ZONE CONTROL

A huge deciding factor on winning games easily is proper zone control. Far too often do I see teams eliminate players off the break from a side, then shoot the next widest guy, but they let a player fill over and they lose control of that side. If you ask any player, the scariest thing is when a whole tape gets eliminated on your team. So when you get this advantage you need to control it and you need to apply pressure. 

Now let's discuss different zone control situations. First there is the scenario I wrote above, you win a wire by shooting the opposing players. The other type of zone control would be keeping players in the back and not letting them move forward. Since I believe the first one is the most important, we will cover that one in depth. 

The horn goes off and your lanes are on point. You eliminate the furthest runner on a side. Next your goal should be to find the closest player to that side and trap him in his bunker by shooting not only the side of his bunker, but also the gap that he would rush through to make a move. This type of pressure will make him play uncomfortable and either give you a chance to eliminate him or one of your players to get a better angle on him and let them shoot him out. Once those two players are eliminated you have an entire wire for your team. 

Have your player on that side stay dedicated to wrapping the wire side of their bunker to apply pressure on the center guy. You as a back center player should look for a move forward toward the center to reduce room for error. Once you get into a closer and better position you should wave off your wire player and try to bait that center player to move out into his weak wire. When he does you'll be able to easily eliminate him. Then you and the players on that wire should work together wrapping around your bunkers applying pressure until the rest of the players are eliminated. 

You can set up a series of scenario based drills with your own team to work on preventing players from filling out. Just set up a game where you guys already shot the wide guy, and you have to control them, while their goal is to try to get out and stop the attack. After each point break down the good and bad things that happened on both sides. This will teach you how to control a zone and how to fight back when you have lost a wire.