Bringing a Team to the Pitch

Groups who play together regularly tend to settle into a routine quickly, and a little organisation beforehand makes the hour on the pitch go further.

Agree who is coming before the day. An hour is short, and spending the first part of it working out whether there are enough players is the most common way for a session to lose its shape.

Bring two colours if you can. Sorting teams is far quicker when everyone can see at a glance who they are playing with, and it saves the usual few minutes of confusion at kick-off.

Arrive with enough time to warm up properly. Going straight into a game cold is how most avoidable injuries in five-a-side happen, and the warm-up is the part that gets cut when a group is running late.