Biology of Sport
eISSN: 2083-1862
ISSN: 0860-021X
Biology of Sport
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4/2016
vol. 33
 
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abstract:
Original paper

Agility training in young elite soccer players: promising results compared to change of direction drills

A Chaalali
1
,
M Rouissi
1
,
M Chtara
1
,
A Owen
2, 3
,
NL Bragazzi
4
,
W Moalla
5
,
A Chaouachi
1
,
M Amri
6
,
K Chamari
7

  1. Tunisian Research Laboratory ‘‘Sport Performance Optimization’’, National Center of Medicine and Science in Sports Tunis, Tunisia
  2. Servette Centre for Football Research (SCFR), Servette Football Club, Geneva, Switzerland
  3. Centre de Recherche et d’Innovation sur le Sport, Université Claude Bernard Lyon.1, Lyon, France
  4. School of Public Health, Department of Health Sciences (DISSAL), University of Genoa, Genoa 16132, Italy
  5. High Institute of Sports Sciences, UR EM2S-ISSEPS, Sfax, Tunisia
  6. Laboratory of Functional Neurophysiology and Pathology, Faculty of Sciences of Tunis (FST),University of El Manar, Tunisia
  7. Athlete Health and Performance Aspetar, Qatar Orthopaedic and Sports Medicine Hospital, Doha, Qatar
Biol. Sport 2016;33:345-351
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5604/20831862.1217924
Online publish date: 2016/11/24
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The aim of this study was to compare the effect of two different training programmes – change of direction (COD) vs. agility (AG) – on straight sprint (SS), COD and AG test performances in young elite soccer players. Thirty-two soccer players (age: 14.5±0.9 years; height: 171.2±5.1 cm; body mass: 56.4±7.1 kg, body fat: 10.3±2.3%) participated in a short-term (6 weeks) training study. Players were randomly assigned to two experimental groups – training with change of direction drills (COD-G, n=11) or using agility training (AG-G, n= 11) – and to a control group (CON-G, n=10). All players completed the following tests before and after training: straight sprint (15m SS), 15 m agility run with (15m-AR-B) and without a ball (15m-AR), 5-0-5 agility test, reactive agility test (RAT), and RAT test with ball (RAT-B). A significant group effect was observed for all tests (p<0.001; η2=large). In 15m SS, COD-G and AG-G improved significantly (2.21; ES=0.57 and 2.18%; ES=0.89 respectively) more than CON-G (0.59%; ES=0.14). In the 15m-AR and 5-0-5 agility test, COD-G improved significantly more (5.41%; ES=1.15 and 3.41; ES=0.55 respectively) than AG-G (3.65%; ES=1.05 and 2.24; ES=0.35 respectively) and CON-G (1.62%; ES=0.96 and 0.97; ES=0.19 respectively). Improvements in RAT and RAT-B were larger (9.37%; ES=2.28 and 7.73%; ES=2.99 respectively) in RAT-G than the other groups. In conclusion, agility performance amongst young elite soccer could be improved using COD training. Nevertheless, including a conditioning programme for agility may allow a high level of athletic performance to be achieved.
keywords:

Reaction time, Turns, Training, Soccer, Decision-making

  
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