Scoop it off the floor
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
- 4 to 20
- Space
- 20 x 10 m
- Kit
- 4 cones, 2 balls
- Pitch
- Fine on hard ground
- Indoors
- Fits a small space
Setting it up
A ball lying still on the grass five metres in front of a short queue.
How it runs
Run onto the ball, pick it up without stopping, score at the far cones. Then the same with the ball rolling. More minis games are decided by a loose ball than by anything anybody passes, yet nobody ever puts a ball on the floor at training on purpose. Eight goes each. The word all night is early: get low two strides out rather than bending at the last second.
What to watch for
- Get low early. Bend your knees, not just your back
- Little fingers together underneath it, scoop it up into your chest
- Keep running through it. Do not stop over the ball
Make it easier
- Walk in to it
- Ball sat on a cone so it is off the grass
Make it harder
- Ball rolling away from them
- A chaser starting a metre behind
What it looks like when it is going wrong
What you can see from the touchline, then the one thing to say about it.
- Bending from the waist with straight legs and slapping it away
- Bend your knees. Get your whole body down to it
- Stopping dead over the ball to pick it up
- Run through it. Do not stop, scoop it as you go
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.