Effective exercises to improve as a Goalkeeper

Published on: 04/11/2020
Effective exercises to improve as a Goalkeeper
Effective exercises to improve as a Goalkeeper

Effective exercises to improve as a Goalkeeper

Learn some exercises which you can practise at home which will improve your goalkeeping ability.

The exercises we are sharing below are a great way to enhance your goalkeeping skills, which you can do on your own from home, on your own free time. Feel free to use and share these exercises with your local team, with your friends and your local coach.

This package is a small part of what our program, the NF Virtual Academy has to offer. By joining our events, both virtual and local, you will be able to get a complete schedule and a variety of exercises that will improve your overall gameplay as a footballer.

Meet like-minded footballers at our NF Local Camps and develop even further with professional coaches with experience from top clubs around Europe.

Psychical Training Exercises From Home

Every exercise is planned to be done during 30 seconds in five sets. In between the exercises you have two options to do, you can either run at a good pace during two to three minutes (if you are able to). Otherwise do 100 jumping ropes.

Be mindful of your body position, technique and your breathing during the course of all the exercises.

READ ALSO: Efficient ways to improve your mobility and ball control

WARMUP GOALKEEPING EXERCISES

During our warmup, we will work on a good drill on the basic technique, positioning and displacement. During the first exercise we will move our body to do the following; hold the base position, lock the ball, go low and throw the ball in the air to catch it.

You can either follow our goalkeeper coach NAME numeric order or follow a friends/coaches orders. The mentor will mention a number from one to four, and the goalkeeper will do the following for the numbers:

Number one: You make the base position.
Number two: Lock the ball
Number three: Go low
Number four: Throw the ball and catch it

Try to do it for 5 minutes, make the ball bounce and move a lot during the exercise. Just like how you want to make the exercise flow more naturally.

For the second warm-up exercise, you’ll need four cones (or any other optional item). Where we will work on our displacement. The goalkeeper should move to the item the guide is specifying, in the video THE COACH FIRST NAME is using colors to define the placement. We are going to make the goalkeeper take a step forward, back and to the sides. Your coach, friend or family member can specify which cone you are going to move towards.

This sums up our warm-up. A good drill to master the basic techniques.

READ ALSO: The NF coaching team continues to grow and develop

IMPROVE YOUR GOALKEEPING WITH THESE EXERCISES FROM HOME

Let’s move forward. Structure a goal with two cones (or any other optional item) at your home, or use an actual goal.

We will work on our positioning, where the goalkeeper starts in the middle of the goal. The goalkeeper is going to move to the four different items (we are specifying the item targets as the items colors in the video). We always start in the middle of the goal, where we move to the color and then go back.

Focus on your saving technique according to how the ball has been shot, with emphasis on how high the ball comes towards you. If it comes to your head height you catch with your hands but if it comes to your body you block it with your body. After your back and forth movement from one item back to the goal, you will have to catch the ball from someone who throws it towards you.

Do the exercises in four repetitions six times. After two repetitions of moving to a single target, we recommend you to try to move towards two targets before the ball comes to you.

While doing the exercise, follow the ball, keep the right position and focus on having a good body position. Keep your body behind the ball. When you work on saving the ball, have your hands close to each other, your thumbs should meet. “Like you are doing a triangle”. This is the best way to work on your grip.

For the next exercise, we will only work with two items. Keep it low on the two coloured cones and the third one is a shot. The mentor/the one who shoots should focus on a medium shot so that the goalkeeper can block with his or her body. You can also make variants of this exercise, for example, the focus could be to make a low save for the first item target, a medium shot for the second item and for the third shot, the goalkeeper stays in the middle of the goal and the attacker can shoot anywhere; just like during a real match, you never know where your opponent wants to hit the ball.

READ ALSO: 3 steps to really start helping your child’s development as a football player

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Check the complete Event Calendar here.

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