4 Must-have Exercises for Youth Soccer Athletes

As sports performance coaches, you may think our #1 goal is to make our athletes stronger, faster, and more powerful. Well, those things are certainly important to us, but…

Our #1 goal is to keep our athletes as healthy as possible for as long as possible to keep them on the playing field.

This means that we need to continually explore the latest studies on the prevalence of injuries in specific sports and what has been proven to reduce them. This allow us to create the most appropriate training program for each athlete.

In this article, we’re focusing on football (soccer). At the youth club level in the United States, it’s evolved into a nearly year-round sport. Single-sport specialization is happening in younger footballers compared to a decade ago. This increased, younger sport specialization and year-round play has resulted in more injuries as it relates to hours played, age, and physical maturation.

Keep reading to learn about common soccer injuries and the 4 ways we fill those buckets in training to reduce the chances of injury.

Common Soccer Injuries

In both youth and professional soccer, the most common injuries are to the lower body (ankle, knee, and hip/groin) (1, 2, 3, 4). There is also a significant percentage injuries to the head (i.e., concussions, abrasions, etc.). Common injury types are often strains, sprains, pulls, impacts injuries, or tendinitis.

While we can’t wholly prevent injuries to our soccer athletes, we use this data and our athlete’s daily readiness feedback to inform our training programs.

Make sure you aren’t missing the following 4 buckets in your training.

#1: Nordic Hamstring Curls

Also known as Russian Ham Curl or Leg Curl

Why do it: Hamstring strength has been proven in multiple published studies to significantly reduce the chances of injury to the knee (5). Strengthening the hamstring specifically via Nordics has also been proven to reduce the incidence rate of hamstring injuries themselves with amateur soccer athletes (6).

How to do it: Kneel on a pad (your knees will thank you), hold your ankles in place (with a partner, or with some other immovable object like a bar), and lower yourself with control as far to the ground as you can. Keep your hips in line with your shoulders and knees (no hinging).

Unless you’re already freakishly strong, you won’t be able to lower yourself all the way down to the floor and pull yourself back up for a good while. Either go down as far as you can but still be able pull yourself back, or go down farther and brace your drop to the floor with your hands before resetting.

This video does a great job showing technique and adaptations if you don’t have a partner to help you.

Collegiate soccer athlete Lily Wilson (Twitter) does Nordic hamstring curls with Coach J.

#2: Copenhagen Side Planks

Also known as Copenhagens

Why do it: Copenhagen side planks have been proven to self-reported prevalence and risk of groin pain because it strengthens the adductor.(7, 8)

#3: Neck Training

There’s many ways to train your neck as well as some exercise products on the market that are devoted solely to improving neck strength. Here’s two of the ways that we train the neck using minimal equipment.

Why do it: Strengthening the neck has been proven to lower the risk concussions in multiple published studies (9, 10).

Rear Iso Neck Hold

4 Way Neck Crunch

#4: An Explosive Movement (The Clean)

Soccer is an explosive and dynamic sport, which means we need to train force production and force absorption in an explosive way. In my opinion, the Clean is the Queen of explosive resistance movements.

Why do it: The Clean fills a bunch of training buckets, all at once. It’s a whole-body movement that is super effective at building power. It is also as dynamic as a plyometric movement. The Clean trains the body to both PRODUCE and RESIST FORCE through loaded triple extension and triple flexion– thereby strengthening the ankles, knees, and hips.

Please do not attempt to Clean without someone qualified instructing you in the movement. It’s technical, and we’ve listed other progressions to fill this bucket if you can’t perform the clean proficiently. Other performance coaches have had also had success using Trap Bar or Jump Shrugs instead of the Clean.

Clean

Regression 1: High Pulls

Regression 2: High Pulls from a Rack

Regression 3: Jump Shrugs

Conclusion

In this article, we covered four different training buckets that are important to fill for soccer players in order to reduce their chances of injury.

