February 2013

‘Time wasting’ at the short corner

A quick article on the option of standing outside your goal to prepare for the corner. Not everyone uses it and might consider this sort of thinking to be a little tedious, but I think to think outside the box and enjoy writing about all things goalkeeping, so something to mull over if you’ve never considered it before!

‘Time wasting’ at the corner is essentially just taking your time to set up at the short corner, stepping outside of goal and making the most of the opportunity to prepare or attempt to ‘psych out’ the opposition. I thought I’d give it that title just to reel you in (hopefully!)! It’s basically an opportunity to take on fluids and rehydrate (if you are playing in a hot climate especially, or to help with mentality and concentration; water is said to aid this!) as well as organise your corner defence, especially if the opposition are running a set-up you are having trouble with or not experienced before and need to know how to run your defenders against the injection. It’s not exactly the same time wasting in footie where they drag out a spot kick but I guess is in a similar vein.

Kelburne take their time preparing for the corner.

What is it?

‘Time wasting’ at the corner is a variety of things, but I wanted to extrapolate it for the point of article writing! It can be really trying to push the boat out and run down the clock, or simply standing outside the goal and chatting to your defence to organise it, if the team has started to variant their routine and you need to change up your defence run out. Taking the chance to rehydrate and run through options with your team mates. In some ways, in its truest form, ‘time wasting’ is a technique used noticeably at the international level to try and slow down the taking of the penalty corner. Especially if trying to run down the clock at the end of a match when you don’t want to face another corner! The method puts the other team off their efforts in organising the corner attack; hopefully messing up their chances. Defenders will take their time putting on their face masks and try to prolong it for as long as possible. As a team effort, the goalkeeper is also expected to find ways of wasting crucial time!

Who does it?

It’s not that uncommon to see goalkeepers step out of their goal just before they set up before a short corner that has been conceded. If you watched the Olympics or been watching other games at international level, then you may have seen various goalkeepers do this. James Fair for example would often drink and talk to his defenders just before getting back into goal to prepare for the corner. I managed to get down to the Euro Hockey League first round stages at East Grinstead not so longer ago in person and watched Kelburne’s goalkeeper in the game against Rot˗Weiss Kӧln taking time out to step out of his goal to do so. You can often find goalkeepers at all sorts of levels doing so too.

Stepping out of goal

Instead of stepping into their goal to get ready for the corner, some keepers like to step out of their goal and stand off the line, outside of goal. This allows the team to get organised and signals to the umpire that the time is not ready yet. This is especially useful if you do not have the full 4 defenders for the corner defence and are waiting for the extra men to come back. Once the extra defender has turned up, or your team have got ready, you can step back into goal and get prepared (ready in your stance) for the injection and the shot.

Here you can see the goalkeeper of Boxmeer (black jersey, red TK pads) waiting outside the goal to give his defence the time to set up at 0:48:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUNRmTL7-Sc

At 0:07 you can see Dan Vismaan (the goalkeeper at Rotterdam before Blaak took over) stepping out of goal, but not making ‘a meal out of it’!:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZjWWPWrPbg&feature=related

In this clip at 0:22 playing time makes an obvious statement of stepping out of the goal to ‘time waste’ and then talks things through with his defenders:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QojFtHaOFIA&feature=related

Stretching

Some goalkeepers will even go as far as stretching to try and run down the clock even further. When they are outside of the goal, waiting for their teammates to get organised (if the defenders are putting on their face masks, jocks and hand protection) then the goalkeeper could do some stretching, like the leg muscles. If you wanted to waste further time, you could pretend there was something wrong with your equipment. For example, you could fiddle with the straps on your kickers, or take a leg guard off to look at the kicker and then put it back on again (pretending as if there’s something wrong with it). Doing this wastes further time and frustrates your opponents even more.

N.B.: In writing this, I’d like to point out I don’t condone it, as reporting it, just making note of observations from games I’ve made! It feels a little cheeky and audacious to try to get away with!

On the second corner in this video, you can see the goalie stretching a bit at 0:27 to give his defenders extra time to get ready, before he quickly sets up behind the goal line:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oEmgPLBPv3E

Time to prepare

‘Time wasting’ other than the phrase, at its simplest form; of stepping out of goal and organising offers a simple but crucial option. It gives you the time to think through options against an opposition who are trying a different corner routine, which you need to analyse and work out a suitable way to defend. If you have faced a corner where the opposition have ‘switched things up’ and changed their approach then your standard defence may not be up to it. Ex-GB and Scotland international Ali McGregor used to talk with his defenders outside the goal to talk through things with his defenders in club action when he was at Loughborough as do various other goalkeepers.

