Soccer is a sport that consists of two teams that each have eleven players on the field.  The objective of this sport is to shoot the spherical ball past the goal keeper and into the goal in order to score a point for your team.  Only the goal keeper is allowed to touch the ball with their hands.  Even though soccer goalies can use their hands, it is still probably one of the hardest jobs in all of sports.  Not only is being a soccer goalie a physical position, but a mental game as well.  This is a guide to help you become a better soccer goalie, with helpful hints and drills to practice.

The best way to become a good soccer goalie is by practicing repeatedly.  The more that someone practices, the more experienced they will become, which means that they will in turn get better.  There are four basic soccer goalie drills that you should practice.  The first one is to work on one hand catches.  This drill is not complex at all because all that it consists of is basically having a catch with someone, but only catching with one hand.

The next soccer goalie drill is a two hand catch drill where someone will be shooting the ball from a short distance at you and you should practice catching the ball with both hands.  You should be wearing your soccer goalie gloves during these catching drills.

Once you have catching down, you will need to practice your diving skills because this situation occurs quite often in actual game play.  To practice this skill, you should have someone shoot low at the goal posts and you need to dive for the ball in order to prevent it from crossing the goal line.

Finally, the last thing you need to practice is catching high balls.  Get someone to shoot a distance shot so that you need to jump for the ball.  Once you get all of these skills down, it will help you for all situations during an actual soccer game.

It is good to keep practicing the drills, but that is not the only soccer goalie training that you will need, because a good part of the game is mental.  During a soccer game, it is crucial to remember to communicate with your teammates so that everyone knows what is going on.  If communication is broken or does not occur between the players and the soccer goalies, the team will not work well together.  Being a goalie can be very nerve racking, so you must find a way to stay alert, but yet calm.  In your head, you should be thinking of all possible scenarios that could occur, so that you are ready to react quickly once the ball is shot.  Also, with experience you will be able to read your opponents better.  Once you have this skill down, it is a major advantage to you.

The top five soccer goalie tips that you should always remember in order to be the best soccer goalie you can be are:

• Stay focused no matter where the ball is on the field.
• Follow the ball, not the opponent.
• Do not stay on the goal line the whole time.  You sometimes need to run out and challenge the opponent.
• Be confident in yourself.
• Try to read the body language of the opponent to predict what is going to occur.

Once you have mastered the basic fundamentals and learned the mental game of being a soccer goalie, you can go out there with your soccer goalie equipment on and just get in the game – again and again and again.  As mentioned before, the best way to become a better soccer goalie is by constant practice and repetition.  Hopefully these soccer goalie tips and training drills will get you on your way to becoming the best goalie you can be.