Handball
A handball training plan for your team
A build-up across the season, and a worked session for every training night with drills, timings and coaching points.
Handball has a lot of actions per minute and not much time. In seventy-five minutes, four things compete for it: the overhead throw, build-up play with the circle runner, a defence that actually shifts, and small-sided games, where most of it sticks. They do not all fit. Which one you drop this week is the question a coach is chewing on at four in the afternoon.
With youth teams, conditioning belongs inside the game. A continuous three-a-side with a sensible work-to-rest ratio does more than a block of running, and the players prefer it. That is built into the library here. Separate physical blocks only appear for the oldest age groups, always with a ball.
We plan that order. Each week has a job, and we say what it means for this week's session.
How a handball week runs
01
Two sessions and a Saturday match is the rhythm most teams are on.
02
The session furthest from the match takes the hard work and anything new: drilling the defence, a new crossing move, the long game.
03
The last session before the match gets shorter and sharper. Finishing from the wing and from the circle, and nothing new that will not hold up in the match.
What a drill looks like
A handball drill from the library, written for the middle age group. The text you see here is the text that lands on your session sheet.
Three-wave fast break
18 to 48 minutes
Keep the counterattack going through all three waves when the first wave is stopped.
- Setup
- You place one cone on each sideline (cone 1) and a second cone 5 m behind halfway (cone 2). One wing starts at cone 1 on each side, and the trailers start at cone 2. You put a goalkeeper in each goal. Twelve players take part. Any extras wait outside the sidelines at halfway and return used balls.
- How it runs
- - You run 3 blocks of 5 to 6 minutes, with 2 minutes’ rest between blocks. - Each sequence lasts 25 to 35 seconds. - Wave 1: The goalkeeper releases the ball within 3 seconds to the wing at cone 1. The attack must shoot within 6 seconds. - If Wave 1 does not result in a goal, start Wave 2. Two trailers leave cone 2, and two defenders join, creating a 3v3. The attack gets a fresh 8 seconds to shoot. - If Wave 2 does not result in a goal, start Wave 3. Play 5v5. The defence stays unorganised until halfway and only sets up beyond it. At 15 seconds, you raise an arm to signal passive play. The attack then has 4 more passes to shoot. - You alternate the side of the Wave 1 outlet throw. - You change the goalkeepers after each block. - A waiting player rotates in after each sequence.
- Coaching points
- Trailers run before they know whether wave 1 scored.
- Wave 2 attacks the space beside the first defender.
- Wave 3 plays immediately: no reset, no walk-in.
- Common mistakes
- The sequence dies at the first save → keep counting; nobody stops.
- Trailers running behind the ball down the middle → send them wide.
- Kit
- 10 × ball, 2 × goal, 10 × cone, 8 × bib
Where this fits in
There is no shortage of handball drills. Collections, PDFs, clips: if you want something for the overhead throw you will have it inside ten minutes.
None of that gives you a season. Knowing which drill belongs in week seven, and why that differs from week seventeen, is a different question, and a different kind of product. This is that other product, with drills we wrote ourselves.
Ages and limits
Federations divide their youth into different age groups, and the plan follows whichever one applies. You say which country you coach in and which age group your team plays. Where we hold that federation's categories, the plan uses its names. Every age group carries a load ceiling that decides which drills qualify and how hard a week can get. That ceiling sits in the code, and it holds even when you ask for more.
Try it with your team
A few questions about your team, and the first weeks are already there.
Set up your team