Pop pass gates
A handling and passing drill for U8 and up, with where the cones go, how it runs and what to say when it is not working.
Free to read with no account. It works at a pitch with no signal too.
- Age grades
- U8, U9, U10, U11, U12
- Time
- 8 minutes
- Players
- 6 to 18
- Space
- 20 x 10 m
- Kit
- 8 cones, 1 ball
- Pitch
- Fine on hard ground
- Indoors
- Fits a small space
Setting it up
Four gates of two cones, two metres wide, spread up a channel. Pairs at the start.
How it runs
Run at each gate together. The carrier goes to one side of it, the support runs through it and takes a short pass off the hip. Four gates, then swap who carries. Six goes each. This is the pass they will actually use at a ruck in two years, so it is worth getting the timing early.
What to watch for
- Short and soft. A pop is not a spin pass
- Support runs onto it at pace, do not slow down for it
- Give it late. Too early and the defender reads it
Make it easier
- Wider gates
- Walk through the first two gates
Make it harder
- Add a defender in one gate who can only stand still
What it looks like when it is going wrong
What you can see from the touchline, then the one thing to say about it.
- The pass thrown hard, so the receiver has to check
- Softer. Just lift it into their hands
- The support runner slowing down to collect it
- Run onto it. Full speed through the gate
More like this
The grades that can do it
What U8 rugby allows is the rule this sits under. Regulation 15 is reissued every summer, so the RFU's own rules of play are the ones to read for this season rather than a copy on somebody else's website. Ours included. Read against the RFU's 2026/27 appendices in August 2026.