McGregor discusses with his team mates how the short corner defence will be organised.

Here the goalkeeper is visibly far out of goal and taking to his defence:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmbmUwbvYYA

It also gives time to rehydrate as has been stated previously. Rehydrating is important and often forgotten and the umpire should allow you to get a drink during the process of preparing for the corner, within the team it takes your defenders to put on extra protection. Otherwise you may be taking the risk in getting a drink, only to have to push your helmet on and rush out of goal as someone throws an aerial into your D or something, as I’ve heard a tale of!

Rob Turner of Bowdon takes on some water.

Umpire timing

Whilst, the title and phrasing suggests that you could actually time waste, I don’t think umpires should or would seriously let you get away with total defrauding! Umpires will normally time at the elite level to make sure they don’t actually waste time, and hope this is the same for elsewhere. In the Euro Hockey League they had an allotted time limit for how long the team had to prepare on a corner. At lower levels you will still get astute umpires making sure you’re not taking an obscene amount of time with the tactic, even if the same restrictions aren’t in place (i.e. amount of time set)!

And for one final clip, you can see a good junior Australian goalkeeper (who is actually in the U21s set-up as much as I know) stepping out of goal and not taking too long or a fuss to sort out his defenders and the defence at 0:57, under the watchful eye of the umpire:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hmNsZjHlCcs

Psychological advantage?

One other interpretation is that it is to do with ‘mind games’ a goalkeeper can play with the opposition. Just like at flicks where a goalkeeper might take off their kit and then put it back on again before setting on the line, or banging the posts and making a lot of noise, that sort of thing! The idea is to put the team off their attack. It is a simple concept: the more time you waste, the more agitated and annoyed the opposition get; putting them off their ‘game’. Rather than allowing them to get on with it, they will probably get annoyed at the idea of you running down the clock!

By doing this, you ‘get into the heads’ of the opposite team; playing mental games like this will disrupt their concentration and therefore disrupt the corner routine, getting them to hopefully miss. If they have a set routine they like to use, then they may end up changing it, or the drag flicker could mess up, having had his concentration dented. But, at the end of the day, if like all the posturing done at penalty flicks (like the penalty shootout in football; and there are some bizarre routines!) and you don’t make the save then it’s better just to set and get ready and ensure you do make the stop!

Using it?

Ultimately, it’s up to you to decide how you play. There’s nothing wrong with experimenting and trying things out to work out how you play best and develop your own style. There are a lot of things you can learn about goalkeeping that you won’t pick up from coaching, but rather normally from seeing other goalkeepers play and how they approach the game and this is one of many of them. I personally would rather just set up behind the line, focus on the ball at the injection and try and analyse the corner set-up to expect what type of shot is heading my way, but have sometimes done it in the case of team mates needing a ‘breather’ after a tough half or feel the need to talk through a defensive change.

Goalkeepers ‘are like wine’

Goalkeepers are always told they will reach their peak at a later age and though some defy this expectation with their abilities, it is often safe to say the goalkeeper has a harder time of getting first eleven game action! Like wine, mature and develop as your career goes on.

Although it is not impossible for a goalkeeper to play strongly at a young age, goalkeeping isn’t exactly a ‘boy’s game’. This is in the sense that it takes a lot of talent, a mature attitude, and experience of the speed of play and scenarios at the highest level, to really make it. Whilst there are many extremely talented goalkeepers who have got their break early playing at a much younger age than a mature veteran, maintaining this level takes experience. A goalkeeper with more experience should perform better as they can work off their experiences to develop awareness and ability to deconstruct the game. If you have been ‘around the block’ more you already have a head start. Whereas climbing the ladder is based on gaining crucial experience at each stage, experience of play at the highest level is undeniably important for making the switch to elite starter.

Why?

A good metaphor for the goalkeeping journey is wine; wine gets better with age and the best wine is theorised as a mature wine. Or whiskey if that’s your tipple! This is the same with goalkeepers: goalkeeping is all about experience and the ability to know what to do when something happens in the game, so gaining that experience is all important to achieving success. Like wine, goalkeepers need time to develop; the older they get, the better they get thanks to their game experiences. Playing 2s as a reserve is not the same standard as a 1^st choice premier league starter, so there is quite a jump to be made.

