Drills to teach/reinforce Defensive Holds

[jmsaway]

Does anyone have any drills to teach either the forearm hold or the butt-end hold?

[picknroll]

Here's one that I use.

Set up three cones around a goal: one at X, two at slightly behind GLE about two yards outside of the crease on each side.

Start an attack at X with a defender on him. First have the attack drive right. The defender drop steps, shuffles to the cone and meets the ball carrier with a forearm hold (assuming righty defender). The attack then rolls back away from pressure changes hands to lefty and circles back around the X cone for a lefty approach to GLE. The defender stays on the ball carrier, drop steps at X and then applies a butt-end hold (righty defender) on the lefty approach. You can keep continuing this pattern back and forth. A couple of coaching points are to teach the defender to use the full length of his stick as a buffer to outrun the ball carrier to the cone and to always keep his stick in front of the ball carrier or else he won't be in position to apply the holds.