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These skills will improve your touch and ball control.   Players can dramatically improve their performance if they practice these regularly.    Many thanks to Ronan here for his outstanding skills.

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Start by rolling the ball backwards on to your foot and give it a small lift.  The object is to keep it up with alternate feet and using small touches to keep the ball low.  Notice how the ball comes off the top front of the foot and has a very slight backwards spin. 

Alternate touching the ball with the sole of each foot, gently touching the ball but not moving it too much so that it is stationery for the next touch.  The head should remain high so that you are not staring at the ball.   This will help train you to be able to observe the game better to look for opportunities to dribble or pass. 

Again, keep your head up and use your peripheral vision to watch the ball.   The legs should extend straight as they circle the ball. 

Ronan is using the souls of his feet to roll the ball back and forth.  Try speeding this up when you get the hang of it.

In this drill, use the inside of your feet and try and keep your head high.

A variation on keep ups where you count from 1 to 10, keeping the ball up an extra time for each new number.  Start with the ball in your hands and drop it to your foot, kick it back up to your hands and count 1, then catch the ball.  Drop the ball again, kick it up lightly and count 1, kick with the other foot back up to your hands, count 2 and catch the ball, and so on.  1, 1-2, 1-2-3, 1-2-3-4, etc.

Note, this gives you more control goals than  just keeping the ball up endlessly as your last kick needs to be hard enough to raise the ball high enough to catch it.

This works best with another player to act as a defender, but you can also use a cone, a tree, or something else.  Start by rolling using the sole or one foot and then step over with the other. 

This again works best with another player to act as a defender, but you can also use something else.  In a very similar move, Ronan shows how to ‘soul’ the ball away from an opponent and then in order to protect the ball, he runs through the space between them while dribbling past.

Here is a great drill for close ball control demonstrated superbly.

Start with a small kick, then the next kick should send the ball above head height, and so on.

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