Wall Pass (The Give And Go)

The wall pass, or one-two is a great football tactic for working the ball through the defense, beating the offside trap, for creating space in midfield, and for avoiding tight marking. The wall pass can even be played in defence. The move is simple, player one passes the football to player two, who immediately passes it back to player one. It's important that both players keep moving, and especially that player one runs into space as soon as he has played the ball.

An effective one-two requires team work: an understanding with your team mate. The key elements are accuracy in passing, timing and speed. Both passes should be weighted and timed so that the player receiving the ball does not have to alter stride. In the illustrations, the blue defender has to turn around and give chase, but the red attacker already has forward speed to run into space, and gains several metres over her marker.

An understanding between players is vital when playing the wall pass. Instead of running to the outside, player one might decide to cut inside round the back of the defender. Obviously, the player making the return pass must see which way he runs. Even more embarassing and costly is the situation where the return pass is sent straight back to a player who has already started his run. Soccer drills for the wall pass, and other passing techniques that are described in Soccer Academy our football coaching software for parents, players and coaches.

sports psychology

One

Two

The one-two (or wall pass) is basic to the games of basketball, hockey as well as soccer. In simple terms, the player with the football passes to their teammate, who, at the beginning, is stationary. The receiving player is, in essence, the wall.

After a brief demonstration of the wall pass using stationary players it's time to add player movement. I would suggest for the younger levels that you start this drill with a coach acting as the wall to build success. Timing the run of the player is critical and takes a lot of demonstration and a lot of practice. The basic setup is shown below:

Player passes to the coach and immediately makes his run to the second cone on his side. The coach times the run so that the ball and the player arrive at the same time. If there are two coaches repeat the process. Otherwise have the players pull a move after they receive the ball and rejoin the line at the end.

Coaching Points

	Stress that the run is immediate. Do not watch the pass since once it has left your foot, there is nothing your eyes can do about affecting the flight of the ball
	Stress that the ball must be played with the proper weight so that it gets there, but doesn’t get there with so much pace that it cannot be handled
	Stress that the ball should be played to the foot that is open to the field. In the illustration above this would be the coach’s left foot. In that way the coach does not have to chop the ball across his body.
	Stress receiving the ball on the foot open to the field. In the illustration above that would be the receiving player’s right foot.
	Switch sides often so that both feet are used by the wall player and by the receiving player

Progressions

Once the timing aspect of the drill is understood and the players have achieved some measure of technical proficiency receiving the ball "on the fly", it is time to make a player the wall.
Start the drill in the same manner and work both feet.
Switch the wall player often
Add movement of the wall player as shown below.

After wall player makes his pass he makes a run to get the wall pass back from whom he passed it to. A second player steps in as the wall. This minimizes standing around.

Add a passive defender so that the players can see where the pass has to go and how the run affects the defender.. Generally the pass goes past the defender’s front and the run is made behind his back
Allow the defenders to attempt to intercept the pass. However since the defender "knows" the drill you now have to add movement on the player making the pass so that the defender has to concentrate not only on the pass but on the fact that the ball handler might dribble past them.

Practice the wall pass with this drill