Soccer Passing Drills for Kids: 10 Drills for a Partner, a Group or a Team

The best soccer passing drills for kids are the ones that put a real receiver at the other end. A child can strike a ball into a wall a thousand times and still arrive at Saturday unable to pass, because a wall never moves, never closes them down, and never needs the ball played into the correct foot. The ten drills below run with two players, a small group or a whole team, in a deliberate order: clean technique first, then the same technique with someone trying to take the ball away.

Passing is also the skill most youth players quietly skip. Dribbling and shooting are fun enough that a nine-year-old will do both unprompted. Passing needs a partner, so it mostly happens at team training — where each player might get a few dozen reps in an hour.

What makes a passing drill actually work?

A clear split between two things that look identical from the sideline.

US Youth Soccer's coaching education department puts it plainly in its Skills School manual: "During the first fourteen years of a young player's career the coaching emphasis must be on technique." But it then draws the line that matters for choosing drills — "Skill is being able to execute a technique under the pressure of opponents in tight space and most likely on the move."

Technique is the mechanics of striking the ball, built best unopposed. Skill is the same mechanics with an opponent arriving, and it only ever gets built with opponents present. Most drill lists mix the two at random; this one does not. Drills 1 to 6 build technique, drills 7 to 10 convert it into skill.

The manual also lists what a good pass is judged on, a better checklist than "did it get there": accuracy, pace, angle, height, timing, disguise.

How should a child strike a push pass?

The inside-of-the-foot push pass is the one that matters, and the manual's coaching points are more specific than most parents have been told:

Two faults account for most bad passes: a child who strikes with the toe rather than the arch will be accurate at five yards and wild at fifteen, and a child whose plant-foot toes point away from the target will miss in that direction every time.

The receiving half gets even less attention, and the manual is blunt about the cost: "Without good receiving techniques a player is reduced to a kick and run style of play." The mechanics are the mirror image — turn the toes of the receiving foot out so the arch faces the oncoming ball, then pull the leg back to absorb the pace. Our first-touch guide goes further on body shape; for passing drills, just insist the receiving foot is out early rather than stabbed at the ball late.

Technique drills: two players, no pressure

1. Arch stamps

Ball still, partner ten feet away, no run-up. Plant the standing foot six inches from the ball, turn the kicking leg out, and push the ball along the ground with the arch. It should arrive flat and dead straight. Target: 20 each foot, counting only the ones that reach the partner without wobbling.

2. Cliffhanger

Lifted from the Skills School manual. Mark a line about 15 yards away — a crack in the driveway, a touchline, a row of shoes. Every player has a ball, and the job is to pass so it stops as close to the line as possible without crossing it. Closest wins.

It is the only drill here that trains pace rather than accuracy — the half of passing nobody practises.

3. Two-touch rhythm

Partners 10 to 15 yards apart. Receive with the inside of the foot across the body rather than stopping it dead in front, then pass with the other foot. Two touches, no pause. Target: 30 unbroken cycles.

4. Pass and move

Same setup, but after every pass the passer sprints two or three steps sideways, so the return pass is never to a player standing still — true of every pass in a game, false in most passing drills. Target: 90 seconds continuous.

5. One-touch returns

Remove the control touch entirely. Nothing exposes a loose ankle faster. Keep the distance short. Target: 10 consecutive clean returns per foot.

6. Receive, turn, pass

Two gates made of shoes, 12 yards apart, receiving player between them facing their partner. Receive, turn with the first touch, pass through the far gate, turn back. The most game-realistic unopposed drill here, because almost every pass a midfielder plays starts with their back to where the ball is going. Target: 10 each way, both feet.

Pressure drills: three players and up

7. Gates

Scatter six to eight gates — pairs of cones or shoes two yards wide — around a 20 x 20 yard square. Pairs pass through any gate for a point, no gate twice in a row. Ninety seconds, then compare scores. It looks like chaos and does something precise: every pass needs a target chosen while moving.

8. Triangle pass and follow

Three players, one ball, a triangle about 10 yards a side. Pass, then run to the position you passed to, so ball and players circulate in opposite directions. Target: two minutes, then reverse.

