Defence
Defence has been covered a fair amount in the Teams & Training section. Here I’m just going to outline a particular way of coaching defence – use as you will.
While Front defence is the standard and default defence, it can at times be very useful to play some Rebound as well. Some teams can’t cope with it at all (it’s impossible to play against without Walking the Block), and for some, playing it will disrupt their attack.
If you play Rebound though, it’s important to be able to switch immediately on court back to Front, if the attack manage to get a collect in, and this is how I did it, with a story (Explanations in brackets):
“I have these two girls, yes I’m a player, after me – Rebecca and Freya (Rebound and Front defence, respectively…).
Freya’s amazing. I love her. I’ll let her in as close to my heart (the post) as she wants (Front D lets the attack in to the post/collect). But, I want to make sure no-one else can get in and steal her away from me, so I won’t let anyone else come anywhere near her when she’s close to me (under the post – don’t let the ball come into the feed), so I’ll always stay between her and the ball…
Rebecca, however, is my bit on the side. She’s great fun, but she always wants more from me – she can get a bit clingy. I’m happy for her to do whatever she wants, as long as she’s not trying to get into my heart – I need my space. (In Rebound, give players lots of space so they don’t run you, but when they head to the post, rebound them away from it).”
Essentially, if a team starts out their defence playing Rebecca (Rebound) and a collect manages to come in, they scream out “FREYA!!!” and the whole division reverts to Front defence. Once the ball has gone out, they can decide whether to go back to Rebecca, or stick with Freya (Front). It’s essential that the division can communicate. If they are playing different types of defence and don’t know about it, it won’t work.