Let’s all go to Animal Island!

WHY USE IT

Animal Island is a fun game to get young players thinking about teamwork, changes of direction and awareness of where to move to, while incorporating dribbling with the ball and passing.

SET-UP

Players are split into groups of two or three (depending on numbers) and each group needs a ball. The area has four boxes (islands) set up around the outside, which can be any colour. The middle box is red. Players must start on the outside of the islands.

Before they start, encourage the players to come up with an animal, this will be the name for an island. The middle red island is known as Danger Island or, if players don’t like that, you can call it Lion Island instead.

HOW TO DO IT

The aim is to be the first team to conquer all islands. To do this, players must dribble the ball onto an island and complete three good passes between each other. If they make three good passes, they conquer that island and get to move onto another island, by dribbling with the ball.

However, if players make a pass and the ball goes off the island, they must leave that island and try to conquer another before they can return to that island and try again.

Once they have conquered all the islands on the outside, they can then travel to Danger (or Lion) Island. Once they make three good passes there, they shout as loud as they can ‘WE CONQUERED ALL THE ISLANDS!’.

TECHNIQUE

Encourage players to demonstrate good technique when passing the ball, using the inside of their foot to control and pass. They can also be reminded to consider weight of pass, communicate with each other and use small touches when dribbling to another island.