During the Autumn Term Mr Luck has been running two lunchtime clubs at Sherwood Park School, one a football club for girls, and the other a football club for the boys.

Over the course of the term Mr Luck has been teaching the children basic ball control skills as well as attacking and defensive tactics.

Participating children, from 9 to 11 years old, have been practicing dribbling skills, passing, and turns, as well as looking for space and running into it.

While waiting for the whole group to arrive children practice their ball juggling skills, using their head, feet and knees. The current best for the girls is 5 and the boys 7. The challenge is to beat those scores in the final session next week.

Other challenges include the time bomb, where the group pass a ball to each other in a limited space without letting it come to rest. Easy you may be thinking. Not when Mr Luck adds more balls and then makes the area increasingly smaller. The aim of this exercise is to ensure children communicate and look where they are passing the ball as the challenge usually fails when someone receives more than one ball at the same time.

The children like to show off their dribbling skills through a series of races. Some where they run straight to a marker then back and others where they have to run around cones. Challenges are made harder when the children are restricted to the use of one foot or specific areas their feet such as the in step.

Sessions culminate in short small sided games with Mr Luck joining a team when it falls behind. These games are very competitive and the children are finding that they achieve more success when they work together. Last week there were two very exciting games, the girls played out a 4 – 4 draw and the boys a 6 – 4 victory. Having the coach on your team is by no means a guarantee of success as even Mr Luck scored an own goal.

These clubs have been well attended and are much enjoyed by the children.

Next term the clubs will change sports from football to Tag Rugby. For the first half term the boys and girls will develop their skills separately, then for the second half term they will combine in preparation for the TWDPSSA Tag Ruby Festival.