9. 3v1 rondo

Three attackers on the edges of a 10 x 10 yard square, one defender inside. Keep the ball away from the defender; whoever loses it goes in. Five consecutive passes is a point. This is the first drill where a child has to look before the ball arrives, and the cramped square is what forces that early look.

10. 4v4 with a touch limit

A plain 4v4 game on roughly 20 x 30 yards, with one rule added: a maximum of two touches per player. The most effective passing exercise on the list, and the reason is measurable.

Should you use a two-touch rule?

Sometimes — and the trade-off is now reasonably well documented.

A 2025 study in the Journal of Human Kinetics by Rosten, Aune and Dalen ran 30 separate 4v4 small-sided games with 12 junior players under three conditions — a maximum of two touches, a maximum of three, and free play — four minutes each on a 20 by 30 metre indoor pitch.

The two-touch rule produced significantly more passes than free play — roughly a quarter more in the same four minutes — and pass success did not drop, with all three conditions within a percentage point of each other.

But free play produced significantly more receptions. If what a player needs is reps of controlling the ball, a touch limit takes them away: players pass on the first touch to avoid losing possession, and never receive at all.

The honest caveats: 12 players from one junior team, averaging just under 18 years old, not children, in a single 4v4 format. Treat the direction as reliable and the numbers as indicative. The paper also notes, citing earlier match analysis, that elite players average between 1.74 and 2.24 touches per possession in real games — which makes a three-touch limit closer to the real thing than a two-touch one.

The practical rule: a two-touch limit when you want passing volume and speed of play, free play when first touch needs work, and never a touch limit for a whole session.

How should passing drills change by age?

Ages 6 to 8. Drills 1, 2 and 3 only, ten minutes total. The win at this age is the arch instead of the toe, and distances of six to ten yards — a child who has to swing hard to reach their partner will never build a clean technique.

Ages 9 to 12. The window the federation points at. U.S. Soccer's U9-U10 coaching guide lists the age-group focus as "fundamental soccer skills using both feet," "short passing and receiving," and winning the ball back, with training games small-sided up to 7v7. Run the full technique set, then finish every session with drill 9 or 10.

Ages 13 and up. Two technique drills as a warm-up, then drills 7 to 10 with a scoreboard. Older players need constraints and consequences more than new drills.

A workable 25-minute session at any age: five minutes of arch stamps and Cliffhanger, five of two-touch rhythm and pass-and-move, five of receive-turn-pass, ten of rondo or 4v4. Passing holds up indoors on a hard floor, which makes it good winter work — the indoor drill set covers the surface and ball changes, and the small-sided games library has more formats than the two here. FlickTec's home sessions, built by a UEFA Pro Licence coach, sequence this kind of work between team practices.

If your child has nobody to pass with, a wall is the substitute, and the seven wall drills are the right way to use one. It builds the technique honestly. It just cannot build the skill.

Frequently Asked Questions

What are the best passing drills for 10 year olds?

Receive-turn-pass, pass and move, and a 3v1 rondo. Ten-year-olds have enough coordination for proper push-pass technique and enough game understanding to benefit from pressure, so include both. U.S. Soccer's U9-U10 age-group guide names "short passing and receiving" and both-footed skills as the focus for exactly this age.

How do you teach a 6 year old to pass a soccer ball?

Stationary ball, partner six to ten feet away, no run-up. The only coaching point at that age is contact with the arch rather than the toe, plant-foot toes pointing at the partner. Make it a game — passing so the ball stops on a line, or through a gate of two shoes — and keep it under ten minutes.

How far apart should kids stand for passing drills?

Six to ten yards for ages 6 to 8, 10 to 15 for ages 9 to 12, 15 to 20 for teenagers. The test is whether the child can reach their partner without swinging hard: if they have to lash at it, the distance is teaching a worse technique than they already had.

Can kids practise passing on their own?

Technique, yes — a wall returns the ball thousands of times and punishes a sloppy pass immediately. But solo work cannot train what breaks down in games: choosing a target, passing into the right foot, looking before the ball arrives. Those need a moving receiver, which is why at least one partner drill belongs in every session.

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Passing is the only skill in soccer that cannot be practised selfishly. Everything else a young player can grind out alone in a driveway. This one needs somebody standing fifteen yards away — which is precisely why it is the skill most of them are worst at.