How do you take away the best player in 11v11 football?
In 11v11 football you take away their best player by rolling coverage toward him rather than by assigning two defenders to follow him, because at this size the offense can move him and your answer has to be structural. A safety rotated to his side, a corner with inside help, and a linebacker who knows he is responsible for him on any crossing route is a bracket that survives motion. Chasing one player around with two defenders is how the other side of the field ends up unmanned.
Your FS ends up here. It is the instinctive place to go and it is the wrong one, which is why this keeps happening to teams who are trying hard.
Why the sweep keeps working in 11v11
He can line up in four different places, so a personal shadow is expensive
With eleven players and real formations, their best receiver can be outside, in the slot, in the backfield or attached to the line. A defender who follows him gives away where your help is on every snap, and at this size a coach will use that to move your whole coverage before the ball is snapped.
Rolling a safety is the same idea done structurally
Instead of two players chasing him, the whole shell tilts his way: the safety to his side plays deeper and narrower, the corner plays inside knowing he has help over the top. Nothing about it tells the offense who you are worried about until the ball is snapped.
Taking him away creates a numbers problem somewhere else, and it is findable
A rolled shell is a single-high shell on the other side, and every offense at this level has a play for that. The question is not whether you are creating a weakness but whether their second option can exploit it faster than you can rotate back.
Every team has one, and at this age he gets the ball every down
Youth offenses are not balanced, they are built around whoever is best, and that player will touch the ball more than everybody else combined. So the question is not whether to account for him, it is whether you are going to do it deliberately or find out at half time that you never did.
Taking him away is worth more than covering everybody adequately
If their best player gets nothing and their fourth best beats you, you have usually won. Spreading your attention evenly across five receivers is how a defense gives its best matchup to the player least able to handle it, and it feels fair right up until the film.
He will move, and your answer has to move with him
A coach who notices you are on his best player will line him up somewhere else. That is not a problem, it is a confirmation, but it means your answer has to be attached to a person rather than to a position on the field.
Where he actually has to be
Same 11 defenders, same alignment. One job changes.
- The instinctWrong11v11: the FS takes the instinctive path.
Where a young defender goes when nobody has told him otherwise.
- The jobRight11v11: the FS takes his actual landmark.
Where the job is. Say it out loud before the snap and most of this page stops being a problem.
This is the landmark. Give it a name your players can repeat back to you. A spot with a name gets occupied; a spot described in a sentence does not.
Three ways to take him away, and what each one costs
Roll the coverage to him
Where it excelsStructural, disguised, and it survives him moving. The offense cannot tell before the snap that you have done it, which means they cannot check out of the play they called.
Exposed · deepThe far side is now single high, and a post or a deep cross from the backside is exactly the play written for it. You have made one half of the field safer and the other half thinner.
Shadow him with your best corner
Where it excelsHe gets your best defender wherever he goes, which is the simplest instruction on this list and the one your players will execute correctly every time.
Exposed · the combinationYour corner now follows him inside, where he has to play in traffic against combination routes he is not used to. Good offenses move their best receiver into the slot for exactly that reason.
Take him away with a linebacker underneath and nothing else
Where it excelsCheap. One player is told he has that receiver on every crossing route, the shell stays symmetrical, and nothing about the rest of the defense changes.
Exposed · the flatIt only covers half the routes. Anything vertical is a corner alone against their best player, and the linebacker who was supposed to help is thirty yards away watching it happen.
Roll the coverage, and have a check for the backside post
Do it structurally so it survives motion and gives nothing away pre-snap. Then teach the one answer to the one weakness you have created: if the backside receiver goes vertical, the middle linebacker carries him until the safety can get back. Without that check the roll is a good idea that loses you the game once per season.
What a good offense does about it
They motion him across after you have rolled
Do not chase the motion with the safety. Rolling back is slower than a receiver walking, so either roll back before the snap at his pace or stay where you are and play it honestly. A shell caught halfway is worse than either shell.
They start running the ball at your rolled side
A rolled safety is an extra man in the box on that side, so this is usually the offense doing you a favour. Check that your force defender knows he now has help before you celebrate it, because the alternative is everybody assuming somebody else has the edge.
When this is the wrong fix
When taking him away breaks everything else
Doubling one receiver means somebody else is alone, and if that somebody is your weakest defender against their second best player, you have moved the problem rather than solved it. Check who you are leaving before you decide who you are taking.
When he is good because their quarterback is good
Sometimes the best player is a symptom. If the throws are what make him dangerous, pressure or coverage on the quarterback removes him more cheaply than two defenders ever will.
When he is not actually their best player
Coaches decide this from one long run in the first quarter and then spend three quarters being wrong. Wait until you have seen the whole first half before you rearrange a defense around one child.
Take it to your team
Draw your plays in the football play designer, collect them in the playbook maker, and print printable play cards so every player knows them come Saturday.
Draw it for your own team
Open the designer at 11v11, put your defenders where this page says, and print it so everybody shows up on Saturday knowing the same thing.
Open the free play designerRelated questions
How do you take away the best player in 11v11 football?
Should you shadow a receiver with your best corner?
What is the weakness of rolling coverage?
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.