I am a firm believer in first time touches on the ball. For those that don’t understand, I am talking about hitting the ball as it comes to you without any additional touches to get the ball under control. This may be a first time pass or having a shot at goal while the ball is rolling out of your control. Striking the ball first time can be the perfect sneak attack on any goal keeper or any defender for that matter. So let’s have a look at the two different types of first touch plays that could be used on the field. The pass and the shot, as I mentioned above.

First Time Shot On Goal

I have to go with Wayne Rooney’s goal that I covered the other day which was about the goal that I scored a weekend ago. This is just a great example of having a shot at goal with the first touch. The fact that Dida didn’t see the shot coming was the beautiful part about the goal and illustrates my point convincingly. The only thing that you need to weary of here is the opportunities you take to have first time shots. Understand that there are times and places for these wild strikes at goal, so be aware more than anything of the goal keeper, the ball which isn’t under your control and the defender who is on you. The goal by Rooney can be found below.

First Time Passes

Anything better than a shot on goal is the passes that lead up to a goal and I can’t go past the recent goal that was scored by Drogba of Chelsea in the F.A Cup Final against Manchester United. This goal came about in the 2nd set of extra time. What I need you to see here is that the goal here is not important, but rather the one-two passes that lead up to the goal. In particular Frank Lampard’s mid-air pass to Drogba. This is purely great football to watch and I personally love the pass more than the goal in all honesty. Not to mention the flick from Drogba to Lampard. Here is this goal and the lead up. Pure magic.

One Of The Hardest Things To Master

The use of first time touches is truly a very hard thing to do, accurately and with enough power. The best in the game still get first time touches on the ball wrong. But rarely. You need to practice this skill a lot because it will help you towards your journey to being a great footballer like Ronaldinho. I want to stress again the importance of practicing your first time touches on the ball because it becomes a great skill to possess in the future, your game will flourish and you will feel great when you team mate scores a goal off a great first time touch from you.

Yes I love a bit of action and violence in a movie that I see at the cinema and why wouldn’t I, it makes the film all that more interesting. I’m sure you will agree with me that with all the diving that you see take place on the field, it becomes a sight for sore eyes when you see some good physical contact between tackling players. I came across this video in light of this and in direct response to my previous post about talking back to the referee. In this case, you will see some referees who have more than words exchanged to them.

Is Ronaldinho Part Of This Compilation?

He sure is and it’s quite a funny incident. I in all honesty wouldn’t have figured Ronaldinho to head butt/smother Regardless, you can catch his antics at 2 minutes and 53 seconds. One of my favourite fits of all time put would have to be Paolo De Canio’s, of Sheffield Wednesday, who lets the official know his feelings. You can see this one second past one minute. There are quite a few more notable ones, however, they’re all good in my opinion, so enjoy this one because I know I did:

We’ve all done it before and it’s safe to say that many of us love contesting a decision given against us. It’s human nature and when males play the sport, testosterone is bound to fly around. The inspiration of this story comes from the matches that I played today. Unfortunately the referee that we were given was a bit of a dud. And it seemed as though he was blind because every call would be against us and I’m sad to say, all I could do was keep playing my game and ignore what was going on around me.

There Was An Incident

In the second half we were drawn at 1-1 and my team mate decided to slide tackle another player who had the ball. In honest truth it was a great tackle and the ball was cleanly taken away from the player. Then the next thing we hear is the referees whistle and a yellow card made its way out of his pocket. My mate was absolutely peed off about the whole decision and started arguing with the referee saying, “Couldn’t you see I took the ball! I can’t believe this!” Then he swore at the official. As a result he brandished a red card which sent my friend mad and off to the bench, cursing at the official at the same time.

Pretty Funny Stuff, But Now We’re Down to 10 Men

Now, what can we learn here? Here is a list of things you need to understand about talking back to referees and what is wise:

• Their word is final and they cannot change their decision once it’s been made.
• Never argue with the referee as there is a chance that he might hold a grudge against you for the entire match
• If you have really been treated unfairly, go up the referee and ask him politely for an explanation for his decision, most will let you know
• If you don’t like their explanation, walk away
• In any situation you see that might get out of hand, you need to walk away and keep your comments to yourself

Keep this in mind next time you have a disagreement over a decision made by the official because you won’t regret it, much better having a yellow card, than a red. Plus think about what that red brings you. You get kicked out of the game, but more importantly you let your whole team down too and I don’t know about you, I would never want that guilt weighing on me.