Experience is so important to allowing a goalkeeper to perform at their best. Whilst reaction speeds and cannot be taught, experience needs to be learnt through playing (obviously!). And thus, the more a goalkeeper plays the better they should get as they grow accustomed to the rigours and tribulations of a season at the highest levels of hockey. Whereas a forward can come on as a replacement and come off the bench to play, a goalkeeper is there for the full 70 minutes, meaning they come under a lot of pressure to perform well week in week out, relying on their previous experiences to follow onto the next.

Wine gets better with age

Experience is like the maturing stage of wine in this metaphor. Goalkeepers are players that need experience and wisdom, so that they can make the timely save and play with consistency. Without it, they cannot succeed: they will not be able to know how to react to a bad game and end up letting their team down. Like wine, goalkeepers need time to get to their best. Outfield players are expected to have more of an immediate impact at a younger age breaking into a 1^st XI, but goalkeepers often have to wait their turn.

The best goalkeepers are theoretically the older goalkeepers: they know what’s coming and they know how to react to it and deal with the play. They know how to get the job done and they know what it takes to compete. With all their experience, they can put it to work during the game when it becomes a tough match. Once goalkeepers reach their peak they will potentially be unstoppable, even if it will only be short lived; everything else up to that point is the work done to reach that level. Michael Mahood from Canada, considered one of the world’s best, was 36 or so before he retired. Of course, eventually reaction times will wane and you can become more prone to injury as you age.

If you look at the average age of most national league and international goalkeepers, you will see a common trend of older aged goalkeepers. As in older than 20 at least, but generally are nearer mid-20s and older! At home in England, Simon Mason (who was obviously GB’s no.1 for a long time) is currently playing National League at an old age; that says something about his ability to read the play and dominate the game. Chris Hibbert is going strong in his late thirties at Southgate and Simon Mason is nearing the big 4-0. If you take the National Premier League in England, 3 starters are 21 or younger, whereas the youngest in the conferences is about 23 (Phil Carr or Tommy Alexander), although Andrew Miller is 22 and Chris Rea 21; Old Loughtonians’ Chris Naven 22, whilst George Ratcliffe (21) is benching at Doncaster, though given a chance in indoor, as far as I know, but could be wrong about the general age range!

Reaching your peak

Goalkeepers aren’t really expected to hit their prime until their late 20s now, although the early 30s is what it is generally considered to be the time for that. Repetition of actions makes decision making easier as the goalkeeper should know exactly what to do for specific situations as a result of their experience. Positional awareness comes from the experience of being in the right position on multiple plays over time, so being on angle all the time and knowing where to be when at the right time is also a bi-product of game experience. Consistency develops as the goalkeeper gets used to playing at the highest level on a regular basis. Mistakes are made and you can learn from them to improve.

With confidence being the most important skill bar the technical side of things, a young goalkeeper tested too early can have their confidence crushed after a few shaky performances and may struggle to refind the form that got them to that position. 24 seems to be the bar that is being set for goalkeepers to be old enough to stand the rigours of being the starter, the age where they can be expected to take the reins. David Kettle for example is settling into a starting role at Surbiton and I don’t think Potton started as the first choice for EG until he was about that age. John Ruddy and Joe Hart in football really started to become elite goalkeepers at this age (Hart having a crucial season at Birmingham). So whilst I think there is a lowering of the age for a starter, they will still potentially and theoretically still hit their prime in their late twenties or early thirties as a result of game experience and improved ability to ‘read’ the play and what is about to or going to happen in front of them. Which is a good thing as they aren’t playing to their best just yet!

It is a good point to know that goalkeepers theoretically won’t peak and play at their best until they are about 33 years old; that seems like a long time if you’ve been playing in goal since you were 12 or so! Take Vogels for example; if you saw him before he retired, playing internationally, he played like a wise veteran and arguably the world’s best, whereas Stockmann was struggling a bit against teams internationally as he took over but has been recently finding great form and playing up to expectations as of late, to dramatic effect. Not that he isn’t any good but it was his first real experience of taking the starting spot at international level and experiencing the struggles of competing against the world’s best, like Nathan Burgers in his early days. Without sounding overly critical (they are the world’s elite after all!).

