Probably the best asset a striker and attacking midfielders need to have and that is speed. Many want to know how to get much faster than they already are and this question plagued me for many years during my younger years. There would always be this guy who would always beat me in the 100 metre sprint at the school athletics carnival every year. It would drive me mad because I personally didn’t know about the best speed building techniques. The best one I know about at this point in time would be using a special apparatus called a speed ladder as pictured below. Using this piece of equipment becomes a form of isometric exercise.

How Do You Use It?

Once layed out on the ground, you proceed to run though each square, one after another, making sure both feet are hitting each square. This rapid succession of running through these squares builds speed and as you go along with your progress, you can move your legs faster meaning more strides in one minute. The biggest reason why this exercise works so well is because it is high intensity and with this intensity comes results. Take a look at the video below of to see an example of how you should go about building up your speed. By the way, the two shown here do this exercise incredibly fast and I can’t do it that fast yet.

What To Do If You Can Get One

I personally would like to purchase a speed ladder, but I’d much rather, using chalk, draw out the ladder on a concrete floor and run through the squares. It is simple, cost-effective, however, is not convenient. The ladder on the other hand is. So if you ever wanted to get one for yourself they will set you back around $40 USD. Here’s to building your speed, and it doesn’t matter what position you play, you can never have too much speed, only until you can’t handle it.

If you play football for reasons other than enjoying yourself, then I am going to drop a small bombshell and say that you will never be a great player like Ronaldinho. The biggest reason why I write this is because of one of the 4 games I had on the weekend. In particular, the one I played in the Premier League. The team that I play with for that league is one of the most serious bunch of people I’ve ever played with. Like I posted earlier, this is the team that lacks cohesion and doesn’t seem to have fun while playing football.

What Effects Can This Have?

This allows for negative talk, shouting at other players and as a result leaves the victims of such verbal abuse lacking confidence, lacking composure and can even lead to leaving the team. How do I know this? Because these are the very same emotions that went through me for about 5 minutes, and it was only during that 5 minutes that I played mediocre football. I honestly thought about leaving this team, because Premier League or not, I refuse to play with a team that plays so seriously and puts one another down. You just can’t play like that. Yes you have to be serious about playing your best, but you play your best when you’re having fun.

The Ronaldinho Smile

Ronaldinho is a good example of having fun while playing the best football of your life. I hardly see him go on without a smile on his face because he loves playing football. If you ever feel as though you are being pressured by others to play serious football, make sure that you don’t give in to them. Yes be aware of the team and play your best, but play with an open mind and heart towards the fun you want to be having with that ball. Only then can you really play as well as the greatest player in the world, Ronaldinho.

I’m sure many of you have seen the Joga Benito clips and the one I want to talk about today is the one with Ronaldinho featured as a young child playing for Gremio in Porto Alegre. This happens to be my favourite of all the Joga Benito clips that Nike have pulled out. When you watch the video, Manchester United great, Eric Cantona says:

Now, something I’ve found to remind you of how it should be. When you were a kid it was easy, you were not afraid to try… to dare. You do it just because you liked it. So my advice to you is, never grow up my friends.

I actually see some good advice in Cantona’s little blurb. As you watch Ronaldinho obliterate the entire team (which is of course staged, but I actually don’t think it is impossible to do) the words of Cantona seem to ring into my ears, especially when the younger Ronaldinho tried all these unorthodox things on the football court. This brings me to the point of this post.

Never Be Afraid To Try Anything

Given the right place and the right time of course. Let’s take me for example. The other day at football training, I received a ball from a team mate who send it behind my feet and I needed to get it back. Now it would’ve been easy for me to just stop, turn around and stick my leg out and control with the inside of my foot. But no, I wanted to try something. So while looking up to maintain the illusion that I had nothing to do with the ball, I didn’t turn around and stuck my foot out behind me, visualising the ball would flick forward if it hit the front of the boot. Sure enough it hit the boot and had the desired effect, but the power on the pass was too high so the ball went in front of me and out of my control. If that were a game, the thought of trying that wouldn’t have gone through my mind unless I practised it vigorously.

What Can We Learn Here

Firstly, it worked to an extent and that is something that I could work on in my own time and incorporate it into my game if I wanted. Secondly, I tried this at the right place and the right time. Training is predominately the best place to try out something you usually wouldn’t do in a real game. So take young Ronaldinho as an example. Don’t ever be afraid to try anything that you think will help out a certain situation you might be in. And don’t pay any attention to those who say “What do you think you’re doing?”. You just tell them, it’s better than trying that during a game isn’t it? It keeps them quiet everytime for me