  • Nordics: Hamstring strength and knee injury reduction

  • Copenhagen Side Planks: Adductor strength and hip/groin pain/injury reduction

  • Neck Training: Increased neck strength reduces the risk of concussions

  • Explosive Training (Clean): Builds power as well as the capacity for joints to absorb sudden force (ankles, knees, and hips)

While our article covers some main training buckets at a high level, it doesn’t account for assessing the movement quality of an athlete, or the proper training protocols to follow for athletes to follow according to physical maturation.

There is more than one way to approach injury reduction in sports performance training. The single, most effective thing that you could do to reduce chances of injury as a sport coach, athlete, or parent, is to find a qualified strength and conditioning/performance coach in your area. They can provide a safer learning enviroment and individualized programming that’s age-and-experience appropriate.

Interested in training with us?

We offer in-person training at our on-site facility in Indianapolis as well as online training to athletes across the U.S.

References

  1. Burger, R., & Fine, K. (n.d.). Orthopaedics & physical performance. Soccer Injuries - Sports Medicine Program. Retrieved January 14, 2023, from https://www.urmc.rochester.edu/orthopaedics/sports-medicine/soccer-injuries.cfm

  2. Price, R. J., Hawkins, R. D., Hulse, M. A., & Hodson, A. (2004). The Football Association medical research programme: an audit of injuries in academy youth football. British journal of sports medicine, 38(4), 466–471. https://doi.org/10.1136/bjsm.2003.005165

  3. Crossley, K. M., Patterson, B. E., Culvenor, A. G., Bruder, A. M., Mosler, A. B., & Mentiplay, B. F. (2020). Making football safer for women: a systematic review and meta-analysis of injury prevention programmes in 11 773 female football (soccer) players. British journal of sports medicine, 54(18), 1089–1098. https://doi.org/10.1136/bjsports-2019-101587

  4. Faude, O., Rößler, R., & Junge, A. (2013). Football injuries in children and adolescent players: are there clues for prevention?. Sports medicine (Auckland, N.Z.), 43(9), 819–837. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40279-013-0061-x

  5. O'Kane, J. W., Neradilek, M., Polissar, N., Sabado, L., Tencer, A., & Schiff, M. A. (2017). Risk Factors for Lower Extremity Overuse Injuries in Female Youth Soccer Players. Orthopaedic journal of sports medicine, 5(10), 2325967117733963. https://doi.org/10.1177/2325967117733963

  6. van der Horst, N., Smits, D. W., Petersen, J., Goedhart, E. A., & Backx, F. J. (2015). The preventive effect of the nordic hamstring exercise on hamstring injuries in amateur soccer players: a randomized controlled trial. The American journal of sports medicine, 43(6), 1316–1323. https://doi.org/10.1177/0363546515574057

  7. Harøy, J., Clarsen, B., Wiger, E. G., Øyen, M. G., Serner, A., Thorborg, K., Hölmich, P., Andersen, T. E., & Bahr, R. (2019). The Adductor Strengthening Programme prevents groin problems among male football players: a cluster-randomised controlled trial. British journal of sports medicine, 53(3), 150–157. https://doi.org/10.1136/bjsports-2017-098937

  8. Fujisaki, K., Akasaka, K., Otsudo, T., Hattori, H., Hasebe, Y., & Hall, T. (2022). Effects of a Groin Pain Prevention Program in Male High School Soccer Players: A Cluster-Randomized Controlled Trial. International journal of sports physical therapy, 17(5), 841–850. https://doi.org/10.26603/001c.36631

  9. Collins, C. L., Fletcher, E. N., Fields, S. K., Kluchurosky, L., Rohrkemper, M. K., Comstock, R. D., & Cantu, R. C. (2014). Neck strength: a protective factor reducing risk for concussion in high school sports. The journal of primary prevention, 35(5), 309–319. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10935-014-0355-2

  10. Hrysomallis C. (2016). Neck Muscular Strength, Training, Performance and Sport Injury Risk: A Review. Sports medicine (Auckland, N.Z.), 46(8), 1111–1124. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40279-016-0490-4

Coach J