The exception to the rule

It’s not uncommon for a prodigal goalkeeper to be able to play at the elite level from a much younger age. Obviously it is important to get noticed early and prove you have talent, because making attempts at a later date to jump to the top is obviously much more difficult! Technique can be taught and experience can be gained but god given talent is not. A young goalkeeper with exceptional athletic ability and composure within their D is a rarity and yet not impossible. Like Niklas Sakowsky at Crefelder HTC, Antoni Kindler for Canada or Pirmin Blaak at Rotterdam. But everyone is unique and develops at different stages and times. The reasoning for getting recognised early is that coaching has developed enough for goalkeepers to get good access to developing their skills to the highest levels. Diccon Stubbings, Harry Martin and James Bailey are the latest crop of mercurial youngsters, with Patrick Smith waiting in the wings at Cannock, in England, for example

If elite athletes get the right coaching and are pushed properly they can quickly ascend the ladder rapidly if given the chance to shine, with the experience of higher level hockey increasing this development significantly. However, with the pressure to perform consistently and to a high level, the goalkeeper has to be incredibly mentally strong. Young people are often overly confident, so maturity and composure at a young age and not getting carried away with your own success is as true of goalkeeping as it is anything in life. A young goalkeeper with the correct level of mental strength and ‘cockiness’ and the play to back it up will go further than if they begin to self doubt. And good performances can be the assurance for psychological benefits.

Maturing like wine

Ultimately, your best goalkeeping years will be later on in your playing career, even if you show promise early on. Hard work, dedication and commitment will pay off eventually. If you have your heart set on playing the best you can (whether that be internationally, in national league or whatever else), be prepared to have to wait and be patient but retain that edge and drive to be able to get the chance and run away with it when it comes. Goalkeeping is something you need to work at it and learn from your experiences. Don’t think that you will suddenly become amazing, but be accepting that you will need to work for your opportunities and give it your best, so that one day you will be unstoppable! It is human to want everything now and be impatient, but you need to wait your turn. Like wine, let yourself develop with time and then grasp the starting job with all your might when you get the chance.

Looking to win

If you want to win the league or a tournament, you’re going to learn how to win. Here’s a rough guide!

The object of any game (whether you feel that way or not or otherwise!) is to win. And as a goalkeeper we hope that we can consistently play in such a way that we can lead our team to victory time and time again. But it is not always that easy, with the elite goalkeeper able to carve out a reputation for success by rising above the challenges they face. Whilst some goalkeepers potentially get an easy ride by playing on a strong team, the great goalkeeper will be able to find ways to win even on a mediocre or poor team, aware of what they need to do during a game to secure the points. Take Julio Cesar at QPR. Yes, different sport and they haven’t won many (Green got their first win ironically!), but he is able to consistently put in mind blowing performances to keep a clean sheet and earn a draw, like the recent game against Chelsea, helping them come out on top at 1-0. What more can you do than not letting any goals in week in week out?! So in this vein, you should look to emulate this success in your own season, being able to battle through adversity to earn the points and be the hero!

Making the routine stops

Even though the art of practice and training tries to boil down the art of goalkeeping and sport in general into a series of routine actions, it is not always that simple. Get set in your stance, be on angle, react to the shot and make the stop, that kind of thing. But a lot can happen in a game and it won’t always go to plan. So it is important to be able to control the controllable. Getting the job done means being able to make the simple easy looking saves that are just as important as the spectacular, breath taking ones; make sure you are able to stop the ones coming straight you and don’t give away those ones that make you blush.

Making the big saves

The goalies who are really the crème de la crème are the ones that can make the game changing saves; they know it’s happening and they pull it off nonetheless! In other sports this may be more obvious, like ice hockey where a big save changes the whole momentum as the time rushes up the ice to counter-attack after a big save, but they can be just as game changing in our sport. Breakaways, interceptions against a forward through on goal or decisive penalty corner saves when the game is tied, that kind of thing. These kinds of saves can happen at the start of the match when the opposition could gain the lead or at the end when they could tie it up or win. You need to have the mental strength and level of concentration to be intensely aware of the need to pull this off, keeping your team in it with a chance to take the full points. The time to change the game is in your hands and the best goalkeepers will be able to do it on a consistent basis!

