Basic Soccer Skills

How to play soccer with the basic soccer skills in mind. The basics are quite easy to define but can be difficult to teach. In soccer there is no apparatus to maneuver, it's just your body. That is why the body does all the work.

The first skill and most important is using your body to control the ball. Beginner players reach for the ball leaving their body behind. The body does 80% of the work and the feet does 20%. Below you will find the basic skills I recommend to learn for beginner soccer players. If you want more extensive skills based on age click here to be taken to How to play soccer based on age milestones.

  • Body coordination and movement
  • Linear dribbling pointing toe out or down using laces or inside feet.
  • Multi-directional dribbling using the body to turn the ball.
  • Passing the ball controlling the ball first then pushing it and finally stepping into pass using body.
  • Shooting the ball with laces, again using body so focus on approach.
  • Two steps to defense: 1st - get goal side (in front of player) 2nd - pressure to take possession.

Although, this is a short list it is the basics of the sport. As one gains more exposure and practice turns can be introduced and positions explained. Drills are great to teach the sport but remember that playing soccer in it's purest form is the best way to get hooked into it and learn by application. Again visit our How to play soccer page to see milestones according to age.

Basic Soccer Rules


Click here for Basic soccer rules of soccer and learn the rules to play and/or coach the game. Soccer rules are simple as the basic skills but if your not familiar with the ways to modify them you can setup an environment of failure versus success. In any soccer coaching/teaching atmosphere you want to create the environment to enhance the success rate of fun and the basic skills your are teaching.

Back home from Basic Soccer Skills

Mark Hyman's Until It Hurts is a hair-raising look at everything that is wrong with youth sports today. More than just a splendid job of reporting and writing, it is a work of true public service. Every parent and every coach who has ever been involved in youth sports and cares about kids has an obligation to read it.

Buzz Bissinger,
author of Friday Night Lights and Three Nights in August