to suggest to a player that he can't focus on improving his dribbling. 

For those that think that it's not possible, then I put to you, how can a player improve his QUICKNESS?? Because that is a choosable development additional focus. I absolutely believe that every trait is open to being improved with the right training, coaches and determination. 

HEADING apparantly can't be a focus of training this version. What utter tripe! Of course you can improve your heading as a player and coach it. Basically someone throws or crosses you a ball and you get stuck in.

[Bothan Spy]

I absolutely fail to see how every attribute in the game isn't open to being improved. The modern game is full of coaches who can improve every aspect of a professional footballers game. To suggest that you can't improve a players heading or dribbling through training is absolutely laughable. Yet I can improve a players quickness and leadership this version...

[Bothan Spy]

Crossing is another aspect and attribute I apparently can't improve in a player. Really?? Wouldn't it just consist of him whipping in balls to his attacking team mates into a crowded box with his defending team mates during training? Coincidentally enough, it could also improve my players heading! Not a crazy thought.

Revolutionary training ideas here!

[Bothan Spy]

3 hours ago, HUNT3R said:

Because he would need to be dribbling at an opponent and it's an individual focus, meaning he's alone while practicing.

So isn't quickness?

[CFuller]

I can't help feeling we've had this debate before. In fact, we've had it more than once. We've certainly had it at least three times.

The truth of the matter is that some player attributes cannot physically be trained alone. Dribbling around a bunch of cones serves no real purpose. Neither does crossing to a penalty area full of cardboard cutouts, or adapting a tennis ball launcher to train up your heading.

If you want to work on a player's dribbling, crossing, heading, whatever... you can tailor your training schedules to work on that. For example, I noticed recently that some of my defensive players were lacking composure, so I set my training schedules up to work a bit more on this aspect of their game (plus some other relevant mental attributes). The changes weren't dramatic, obviously, but I could still see they were having a positive effect.

Though changing your mind will be nigh on impossible, I'd like you to - at the very least - see where some of us are coming from, and move on. I'm sure none of us really want to be debating this again two or three months from now.

[Lem]

3 hours ago, HUNT3R said:

Cones tend to have slow reaction times to you trying to go past. 

 

Point is, you're learning very little by trying to go around a static object. In a match, players are not static. There's a lot more skill involved when trying to beat a player compared to a cone.

Surely that argument applies to a lot of the individual focus options? Corners? Passing? Attacking movement?

End of the day practice will never be the same as a match. You can of course still improve at Crossing, Dribbling, even Heading at least as much as you can the other options available. It's a poor design decision to leave several of them out.

[Weezer]

3 hours ago, HUNT3R said:

Cones tend to have slow reaction times to you trying to go past. 

 

Point is, you're learning very little by trying to go around a static object. In a match, players are not static. There's a lot more skill involved when trying to beat a player compared to a cone.

How do you justify many of the other individual training focuses if that's the case?

[swansongs]

31 minutes ago, CFuller said:

The truth of the matter is that some player attributes cannot physically be trained alone. Dribbling around a bunch of cones serves no real purpose. Neither does crossing to a penalty area full of cardboard cutouts, or adapting a tennis ball launcher to train up your heading.

Nonsense.

[CFuller]

1 minute ago, swansongs said:

Nonsense.

Care to add anything more than that?

[themadsheep2001]

Closing this, because OP has had several threads on this already. 

[herne79]

4 hours ago, Bothan Spy said:

Why can't a player additionally focus on practicing his dribbling? I dont get it...

I'll add the following, written by SI themselves as a result of developing the new training model and following research with real life clubs (it's also pinned to the top of the Tactics & Training forum):

Individual Training

Individual training has moved in a more realistic direction.
Complimentary attributes are now grouped together, where it would be impossible to train one without influencing the other.
Some attributes are no longer available under individual training. This is because it is not realistic to be able to train these on a one-on-one basis. They are included in the team and unit training sessions however.
Goalkeepers have no Individual > Additional Focus. Instead they have their own bespoke training sessions available in the schedule.
Explanation on some of the attributes that are no longer available for individual training:

• Crossing - this is more dead-ball crossing, so Free Kicks and Corners. Open-play crossing is prevalent in quite a few of the team/unit training sessions.
• Dribbling - dribbling around cones in isolation isn't reflective of actual in-match dribbling and not something that is done in reality to improve dribbling.
• Tackling - this isn't the lack of another player to tackle but rather that tackling is something of an innate ability and not a skill that is directly improved with individual work. It is more a player's positioning, marking, decision making etc. that is worked on and improved one-on-one.

Bearing in mind this was developed following research with clubs in order to be more realistic, if anyone disagrees with that realism and can follow that up with first hand experience, you're best off raising it in the Training and Medical Centre forum.