Lesson 13 · Deciding inside the contest
Strategies and tactics in individual and group sports
A singles player can change their entire plan in fifteen seconds and tell nobody. A football team needs half-time, a whiteboard, eleven people to understand the same thing, and several minutes of play before the new plan is actually being played. That gap is not a flaw in team sport. It is the thing team tactics are built around.
A singles tennis player decides at 3–3 in the second set that the plan is not working and changes it completely. It takes about fifteen seconds and nobody has to be told.
A football team decides at half-time that the plan is not working. Write down everything that has to happen before the new plan is actually being played, and estimate how long it takes. Then answer the interesting question: does that make the team's tactics worse, or just different?
- Use strategy and tactic precisely, and say which level a given decision belongs to.
- Identify the factors that influence how strategies and tactics are applied, and group them so a list becomes an argument.
- Explain how the same factor produces different consequences in an individual and a group sport.
- Explain why adapting mid-contest is fast for an individual and slow for a team, and what each does about it.
- Discuss the factors, which means weighing them against each other rather than listing them.
- Strategy — the overall plan for how a contest will be approached.
- Tactic — a specific action or adjustment that carries out the strategy in a particular situation.
- Opponent analysis — the study of an opponent's patterns, strengths and weaknesses before and during a contest.
- Game sense — an athlete's ability to read a developing situation and choose an appropriate response.
- Team cohesion — the degree to which a group works together towards its shared goals.
- Role clarity — each athlete's understanding of what they are responsible for within the plan.
- Contingency — a pre-planned alternative to be used if a defined situation arises.
- Structured flexibility — a plan with a small number of rehearsed alternatives, so that changing it does not require inventing one.
- Conditions — the environmental factors of a contest, such as weather, surface, altitude, venue and crowd.
Lesson 10 introduced these two words. Here they carry the whole dot point, so the distinction has to be exact. A strategy is the overall plan for the contest — it is chosen before the contest, it applies across it, and there is normally one of them. A tactic is a specific action that serves the strategy in a particular moment, and a single contest contains dozens.
| Sport | Strategy | Tactics that serve it |
|---|---|---|
| Singles tennis | Attack the opponent's weaker backhand and shorten points | Serve wide to the backhand side; approach the net behind a deep backhand; return the second serve from inside the baseline |
| Netball | Force turnovers in the mid-court and score quickly from them | Apply a full-court press after a centre pass; double-team the wing attack at the transverse line; use a pre-agreed quick restart |
| Distance running | Run an even pace and rely on a superior finish | Sit two places back through the middle laps; refuse to lead into a headwind; begin the drive with 250 m remaining |
Read across any row and you can see why the distinction matters for an exam answer. Every tactic in the third column can be evaluated by one question: does it serve the strategy in the second column? A tactic that does not is not a clever variation, it is an error. And a response that names a strategy and calls it a tactic has lost the level at which the whole discussion happens.
One strategy, many tactics. If you can do it once in a game it is probably a tactic; if it describes the whole contest it is a strategy.
Quick check: "Sit two places back through the middle laps, then begin the drive with 250 m remaining." This is best described as:
The dot point asks for the factors that influence how strategies and tactics are applied. Listing eight of them earns some marks; grouping them earns more, because the grouping is itself an insight: some factors are about you, some about the opponent, some about the environment, and some about the state of the contest. Two of those four are known in advance and two are not, which is exactly why plans need contingencies.
| Family | Factors | What it changes | Known in advance? |
|---|---|---|---|
| The athlete or team | Fitness and current condition, skill level, experience, injuries and availability, cohesion and role clarity | Which strategies are available at all. A pressing strategy needs the conditioning to sustain it, and a strategy nobody can execute is a fantasy | Largely yes |
| The opponent | Their strengths, weaknesses, patterns and preferred structures, and their own likely plan | Which strategy is worth choosing, and where the tactics should be aimed | Partly, through analysis, but they adapt too |
| The environment | Weather, wind, surface, venue, altitude, crowd, and the rules and their interpretation by officials | Which tactics are feasible on the day, and how heavily each is punished if it fails | Partly; conditions change and officiating varies |
| The state of the contest | Score, time remaining, fatigue, momentum, cards or fouls, stage of the competition, what is at stake | Whether the current plan is still the right one, and how much risk is appropriate | No, by definition |
Two of these deserve extra attention because they are frequently underweighted.
The rules, and their interpretation. The rules define the space in which any tactic is legal, and interpretation varies between officials and between competitions. A team whose defensive strategy depends on aggressive contact at the ruck is making a bet on how the match will be officiated. Good preparation includes a contingency for the bet being lost.
What is at stake. The same scoreline late in a dead rubber and late in an elimination final should produce different tactics, because the value of a draw is different. This is the clearest case of a factor that changes the choice without changing anything physical at all.
True or false: A team's own fitness and skill level constrain which strategies are available to it at all, so an otherwise excellent strategy that the squad cannot physically sustain is the wrong choice.
