Switching & Surrounding

Switching

Usually when we play match defence, everyone sticks with the same person the whole time as they run around the pitch. This works okay, but we can improve our efficiency and start working as a team by being aware of switching opportunities.

Any time that offensive players cross paths could be an opportunity to switch. This is advantageous because defenders don't have to run as far and they can also maintain good positioning on the person they are marking.

For example, in the first switch in the animation, defender 4 is able to stay under of the cutters, stopping easy short passes, while defender 3 can stay deep and be first to any hucks.

Notice that at the moment the switch occurs, the attackers are between the two defenders. This is a very advantageous position for the defenders, and an extension of this positioning is known as surrounding.

Surrounding

Many offences use structures like stacks, in which several offensive players cluster. Rather than continuing to match up, intelligent defences will take advantage by surrounding the cluster. When you are surrounding, there is no direction in which an attacker can go to get to the disc first.

There are a few important things to notice when watching this animation of surrounding:

  • When a player leaves the stack, they are closely marked 1-to-1

  • The rest of the defenders re-adjust so that all sides are still covered

  • We still want to take advantage of forcing to one side, so the open side has more defenders than the break side

  • Good communication is needed. Two defenders may start to follow a cutter initially, but they need to judge where the cut is going quickly and decide who should mark them