There are many different football defence and offence formations and plays that are available today for a coach to choose. With a click of the mouse one can find an endless amount of information and ideas on team systems and philosophies on the internet.
But what is the best one suited for you or better yet, suited for your football team? We all have our favourite defence or offence that we would love to play and implement. However, the point we would like to make is that it's quite probable that your favourite defence you like and want to play is outside the reach of your player's abilities. It's important as a coach that you evaluate your teams abilities and static factors. Static factors would be the unchangeable such as size, strength, athletic ability,speed, desire, and determination. Basically, things that are presented to you that you have no control over. Once you determine these factors its up to you as the coach to select the right systems that your players will thrive in based on their abilities. The worst thing you can do is select a system that will be too much for your team to handle. In the end, it will come back to haunt you!
In most programs testing these factors is done in the early days of your training camp. The coaches will chart, record, and monitor the different strengths and weakness of each player. From that point, they will discuss the type of offence and defence that they will implement in order to get the very best from their players abilities. Perhaps you have a large group of solid offensive linemen and a few good athletes. Probably your evaluation based on these factors is that you will build your offence around your O-line and be a running football team. Or defensively you might evaluate that you don't have a lot of D-lineman or good size so you compensate by playing a scheme like a 3-4 in order to take advantage of your speed at the linebacker and safety positions. Either or, you've selected a scheme that is within your player's abilities.
By doing this you will get the best possible system that your players will thrive in as it will be designed around their strengths. they will gain confidence in it, and no doubt, be tough to play against.
A lot of coaches make the mistake of implementing systems just because they like them and ignore the static factors. For the most part, we are coaching programs when we are dealt our players. There's no recruiting process to get players in that will thrive under the system we like. Therefore we can only play the hand we are dealt and that means it's important to get a handle on the static factors so that we can implement the best possible defence, offence, or special teams.
