Dynamics of indicators of collective ball control in the Ukraine-Romania match of the European Football Championship 2024

Abstract

Championship. In modern football, breaking through layered defenses, creating goal-scoring opportunities, and converting them into goals is becoming increasingly difficult. This has created the need for new, modern training methods based on coaching ideas and philosophies that help players improve their tactical skills and decision-making speed. In this context, coaches pay great attention to developing group and team interactions among players during the final stage of attack. In the training process, such interactions are practiced in limited space and with a high number of players involved, which contributes to improving individual technical skills, speed of thinking, and movement intensity within the playing area.

Purpose of the study: to analyze the technical and tactical actions (level of team ball possession) of the Ukrainian national team during the group stage of the UEFA Euro 2024 Championship.

Research methods: theoretical analysis and synthesis of scientific and methodological literature, methods of pedagogical observation.

The registration and comparative analysis of the indicators of collective ball control of the national teams of Ukraine and Romania were carried out using the video recording of the game of the European Football Championship 2024 in the group round games.

Research results: the article analyses the indicators of the number of passes, which reflect the level of team control of the ball in six 15-minute time periods in the games of the group round of the national team of Ukraine at the European Football Championship 2024.

Conclusions: On the basis of pedagogical observations, the quantitative indicators of collective attacking actions of the national team of Ukraine at the stage of the group round of Euro-2024 were obtained, which were higher than those of the national team of Romania, but were ineffective because they had the following features: collective actions had a low rate of attack development; the team scheme of the game had an uneven distribution of players in the middle of the playing space; players performed a large number of unnecessary individual technical and tactical actions (driving, circling), which significantly slowed down collective interactions; 

Therefore, in our opinion, long-term ball control can ensure the team's success in the match, provided that the above shortcomings of collective interactions in the middle of the playing space are eliminated.