How do you teach defense to 5 and 6 year olds?
With three ideas, given in this order, and not with a coverage. First, everybody gets one person to stand in front of, so that eleven children stop arriving at the ball in one pile. Second, two hands on the flag and never on the shirt, so that somebody can actually end a down. Third, run to where he is going instead of to where he is, which is the first real football idea any of them will learn. That is the entire defense for a five or six year old. It takes about three practices, it holds up on Saturday, and it beats most of what a team that age can run at you. Man, zone and Cover 3 are not simpler versions of this. They are a different lesson for a different age.
Why a coverage is the wrong answer at this age
A five year old cannot hold a rule with an if in it
Every coverage is a conditional. "If he goes deep, pass him off." "If nobody comes, sink." A child this age can hold one instruction that is true all the time, and the moment you add a condition the whole thing is replaced by running at the ball. That is not a failure of attention, it is the age.
They cannot see space, only people
A zone asks a player to guard a patch of grass with nothing standing in it. Ask a six year old to watch an empty square and he will watch it perfectly, facing the wrong way, until somebody runs past. Every instruction at this age has to name a person, because a person is the only thing on the field they can find.
A coverage needs the whole team to be right at once
That is its point and its cost. One player out of position in a zone opens a hole for everybody. One player out of position in "everybody has somebody" is one bad matchup. At this age you want the version that degrades quietly, because it is going to degrade.
The ball is going to one of three or four places anyway
Offenses at this age hand it off or throw it short, and the child who catches it is usually the one who caught it last week. A defense that puts a body in front of each of those children has already solved most of the problem, and it did it without a single word anybody had to learn.
The three ideas, in the order to give them in
- 1
One: everybody gets one person, and it is named out loud
Point at a child on the other team and say a name. Do it again for each of your players, every single down, until they start doing it themselves. This is first because without it there is no practice to run: twelve children chasing one ball is a pile, and you cannot teach anything to a pile.
- 2
Two: two hands on the flag, never on the shirt
Second because a defense that cannot end a down has not got a defense. Two hands, because one hand swipes and misses. Never the shirt, because grabbing the shirt is a penalty and because it is the habit that turns into holding later. Ten minutes of pulling flags at every practice, forever, for the rest of their lives in this sport.
- 3
Three: run to where he is going, not to where he is
Last because it is the only one that is genuinely hard, and because the first two have to be automatic before anybody has attention left for it. Stand behind them and point at the spot. They will not get it in one practice and most of them will have it by the fourth.
- 4
And on Saturday, say one of the three. Never two
Pick the one this team is failing at today and shout only that. A child being given a second instruction while he is still doing the first hears neither, and a sideline that shouts everything is a sideline the players stop listening to by the second quarter.
What changes at seven and eight
At seven and eight, the third idea becomes a conversation
Angles start landing, and with them comes the first thing that sounds like real defense: the idea that you can make a runner go somewhere. That is the age to introduce having one player responsible for the outside, which is the seed of everything on the rest of this hub.
Words like man and zone are for eight and up
Not because the ideas are hard, but because the words are only worth teaching once the children can already do the thing. A team that already plays one person each is a team you can tell is playing man, and the name then costs nothing to learn.
Rushing is a decision you should mostly not make yet
Sending a five year old at the quarterback means one fewer body in front of somebody, and at this age there is no spare. There will be a season for pressure. It is not this one.
Three things not to do
Do not give them sides of the field
Telling a child he has "the left" is the same instruction as telling him to watch an empty square. He will stand there while the ball goes past him and he will be certain he did it right, because he did.
Do not run a drill without a person in it
Cones do not run. A child who has only ever backpedalled around cones has learned a movement, not a job. Every defensive drill at this age should have somebody to follow, even if that somebody is you walking slowly.
Do not fix it with a new scheme
When it falls apart on Saturday, and it will, the instinct is to install something for next week. It is almost never the scheme. It is that nobody was told whose person was whose before the snap, which takes ten seconds and costs nothing.
Take it to your team
Draw your plays in the free play designer, collect them in the football playbook maker, and print printable play cards so every player knows them come Saturday.
Print the three ideas and take them to practice
Open the play designer, draw your defense with each player in front of somebody, and print it so every parent helper is saying the same thing. Free.
Open the play designerRelated questions
Should 5 and 6 year olds play man or zone?
What should the first defensive practice look like?
How do you stop everyone running to the ball?
How long does it take before it works?
Related guides
Coach Ray Carroll
Coaches 5v5 flag football from kindergarten through 7th grade in San Mateo and San Carlos, California, and built RC Football to design, teach and print the plays his own teams run.