Consistency

To win on a consistent basis it needs to become a regular habit, almost a routine. Whether or not you have little to do behind a forward pressing, attacking team, or end up facing a lot of shots behind plenty of defensive breakdowns, the best goalkeepers will find a way to win the game. All the great goalkeepers will win behind high scoring (5 to double figures) or low scoring games (1-0). This is the consistency: the ability to perform well game in game out to allow your team to win. It is the ability to win no matter how many shots you face, to be able to make the game winning save on its own, or the multiple saves that will deny the opposition a comeback. This boils down to not getting to high or low emotionally as things start to rattle your cage as you have to battle against it. Play the full 70 minutes to the best of your ability, not being mentally affected by the score line and give yourself the chance to do your best. Don’t get dismayed, just focus on shot stopping: the team is the one who wins the game, not you, by scoring (well, that’s the way I see it!)! You just have to make sure you keep it that way!

Exuding confidence

Being confident is an essential part of goalkeeping aside from the technical aspects. To win you have to believe you are good enough! Think of Roberto Mancini’s comments about wanting Hart to be cocky. To make those saves and change the game, you have to really believe in your abilities otherwise you will doubt and make mistakes that gift the opposition. Often it comes from within, whilst it may take time, encouragement and strong performances to prove it to yourself. It’s something I intend to write about: be cocky, not arrogant because if something happens you didn’t expect as you said you wouldn’t let it, then you’ll end up looking a wally and your team might doubt you or it could damage that confidence!

Confident goalkeepers believe they will win the game no matter what and make the tough saves look like no big deal. Like Patrick Roy’s brand of confidence (Google for some of his Stanley cup quotes!). They are so confident, they know they are going to stop everything, rather than just ‘can’! This confidence comes from hard work and performing well. Self belief is not about whether your coach thinks you’re good or your team does; you believe you’re good! Taking every step (mental preparation, stretching etc.) to ensure you’ll win helps this.

Being confident is great because it has a knock-on effect you might not have thought about. If you exude confidence, everyone else will play confidently as they reflect on their own ability to play well and do their best. Confidence rubs off! A team is confident when they know they don’t have to cover their eyes when a shot comes in, they know the goalkeeper is going to bail them out so they don’t worry as much! Think about being a team mate of Gomes when he was playing badly. Play well and your team will appreciate it!

Fighting for the win

Goalkeepers who don’t have to prove themselves in my opinion won’t do as well. If you’ve got something to prove, you’re going to work harder and be more competitive. If you don’t have things handed to you, then you already have motivation to outdo your competition. BUT even those that have proved themselves will continue to work hard as they push their abilities to the limits, if they are the elite, because they don’t want to just want to be good, they want to be the best! Tenaciously battling in training and more importantly in games, to play the best they can and give their team the best chance of winning is where it’s at. They’ll outwork you and fight to make sure they stay first choice, it means that much to them! Battling against the odds is a lot of fun if you want to show you’ve got it as I found in my time as you are the underdog: what do you have to lose?!

The stronger-willed goalkeeper will be the top of the pack. The goalkeeper who is determined to win and passionate about goalkeeping will be the best and their desire is noticeable and easy to spot. Taking extra shots in training, doing fitness outside of organised training, the things expected of an elite athlete anyway! Time not doing this is time wasted to them. This is an aspect of your ‘mental game’ you need to work on if you want to get up the ladder of hockey.

Do your best

It’s a hard task to win on a regular basis and takes time and effort and the passion to win to pull it off. Even if you are on a team stacked with talent, take De Gea at Manchester United, you still need to make important saves as theoretically the less chances a team has the more they will take them as they are limited by the defence (i.e. they will be of a higher quality as they can’t waste the chance on goal and aren’t merely ‘throwing’ shots on goal). And make sure you don’t have ‘a bad day at the office’ if anything else because that won’t help your team out! Be strong, be bold, believe you’ve got the ability and go out there and prove it!

Play to win!

Ultimately, you want to play to win. From the outset of a match, you should be totally focused on the game and winning and nothing else. This is the level of intense concentration of the elite goalkeeper and you have to match it if you want to win that badly! Love goalkeeping and love to win and find ways to win and you’ll be alright! Just make sure you can do it consistently!

Feel I should reference Jeff Lerg’s article for this as there is a lot of influence obvious in the article:

http://mihockeynow.com/2013/01/from-the-crease-the-winning-goaltender/

The ‘No goals rules’…

With easy goals not encouraged, the ‘no goals’ rules can be a useful reminder of how not to get scored on!

