The Pillow Pass: How to Give Your Teammate an Easy Gift

Imagine your teammate is standing five steps away from you. They are completely open. You want to pass them the ball.

What do you do?

If you kick the ball as hard as you can, it will zoom toward them like a rocket. It will hit their shin guard with a loud clack and bounce far away. A defender will run in and steal it.

That is a "brick pass." Nobody likes a brick pass.

Instead, you want to send them a "pillow pass." A pillow pass is a ball that is easy to catch. It rolls smoothly on the grass. When it reaches your teammate, it slows down and stops right on their foot.

Here is how you can stop throwing bricks and start passing pillows.

Think About the Distance

Before you kick, your brain has to do some quick math. You must look at your teammate and see how far away they are.

Think of your kicking leg like a swing on a playground. If you want to swing high into the sky, you need a big push. If you just want to wiggle a little bit, you only need a tiny push.

Your leg works the same way:

• For a close teammate (5 to 10 steps away): Bring your foot back just a tiny bit. Swing your leg gently. Hit the middle of the ball with the inside of your foot.
• For a medium teammate (10 to 20 steps away): Bring your foot back a little higher. Swing with medium speed.
• For a far teammate (more than 20 steps away): This is the only time you need a big, strong swing.

If you use a big swing for a close teammate, you are throwing a brick. If you use a tiny swing for a far teammate, the ball will stop halfway there. That is called an "under-hit" pass, and defenders love them because they are easy to steal.

The "Zip and Sip" Rule

A great pillow pass needs to be fast enough to get past defenders, but soft enough for your teammate to control. We call this the Zip and Sip rule.

• The Zip: The ball must travel fast across the grass. It should "zip" past the defenders. If it rolls too slowly, a defender will run out and cut it off.
• The Sip: As the ball gets close to your teammate, it should start to slow down. It should arrive like a quiet sip of water, not a splash in the face.

How do you do both? The secret is keeping the ball on the grass.

A ball that stays flat on the ground loses speed naturally because of the grass. The grass acts like a tiny brake. If you lift the ball into the air, there is no grass to slow it down. It will hit your teammate's knees or bounce high in the air. That makes it very hard to control.

To keep the ball on the grass, hit the very middle of the ball. Do not lean backward. Keep your body tilted slightly forward over the ball when you kick it.

Practice the "Perfect Stop" Game

You can practice this by yourself or with a friend.

Find a brick wall or a partner. Stand ten steps away. Pass the ball. Try to make the ball roll all the way to the wall, but here is the trick: the ball should touch the wall so gently that it barely makes a sound.

If you hear a loud thump, you kicked it too hard. If the ball stops before it reaches the wall, you kicked it too softly.

Keep trying until the ball rolls all the way there and kisses the wall gently. Once you can do it three times in a row from ten steps away, take five steps back and try again.

When you learn to pass this way, your teammates will love playing with you. They will know that when you pass them the ball, it is a gift, not a test of their shin guards.