Learning how to play center midfield perfectly will cement yourself as a vital part of your team. Center midfielders are integral to a team’s success every game. They travel between all parts of the field. Defensively, they need to track back, fill in for players that are out of position, and deny entry passes. Offensively, they need to support their team’s forwards by providing outlet passes, switching the point of attack, making threatening runs, and having shots on goal. If your team loses the battle in the midfield, you will play the entire game on your back foot and most certainly find difficulty finishing the 90 minutes with a result.

Center midfield is a broad term and most players will play a more specific version of the position within certain formations. An attacking center midfield player will function differently within a 4-1-2-1 vs a 4-4-1-1 vs. a 5-3-2 and so on and so forth. This article will cover the four states of the game: Attacking on/off the ball and defending on/off the ball.

Playing Center Midfield: Attacking On the Ball

This is the bread and butter of a center midfield’s role. The Pirlo’s and Xavi’s of the world are artists on the ball. Their legs, paintbrushes. The field, their canvas. As a center midfielder, passing is central to your role. You should be able to put the ball anywhere on the field with either foot. This IS difficult and not to be expected until the higher levels of older ages. People do get away with not being able to pass with their weak foot, but at the very least, your preferred foot should be able to play a 50-yard pass accurately.

Center midfields are the key to controlling the game and attacking successfully:

1. Set and maintain the tempo: Passing the ball quickly or slowly changes how the entire game feels. If you receive the ball from a right back, take one touch and quickly send it in the air to the other side of the field, you’re promoting a high-tempo style of play. This can be very good for when defenses appear tired or your team has a lot of momentum. Keeping relentless pressure on another team will exhaust them physically. However, receiving the ball from your right back, taking a few seconds and playing a short pass will promote a slower tempo. This is a great idea when your team appears tired, or you’re up a goal with the clock winding down. Effectively controlling the tempo is underrated in importance. It plays the game on your team’s terms and coaches are entirely right when they say “Play your own game.” If you let the other team’s central midfielders control the tempo, you’re letting them play their game. And that’s the first step towards losing.
2. Giving forwards opportunities for success: We want our forwards to have the easiest opportunity to score. This isn’t always possible, but it comes from one of two ways. A deliberate cross/through ball/set that puts the forward within scoring range with little to no obstruction, or a pass to a player with a 1-on-1 to goal. Learning how to recognize when these passes should be played is vital to a center midfielder’s success.
3. Beating the last midfielder: If you’ve received the ball deep in the middle third, but haven’t broken the opponent’s midfield line. Taking on the last midfielder yourself isn’t a terrible option—that is if you can beat them. Losing the ball in this situation is a brilliant counter-attacking opportunity for the other team. You need to be absolutely positive you won’t give up the ball. With that said, dribbling at the defense with all of your forwards free to move as they please is a very threatening attack, and very conducive to goal scoring chances.

And by all means, if you can strike a ball from range and are within 20-25 yards and have a legitimate chance to make the keeper make a save. Have a crack. Goalies make mistakes. Rebounds happen. However, know your strengths and don’t waste a possession. There is no better way to infuriate your teammates more than a 25 yard shot that goes 25 yards over the crossbar.

Playing Center Midfield: Attacking Off the Ball

While playing center midfield, you always need to be an outlet. Your off the ball movement is super important. Watch film of yourself playing and compare the amount of time you have the ball and the amount of time when you don’t. Every single person, bar none, spend the vast majority of the game without the ball, so it is vital you know how to be productive without it. You should always be doing one of three things while off the ball in possession:

1. Making a threatening run: It is incredibly effective to make a deep run in behind from a midfield position. Defenses love being able to shift side to side and dealing with people in front of them. By making a deep run, you force defenders to communicate with one another and one HAS to follow you. By pulling a defender so blatantly out of position, you open space in front of them for your teammate to dribble into or for someone to check into and receive the ball.
2. Being an outlet: If you aren’t threatening deep, you should be moving to be open. Plain and simple. Center midfielders play in one of the most tightly packed areas of the field, so you have to move well. Avoid being a lateral option—also known as a square pass. Recognize where everybody on the field is and where the space is/or will be. If you see everybody starting to shift towards one side of the field, start to drift away from the pack and into the open space. However, don’t drift too far out of position. You would be better off dropping deeper on the field, telling a wide player to shift into the space, receiving the ball, and playing it out to them. This maintains the shape of your team.
3. Getting in Between the Lines: This falls under being an outlet, but is so integral to playing center midfield that it warrants its own bullet point. The strongest position a center midfield can receive the ball in is “between the lines.” Between the lines refers to the space behind their center midfield and in front of their defense. Receiving the ball in this space allows you to bypass their entire midfield defense, turn, and run at the defense. At this stage, you can take a defender on, commit one and slot a forward in behind, or pass the ball off and threaten in behind with a run. You can really do a number of things after getting the ball in between the lines and it is of the utmost important you try to do so.

Playing Center Midfield: Defending Off the Ball

Defending in the midfield heavily defends on the system you’re playing. However, you should always be marking someone or close enough to someone to deny a pass. The simple part of defending in the midfield is you almost always will match up with an opposing player, meaning someone on the other team will be occupying the same space you do. If you are an attacking midfield, your primary function will be to deny the opposing defensive midfielder to get the ball. If you are a defensive midfielder, you should be denying their attacking midfielder to get on the ball.

You will be marking someone 75% of the time while playing defense in the midfield. The only time you shouldn’t be marking someone directly is while you’re shifting to mark another person because the ball has moved on the field, or your teammate has been beat—or lost the ball—and you now need to directly defend the player with the ball.

Playing Center Midfield: Defending On the Ball

Do not get beat. That is the number one priority. Too many players, young players in particular, try to win the ball immediately only to miss the challenge and allow players to run directly at the defense. You do not need to win the ball back, you just have to deny the attacker getting the ball behind you. Successful defense in the midfield results in the player playing the ball sideways—or backwards.

Keep the attacker in front of you. Shift your feet side to side and don’t bite on any fakes. It’s a simple job. It’s a thankless job. And it’s fairly boring. But it’s very important. Defending is an 11 man job and starts with the forward furthest forward.

For angle of approach, if you’re in the opponent’s half of the field, just try to stay in front of the player and deny any positive passes if possible. If you find yourself getting dribbled past while standing the player up, pushing them to the sideline is mission accomplished as well.

While in your own half, you should always be forcing the players to the sideline. Avoid the ball in the center of the field at all costs. It’s much harder to shoot from the corner of the 18-yard box than it is from the top of the D (center edge of the 18-yard box.)

Checking Your Shoulder in the Midfield

The biggest central midfield specific skill that needs to be developed is checking your shoulder. This is looking over your shoulder often—every 5-15 seconds—to quickly scan and see where everybody on the field is. You need to know, and this isn’t only center midfielders but everyone on the field, where you are going with the ball before it gets to you. Where are the open passes? Where is the open space? Can you turn? Or do you need to play it right back? Do you have time to shoot? You need to train yourself to constantly check your shoulder, asking yourself and answering all of these questions every time. This is also a secret tip to setting yourself apart during team tryouts: coaches always take note of who is checking their shoulder and who isn’t.

Center Midfield Skills to Train

• Passing and controlling the ball with both feet (inside and outside of the foot)
• Checking your shoulder
• Shooting from range
• Reading the play
• Switching the point of attack
• Denying forward passes
• Willingness to pass backwards
• Weighting passes properly

As always, comment if you have any questions or want to hear about something specific I haven’t covered yet.

Think Smart. Play Smart. And #StudySoccer.