Is this really a secret?
I dunno but it is still lacking in players from all levels, including the AFL at times.
I feel I'm in a pretty good position to comment on this being a left footer but also being pretty good on both sides of the body in kicking and handballing.
I'm also a mixed bag where I kick left footed, handball right handed, jump off my right leg, write right handed, hold a single racquet right handed but bat left handed.
I am not sure what that is all about but that's what I was dealt.
In footy terms what that meant early on in my playing career was that which ever way I needed to go I could do "something" going that way via handball or kick, without having to fully change direction compared to a full left or right sided player.
Back in the 90's when I was a junior almost all training drills were straight ahead lanework type drills or circular/square drills that followed a single direction and that meant the right sided player biased direction.
As a left footer this drill was near impossible to do with the "no U-turns rule" in great effect but as a kicker, that's what I wanted to do.
For a left footer to get the ball going right and then be able to turn all the way around then to go into a complete oppposite (left footers) hook then kick was, and still is, way too time consuming and time you'll very rarely have on game day.
In the end my only choice was to kick right footed to "fit the drills" which is something I started doing in my mid teens and have continued to do ever since.
Now at training and in games if I'm running to the right then automatically I will kick on my right foot if that's where the option is, regardless of distance, type/level of kick required or the position on the ground.
It's THAT automatic.
What that means is that my decision making can still be pretty good as I'm not losing time by slowing down to attempt a skill on my bad side, I'm not holding the ball longer going through 2 decision making processes at the 1 time (making the right decision and executing the skill) and I have access to 360 degrees of the immediate playing area.
You can't tell me this doesn't make me a better player then if I couldn't.
As a deep small forward I also see plenty of opportunities where using the oppsoite side of the body will be of great assistance for us forwards.
Even simply being able to quickly get the ball to foot out of a pack is a huge skill to have which I'll show in this quick video...
If you'd like to acess this secret and the others preceeding it then register at https://aussierulestraining.com/membership-account/membership-levels/.
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