By Patrick Morrison

THE new rules have brought a massive evolution of Gaelic football and the goalkeeper position has exploded even more into a key role.

So much so the powers that be are bringing out new rules weekly to counteract them.

It is now vitally important for all ’keepers and their coaches to tailor training to suit their own specific needs.

Not all goalkeepers will be trained in the same way. Yes, they may complete the same drill but its purpose and how it is completed will differ from ‘keeper to ‘keeper.

It is the role of the coach to understand their goalkeepers and adjust the purpose and execution accordingly.

I train goalkeepers, focusing on the following key areas.

Activation:

Before any training, a goalkeeper must focus their body on the exercises they are about to perform. This is far more than merely warming up the muscles of the body as simply moving about would complete this. Readiness includes attention to specific detail such as hand eye co-ordination, diving technique, footwork, foot speed, ground contact, eye activation and reaction, peripheral vision, hand activation to name a few.

Incorporating such drills like eye exercises, pendulum rolls, short ladders and visualisation allows these areas to be prepared before your game specific drills.

React and recover:

I will always combine both these areas as they can be intricately linked during games. Reaction is how fast a goalkeeper can react to certain stimulus both mentally and physically. Whereas Recover incorporates part b of the recovery principle – from my 11 goalkeeping principles – which deals with how effectively a ‘keeper can return to their set position.

It is therefore best practice to train them together in preparation for competition. Training reactions with drills that force the goalkeeper to make decisions in split second speed sharpens reaction overtime.

Adding in a second ball or balls of different colours and sizes will improve hand-eye coordination.

Multiple reps that remove the goalkeeper from their set position works their recovery set position.

Footwork:

Everything that a goalkeeper does begins with their feet. I cannot stress that enough. If a goalkeeper has good footwork, it makes everything else far easier. Good footwork should be worked on in every session with ladders or hurdles or rushing out to close attackers, working the techniques of different goalkeeping situations, their set position, the last step towards the ball on shots or even positional awareness training. Focusing on this one part of goalkeeping vastly improves every other area.

Always ensure to train footwork in awkward positions or when caught out of position. It is just as important to know how to reposition oneself rather than to just try and get into the best position every time.

There is no such thing as a good or bad position, there is only the position you are currently in and how you adapt to that in game can be crucial.

Firstly, there is no shot stopping in Gaelic football. It’s a phrase borrowed form soccer – the action of making a save.

Realistically, there is virtually no shot stopping in Gaelic football for a goalkeeper. In soccer the goalkeeper can expect a shot purposely aimed at goal from anywhere inside 35 metres.

In Gaelic football, most shots on goal come from inside the penalty area.

It is because of this fact that it is better to say the goalkeeper experiences various ‘situations’ during games. When you use the phrase situations you also change the thinking as well. A situation requires decisive thought and/or an action.

Shot stopping on the other hand, completely focuses on the act of the attacker shooting for goal and disregards the developments that lead up to that shot.

Other situations that must be trained by a goalkeeper include closing attackers – and multiple attackers – high balls, rebounds, penalties, ricochets. All must be practiced at game intensity or higher, under fatigue, consistently during competitive conditions.

Distribution:

Probably seen by many as the most important area involved with Gaelic football goalkeeping at present. For me, it is on a par with every other area.

Goalkeepers need to do more than just kick the ball out from restarts, although portion of training needs to be assigned to this area.

When training it is vital to constantly remind yourself of your kicking style and learn to feel your kick.

Once your body becomes akin to your kicking style it will become easy to feel whenever something has gone wrong, allowing you to recalibrate during competition.

Working on your own to improve kicking technique can include various methods such as using targets to aim at to work on accuracy.

Every team should have a library of restart routines for their respective teams to learn and use during games and these should be practiced at least once a week with as close to 15v15, as possible.

They should be rigorously tested against as many of the different types of presses that a team is likely to face and the intensity that the press is set at should be at game speed or higher.

Another area within the area of distribution is whenever a goalkeeper is in possession of the ball.

With the emergence of the ‘fly goalie’ now evolving into the ‘last man back’ goalie, the goalkeeping position in Gaelic football is being catapulted forward with the like likes of Ethan Rafferty, Odhrán Lynch, Rory Beggan, Shaun Patton and Niall Morgan regularly giving an exhibition of the future of the position.

It is because of this ever-increasing trend that it will become ever more important to coach your goalkeepers to be comfortable being in possession of the football.

You do not have to force them to bomb forward like aforementioned custodians, but enough for them to be competent when in possession of the football.

Technical:

This can be taught as a stand-alone coaching area or can be included into any of the other six areas. Every area has specific techniques that you will use to perform certain skills and actions.

There are also some areas of goalkeeping that will be specific to the technical area. For example, when teaching a ‘keeper about their positional sense using the goalkeeping arc technique is specific to this area but is used within some of the other areas as well.

Every skill a goalkeeper is expected to have will of course have a certain technique used to perform its action.

You can decide to focus specifically on that one technique and use it as the focus of a drill or exercise, or whether to adjust techniques while performing game related drills or in training games.

The technical area is critical and one that all goalkeeping coaches must learn how to be proficient in so as to help your goalkeepers improve their techniques.

It will require the coach to develop a ‘spot and fix’ mindset as well as developing a keen eye for technical imperfections because the goalkeeper cannot see the any of their own flaws.

With the game constantly evolving into a faster paced sport with increasing less decision-making time, it is vital for goalkeepers to train well above game pace and intensity as well as being under the same level of game pressure or higher than they would experience during competition.

This ensures the goalkeeper is at their optimal performance levels for competitive games because they have prepared well.

By training the way in which they intend to play, goalkeepers can be confident all bases have been covered.

Conditioning:

It is important to understand that the way in which a goalkeeper uses their muscles is different to that of an outfield player.

Yes, it is the same muscle groups being exerted but the movements are being performed through different planes and under different forces all the while looking for different outcomes.

Like any other position, the goalkeeper’s conditioning drills must be totally specific to the actions they are expected to perform on the field of play.

There is absolutely no reason for a goalkeeper to be completing the conditioning drills of their outfield teammates, unless of course they play as a fly goalie.

The best way to create conditioning drills for your goalkeeper is by using the levelled progression model as a guide.

This helps create differing conditions and you can optimise your goalkeeper’s conditioning accordingly.

The game has evolved and is metamorphosizing on a weekly basis, leading to an ever-evolving goalkeeper position. We must also still focus on what it important and you’ll find that the more things change, the more, they stay the same.

Email: pmgoalkeeping@hotmail.com Facebook: @MSoG11 X: @MorSchGk