Professional Football and Olympic Sports: Strength, Speed & Power Testing, Diagnostics and Monitoring.

⚽ Professional Football & Olympic Sports: Strength, Speed and Power
Testing, Diagnostics and Monitoring. + ACL, Knee Rehabilitation

💡Who Is this For?
This resource is for coaches, medical teams & performance teams who are interested in gym and pitch based physical preparation and rehabilitation.

🥇 Primary Demands
The tests, diagnostics, around the injury specific load planning considerations are for testing athletes for which speed and power is a primary demand. For example elite sprinters and speed and power athletes. Also included are tests for goalkeepers who are pure power athletes, described as a cross between a rugby back, triple jumper, & Olympic weightlifter. Hence Olympic lifts should be a staple in goalkeeper programmes.

⚡When Do You Train Speed and Power?
Speed and power should be trained all year round, the proportion and percentage of the work will adjust to training, competition variables, and your coaching environment. I would recommend speed is a year constant. Athletes with sharp technical skills do have an competitive edge.

If you start with what qualities need to be developed, depending on the results. These will have training and performance implications, and then consider what to do. I.e. How to optimise speed, strength or balanced profiles, if an athlete has a major deficit, minor deficit or balanced profile.

🧠 Rehabilitation - ACL - Knee Injuries
If we look at the ACL, Knee Injury tests, the samples shown I use are geared towards ensuring athletes have the capability to produce speed and power at a variety of speeds and intensity. It is important to develop training durability so athletes do not break down, pick up niggles or suffer a complete reinjury again.

💡 Test Sequence?
Feet first, then up the chain/body, as this follows low to high speeds and power production.

Testing the hamstrings in a long position is critical for high speed running and sprinting speeds. The groin is described as the third hamstring, critical for high speed running (HSR), sprinting, kicking, explosive actions and braking.

We need to test calf muscles as these are also important for speed and power. Calf muscles also act as knee protectors, i.e. Force if not dissipated correctly, then travels up the chain to the knee, and then upwards to the hip. We need to ensure athletes have strong legs and hips.

Testing ground reactivity is very important, you can tell when an athlete has been rehabbed correctly, you see bouncy, floaty running. Contact with the ground means fast efficient running, movement and durability.

Testing braking is critical, being able to accelerate, stop and reaccelerate at different speeds and over different distances. Particularly important for change of direction (COD) and backwards running.

👩‍🍳 Application?
This resource and methods can all be applied to any position on the field/Olympic Sport.

💡 ⚽ Positional Tips for Professional football - ACL and Knee Injuries
If a goalkeeper picks up an injury, this will mean handling skills and movement will be compromised. If they have a knee injury, finger, hand & forearm training will need to be completed on a weekly basis. Do not over do it as then its a risk of GK/tennis elbow.

⚽ Kicking, Passing and Receiving
Train the feet for kicking, passing, and receiving the ball. For example when an athlete starts ball work, if they have not trained the feet or relearned how to lock ankles, then this means pain, soreness and poor technique. This on top of the inhibition.
Isometric holds (easy to implement and reduce pain / soreness risk), bands, cable machines, weights tied to feet, can assist with rehab. That last bit where the knee folds is the last thing to heal. Therefore a strong groin with speed is critical. I.e. machine cable holds into pulses. groin slides (Body weight to then weight plates)

📚👨🏻‍💻References / Sources
Taberner, Matt & Allen, Tom & Cohen, Daniel. (2019). Progressing rehabilitation after injury: Consider the ' control-chaos continuum'. British Journal of Sports Medicine. 53. bjsports-2018. 10.1136/bjsports-2018-100157.