Pre-season is the chance for coaches to get their players ready for action, so it's vital to condition them physically, as well as tactically, for how they want to play.

Hill runs, bleep-tests, sessions without the ball, these would usually put fear into most players as they return to their clubs to start pre-season training.

While there may be a place for those kinds of activities to a certain extent, it's important for coaches to use their time with their players wisely. 

It's therefore wise for some coaches to combine their technical and tactical sessions with work that will condition them for competitive action.

Along with our free Planning a Pre-Season Programme guide, which you can download here, we have also produced a booklet of coaching practices to help you get the most out of your training time from a physical perspective.

Our Conditioning For Football Session Cards focus on key areas of the game, from possession-based stamina practices, to speed and reaction attacking and defending transition practices.

They inject fun into sessions, as well as making them look like the game, enabling players to understand exactly what you are working on and why.

The beauty of practices like these is, while they are focused on fitness and conditioning, they can also be used to highlight tactical elements of the style of play that coaches want their teams to adopt.

Like most session practices you find on the internet, it's important coaches adapt them for their teams and desired outcomes, but these free downloadable session cards provide you with the outline of the session and what you can potentially use them for.

The concepts within the sessions are all part of our extensive Conditioning For Football CPD course, which teaches coaches the fundamentals of physical performance through six modules; Structure and Philosophies, Stamina, Strength, Stopping, Starting and Sprinting.

If you'd like to understand more about the foundations of conditioning your players for football and gaining the knowledge to apply this within your own environment, check out the course here...