How do you stop the best player in 5v5 flag football?
In 5v5 flag football you stop their best player by putting a defender over the top of him and keeping your other four matched, which you can only do if you are not rushing. You have five defenders against four eligible receivers, so the single spare player is the entire answer: he goes to their best receiver and stays there. Send a rusher instead and that spare disappears, which is why teams who pressure every down never manage to take anybody away.
Your S 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 5v5
Your one spare defender is the whole plan
Five against four gives you exactly one player with nobody to cover. Doubling their best receiver is not a scheme in this format, it is a decision about where that one man stands, and it is available on every snap you do not spend him on the quarterback.
There is nowhere for him to hide, which cuts both ways
On a five-player offense their best player is one of four eligible receivers, so he is always findable and always coverable. He is also always on the field, which means the answer has to work on every down rather than being a package you bring out.
Motion is the whole counter, and it is easy to run
A coach who sees your spare defender following one child will move that child before the snap. At this size the fix is simply to attach the assignment to the player by name and let your two defenders trade the job as he crosses, which needs no call and no vocabulary.
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 5 defenders, same alignment. One job changes.
- The instinctWrong5v5: the S takes the instinctive path.
Where a young defender goes when nobody has told him otherwise.
- The jobRight5v5: the S 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
Double him with your spare defender
Where it excelsThe straightforward version. One defender in front, one behind, and their best receiver is effectively removed from the game without changing anything else about your defense.
Exposed · the middle underneathYour spare was the man in the middle taking away crossing routes, and now he is not. Everything that runs through the middle of the field is one defender easier for the rest of the afternoon.
Put your best cover defender on him alone
Where it excelsCosts you nothing structurally. Your spare stays in the middle, your best player takes their best player, and the rest of the defense is untouched.
Exposed · the combinationIt is a bet that your best is better than their best, and at youth level the best player on the field is usually better than anybody guarding him. When the bet loses it loses on a big play.
Bracket him and leave somebody genuinely open
Where it excelsTwo defenders on him and the other three take the remaining receivers, with the weakest of theirs uncovered on purpose. Against a one-player team this ends the game.
Exposed · deepYou have chosen to leave a receiver alone, and a coach who notices will throw there all day. It works only for as long as they fail to notice, which against a good opponent is about a drive.
Double him, and stop rushing to pay for it
The spare defender is the only free resource this format gives you, so spend it on their best player rather than on a quarterback who is probably throwing before your rusher arrives. Accept that the middle of the field gets easier for them, and make them prove somebody other than their best player can beat you.
What a good offense does about it
They motion him across the formation
Give the job to a name rather than to a side. The two outside defenders trade him as he crosses and say it out loud while the motion is happening. A defense that changes assignments silently is a defense with two players on him and one receiver free.
They start handing him the ball instead
A perfectly sensible response, and it moves the problem to the ground. Your doubling defender is now the extra man in the run fit, which he is well placed to be, but somebody has to tell him that is his job when the ball goes down.
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 free play designer, collect them in the playbook maker, and print football play cards so every player knows them come Saturday.
Draw it for your own team
Open the designer at 5v5, 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 stop the best player in 5v5 flag football?
Can you double team a receiver in 5v5 flag football?
What if they motion their best player?
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.