Volleyball skill

Volleyball is a game that involves some simple and basic skills. The skills required to play Volleyball are serving, passing, setting and hitting, blocking and dinking. A volleyball coach teaches his players these basic skills through the volleyball drills.

The Basic Skills Of Volleyball:
Serving – The serve is a skill that initiates the play. There are two types of serves in volleyball, overhand and underhand. In an overhand serve, the ball is contacted with one hand only. The underhand serve is also referred to as ‘bump’ or ‘forearm pass’ and is the most used skill in volleyball.

Passing – The forearm pass or ‘dig’ is sometimes referred to simply as ‘pass’. The basic skill is called ‘pass’ when the serve is received and ‘dig’ when the opponent’s attack is handled.

Setting –This skill is necessary to make goals in volleyball. The ball is contacted with two hands, above the forehead and placed into position for an attacker to spike the ball.

Hitting – This is also referred to as ‘spiking’. The players hit the ball hard enough to make it cross the net and get ‘grounded’ in the opposite court.

Blocking – This skill forms the first line of defense. The team uses the skill to prevent a spiked ball from crossing over the net.

Dinking – This is a light hit or tip, to place the ball into an open area on the court.

Drills To Learn The Basic Skills: A variety of drills are performed to learn the basic skills in volleyball. There are individual drills to learn each of the basic skills. In order to learn blocking, there are drills like ‘Hands on Blocking’, ‘Three Up’, ‘Angle of Approach Drill’ and drill for footwork and blocking.

The drills recommended for digging include, ‘Dig Dig Attack’, ‘Hit and Recover’, ‘Madness’, ‘Pit’ and ‘Hitter Coverage’. Serving drills like ‘Serving Under The Line’ and ‘Getting Revenge’ help the players to learn how to serve properly. The passing drills are ‘High Pass’, ‘Between the Legs’, ‘Type-tempo Direction’ and ‘Attack Receive Setup’.

Setting is learnt through drills like ‘Using Your Head’, ‘Bump and Set Drill’, ‘Overhead Pepper’ and ‘Read the Block’. The spiking drills are ‘Burn’, ‘Chair-Spiker’, ‘Cover Self’ and ‘Defense to Hitting Transition’.

Teaching Volleyball Skills: A volleyball coach should be well equipped to implement the correct teaching method, to improve the basic skills of his team. The players should practice a variety of individual drills, like ball control, passing, digging, shooting and tactical drills effectively. For example, for improving the digging skill, the ‘Clubhouse drill’ enables the players to dig the spike attacks of opponents. This is a very fast drill repeatedly practicing digging, transition and attack.

Playing The Game Of Volleyball: Volleyball is a team sport. It depends on the joint abilities of the team members. Playing the game is easy, but the players should keep on improving their basic skills through regular drills. The game can be played indoors as well as outdoors. There are five members in each team: two in the front by the net, two at the back and one in the center.