Age-related effects of practice experience on collective behaviours of football players in small-sided games

BARNABÉ, Luís, VOLOSSOVITCH, Anna, DUARTE, Ricardo, FERREIRA, António Paulo and DAVIDS, Keith (2016). Age-related effects of practice experience on collective behaviours of football players in small-sided games. Human Movement Science, 48, 74-81.

Preview

PDF Davids2 age-related effects of practical experience.pdf - Accepted Version All rights reserved. Download (597kB) | Preview

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine whether offensive and defensive collective behaviours emerging in six-a-side football games (GK+5 vs. 5+GK) varied according to age-related practice experience of young, male players (U16, U17 and U19 yrs). Players’ were not instructed to implement specific tactical plans and their movement trajectories (2D analyses) were recorded using 10 GPS units. Four common measures of team dispersion investigated in previous research (surface area, stretch index, length and width of a team) were used to analyse team performance behaviours. After recording these collective variables, we used sample entropy (SampEn) and cross-sample entropy (Cross-SampEn) measures to assess the regularity and synchronization of participant actions in teams. Results demonstrated clear age-related variations in effects on the collective performance measures analysed. In attacking phases, older and more experienced players occupied a greater surface area and displayed higher values of team width and stretch index. In defensive phases, significant differences were observed in team length and stretch index. Cross-SampEn analysis demonstrated a greater synchronization between offensive and defensive surface areas and team width in older age groups (U17 and U19 yrs). Data suggest how coaches can manipulate practice task constraints to enhance development of team tactical performance behaviours in developing footballers between 16 and 19 yrs of age.

Item Type:	Article
Research Institute, Centre or Group - Does NOT include content added after October 2018:	Centre for Sports Engineering Research
Identification Number:	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.humov.2016.04.007
Page Range:	74-81
Depositing User:	Helen Garner
Date Deposited:	11 May 2016 11:59
Last Modified:	18 Mar 2021 04:21
URI:	https://shura.shu.ac.uk/id/eprint/12251

Actions (login required)

View Item

Downloads

Publication Metrics