When it comes to goalkeeping, there are a few basic rules when it comes to potentially allowing the goals you do. Not necessarily ones based on technique or style of play, they are focused more on how the goalkeeper allows goals; whether they give away easy goals or if they play as hard to beat. By following these simple and seemingly obvious rules of playing in goal, you can improve your play and challenge shooters to really step up their game to earn their points against you (that is if you give up any goals!).

The rules

Any goal going in against you that breaks the rules laid out, means you aren’t forcing the shooter to beat you. They don’t have to work hard for their goal, as you allow a ‘softie’! All that is happening is you are forcing the shooter to merely put the ball ‘on’ the goal rather than pick a spot that you would be difficult to beat against. A lack of time as the shooter gets a defender coming in to oppose them, is going to make their mind up for them as they simply shoot towards the goal, rather than targeting a specific spot to beat you at. Rather, a shooter ‘working’ the goalkeeper will look to exploit the corners or spots difficult to reach, trying to get around the barrier that is the body in front of them as they shoot. And this is what the goalkeeper wants, to be tested and consequently test their shot stopping abilities!

The following are the rules that cover how you should focus on not giving away easy goals, and will be explored further:

No goals through you
No goals above or underneath you
No poor angle goals

No goals through you

The first rule and most obvious one, is to not concede through you. Not letting a goal go through you and humiliate you is quite important to showing you can get the job down against weaker, less challenging shots. This can be straight through the legs where you struggle to close your legs in time, possibly against a corner or strike from the top of the D, or possibly gaps in your stance, like the holes under your shoulders, with space between gloves and body, against a tip-in for example. This is the same for ice hockey, where goalies are taught to close gaps as they go down to block and play the percentages. In football they really do focus on the adage of never allowing a shot to get through you, teaching the need to get your body behind a shot so that you get as much coverage as possible if you fail on the initial block (wherein they teach technique to bring the chest in to play to help out, as they go to catch a low ball for example).

I couldn’t find a suitable hockey example, so here’s Scott Carson’s mistake against Croatia and reinforces football’s teachings:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxefXTqeVi4

The following clip does show a hockey example, where at 4:51 playing time, Whitchurch’s Williams unfortunately concedes a squeaker that gets through his legs as it rebounds off the right pad:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SUBtktHtL-k

Or this one where the goalkeeper again unfortunately allows a goal between the legs, against a flick straight down the middle at a short corner:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYTWzYUkhsM

No goals over or underneath you

Again, just like there should be no goals through you, you should aim to not allow goals squeezed under or over you. Essentially, even though you should work hard not to allow them, shots into the corners are ones that if there are any, are the least embarrassing. Lobbed shots, when you are off your line and beaten by a chipped ball aren’t as regular in hockey as they are in football, but should not be given away so easily against the opposition. And balls squeaking through underneath a kicker not firmly placed on the pitch, or when ‘logging’ against a shot or sliding out to block, should be avoided at all costs. Technique and balancing saves should prevent such occurrences.

Though it’s not necessarily an accurate representation, this video illustrates getting lobbed (not sure how else it would have been stopped as the shooter is in total control of the ball and you can’t tackle on your feet!):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmZsS2BeI10

No poor angle goals

Just as you should not allow goals through you as a result of poor footwork or a not very efficient ready stance, you should not be giving away easy goals as a result of weak fundamental angle play. Making sure you are on the angle and covering space is essential to any save, but conceding through a poor angle is not great! Allowing a goal inside the gap between you and your near post is considered another no-no. A goal where you concede through the acute angle on year near side is not what you want; if anything, you should be conceding on the other side where you have more work to do to cover more space, rather than your near post which you should be covering properly. A goal allowed on the ‘short side’, like the other goals, is more unforgivable because it shows problems with your fundamentals. Work on your angles and making sure you have them covered, in training and then in games.

In essence, a goal allowed, like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZLW3ardwyc

It’s also possible to get caught out on the short, acute angle as you charge out to challenge the shooter, where you should be making more of an effort to carry on the line of ‘hugging’ the post. A goal like in this clip at 2:56 playing time:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6nLJt8uaRA

Follow the rules!

Ultimately, it’s a good idea to put these rules to work in your own game. Whilst it’s fun to think about conceding in a different light and making light of goals allowed, these ‘rules’ draw attention to how you should play and what goals you should not be giving up, even if you can make those breath taking stops. Try and focus on them game in game out, so that you give your full attention to being the best shot stopper you are capable of. At the end of the day, make the shooter make the difficult shot, not the easy one!