Medium-sided games in soccer: physical and heart rate demands throughout successive working periods

Abstract

This research compared the physical and heart rate demands of three medium-sided games with the same number of players per team (six) but different playing areas throughout four successive working periods. The two games played in relatively larger areas (large and medium) were performed with regular goals and goalkeepers, so the most reduced game (short) was performed without goals. Nine professional soccer players participated in this study. Meaningful differences were found (p<0.05) on the physical demand s in the three proposals, with higher values for the games performed on larger areas: maximum speed: 22.8±2.4, 19.8±2.3, and 17.6±1.8 Km/h; and distance covered/min: 120.5±13.4, 103.4±11.2, and 93.8±11.6 m/min in large, medium and short game respectively. There were no differences on the heart rate responses among them. When the physical demands were analysed during the four working periods, the differences could only be seen in large game (p<0.05). The first periods in this proposal showed higher values in distance covered/min, maximum speed, and distance/h in the speed zones 7.0-12.9, 13.0-17.9, and 18.0-20.9 Km/h, and lower values in the zones 0-6.9 Km/h, demonstrating, throughout the periods, the tendency to reduce the distance at high speed and to increase the distance at lower speed. These changes in the activity patterns, related to the period of exercising, could depend on the dimensions of the playing field, thus showing (2017). Medium-sided games in soccer: physical and heart rate demands throughout successive working periods.

Age-Related Differences in the Physical and Physiological Demands during Small-Sided Games with Floaters

“…Each team in the SSGs was balanced according to technical and tactical level, competitive experience, player positions and the subjective evaluation of the coaches [5,26]. The two teams of 4 players participated in the SSG with the aim of keeping possession while they were supported by two floaters, who always assumed an offensive role to create an offensive numerical superiority [27]. The drill occurred on a pitch size of 40 m × 30 m (relative area per player = 150 m 2 ), and was played for four bouts of 4 min with 2 min of passive recovery.…”

“…The distances covered at varying speeds were recorded using different thresholds as described in previous research [30]. The same approach was used for the number of accelerations and decelerations [31,32] and the work/rest ratio (W:R Ratio) [27,30]. Each player wore a heart rate monitor (Polar Team 2 ® , Polar Electro Oy, Finland) to obtain the values of maximal and mean heart rate (HR max and HR mean , respectively).…”

Efectos de diferentes juegos reducidos sobre las demandas físico-fisiológicas en jugadores de fútbol sub´14

“…El análisis de las demandas soportadas por jugadores de fútbol ante diferentes situaciones de juegos reducidos mediante dispositivos inerciales es una práctica altamente estudiada (Ibáñez et al, 2020). No obstante, la mayoría de investigaciones han sido realizadas en equipos amateur o profesionales mayores de 16 años (Arslan et al, 2017;Campos-Vazquez et al, 2019;Campos-Vázquez et al, 2017;Campos-Vazquez et al, 2016;Caro et al, 2019;Castillo et al, 2021;Clemente, 2020;Koklu et al, 2017;Rebelo et al, 2016;Zouhal et al, 2020). Por lo tanto, se requiere analizar ese procedimiento en fútbol en categorías de formación más jóvenes.…”

Large-Sided Games and Sport-Specific Training: Parameters of High Intensity in Professional Soccer Players

“…These specific exercises can simultaneously train both the technical-tactical and the physical aspects. They are better known as Small Sided Games (SSG): in the literature, these exercises have been extensively analysed in order to understand how different formats can influence the internal load (Halouani et al, 2017;Martone et al, 2017;Sanchez-Sanchez et al, 2017;Sannicandro & Cofano, 2017), the external load (Sannicandro et al, 2020;Nevado-Garrosa & Suarez-Arrones, 2015;Gaudino et al, 2014) or both (Arslan et al, 2017;Campos Vazquez et al, 2017;Castellano et al, 2015).…”