The strongest way to answer this dot point is not to write one list for individual sport and another for group sport. It is to take one factor at a time and show that it produces different consequences in the two settings. That is a discussion; two parallel lists are not.
| Factor | In an individual sport | In a group sport |
|---|---|---|
| Changing the plan mid-contest | Immediate. One person decides and executes, so a change costs seconds and needs no communication | Slow and lossy. The change must be decided, communicated to everyone, understood consistently and executed together, and until it is, some players are running the old plan and some the new one |
| Opponent analysis | Focused on one person's patterns and preferences, and usable in enormous detail | Focused on structures and combinations as well as individuals, and the opponent's personnel may change at short notice |
| Fatigue | Directly narrows the athlete's own options, and there is no substitute available | Narrows options unevenly across the squad, and can be managed by rotation, substitution and role change |
| Errors | Fully exposed; nobody covers, and the psychological effect from Lesson 12 feeds straight back into the next decision | Can be absorbed by teammates, but can also be compounded if the structure depends on the position that failed |
The first row is the heart of it, and it answers card 01. A team's slower adaptation is not a weakness in its tactics; it is a structural cost of having eleven or fifteen or eighteen decision-makers who must act in a coordinated way. Teams manage that cost rather than eliminate it, and the way they manage it is structured flexibility: a small number of rehearsed alternatives, each with a name and a trigger, so a mid-game change means calling for something the squad already owns instead of inventing one. That is why a team's contingencies are practised at training and an individual's often are not.
There is a real advantage on the team side too, and it is worth stating so the comparison is not one-directional. A team can hold more than one tactic in play at once, because different players can be doing different things at the same moment, and it can change personnel to change capability mid-contest. An individual athlete has neither option.
Do not turn a difference into a ranking
A common answer says individual athletes are more tactically flexible and stops there, which reads as though team sport is tactically inferior. The accurate version is that individuals adapt faster, teams adapt more slowly but can run several tactics simultaneously and can substitute. Each setting has a different strength and a different constraint.
Fill the gaps. A pre-planned alternative to be used if a defined situation arises is called a . The degree to which a group works together towards its shared goals is team . Each athlete's understanding of what they are responsible for within a plan is called role .
The verb is discuss, and a discussion requires the factors to be put against each other rather than listed in parallel. They conflict constantly, and the conflicts are where the marks are.
| The conflict | Pull one way | Pull the other | What usually decides it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Exploit the opponent's weakness, or play to your own strength? | The opponent's weakness is the softest target available | Attacking it may require you to play in a way you are not good at | Whether you can attack that weakness using your own strength. If not, your own strength usually wins, because a plan you cannot execute is not a plan |
| Stick with the plan, or change it? | The plan was chosen with good information and time to think | The state of the contest is new information the plan did not have | Whether the plan is failing or merely not yet working. Changing too early throws away a good plan; changing too late leaves no time to recover |
| Take the risk, or protect what you have? | A more aggressive tactic raises the chance of scoring | It also raises the chance of conceding | What is at stake and how much time remains. The identical scoreline justifies different risk in a dead rubber and in an elimination final |
The middle row is the one worth carrying into an answer, because it is genuinely hard and because both errors are common. The useful discipline is to decide the trigger before the contest: if this specific thing is true by this specific point, we move to the alternative. That converts a judgement made under pressure with incomplete information into a decision made calmly in advance, which is the same reasoning that put a goal-specific aim on the session plan in Lesson 9.
Name the conflict, then say what resolves it. A discussion that never puts two factors against each other is a list wearing a discussion's clothes.
Two truths and a lie. One of these statements is false. Find it.
This is the last dot point of the third inquiry question, and it is the one that connects back to almost everything before it. Four connections are worth having ready, because a question about tactics can be answered far better with them than without.
| From | What it contributes |
|---|---|
| Lessons 3 to 8, training and adaptation | A strategy is only available if the athletes have the fitness to sustain it. A high-press strategy is a conditioning decision made months earlier, which is why the yearly program and the game plan are the same conversation |
| Lesson 10, session design | Tactics are trained by decisions under constraint, not by explanation, so a tactical plan is only real once it has been rehearsed in modified games |
| Lesson 11, the yearly program | What is at stake varies across the season, so the same match situation warrants different risk in round three and in a final |
| Lesson 12, psychological strategies | Arousal and anxiety change decision quality directly. An over-aroused athlete's attention narrows and they stop seeing the cues a tactic depends on, so a tactical failure can have a psychological cause |
That last row is the one students almost never use, and it is the most valuable. When a team fails to execute a plan they clearly understand, the explanation is often not tactical at all.
Odd one out. Three of these factors are largely known before a contest begins. Which one is not knowable in advance?
Activities · weigh the factors
For each decision, name the family of factor that drove it, name the specific factor, and say which other factor it was traded against.
A coach abandons a high-press plan at half-time after the opposition repeatedly plays over the press, and switches to a deeper defensive block.
A tennis player who normally attacks the net stays on the baseline all match on a slow, wet clay court.
Trailing by two with four minutes remaining in an elimination final, a team pushes its defenders forward and accepts the risk of conceding again.
A coach identifies a clear weakness in the opposition's left-side defence but chooses not to target it, because their own team's only two left-sided attackers are both unavailable.
Match each term to its meaning.
- Strategy
- Tactic
- Contingency
- Game sense
- The overall plan for how a contest will be approached
- A specific action that carries out the plan in a particular situation
- A pre-planned alternative to be used if a defined situation arises
- The ability to read a developing situation and choose an appropriate response
Both of these athletes are losing, both have about a third of the contest remaining, and both believe their plan is not working.
| Situation | Detail |
|---|---|
| Individual | A badminton player is down 6–14 in the deciding game. Their strategy was to attack with overhead smashes, but the opponent is retrieving almost all of them and the player is tiring. |
| Group | A netball team trails by nine at three-quarter time. Their strategy was a full-court press, and the opposition has beaten it repeatedly with a long first pass. |
For each, answer four questions. What is the evidence that the plan is failing rather than merely not yet working? What change would you make, at the level of strategy or of tactics? What does it cost to make the change in that setting, and how long does it take to take effect? And what should have been prepared beforehand to make the change faster?
Finish with the comparison the dot point wants: name one factor that operates identically in both situations, and one that produces completely different consequences.
Lock it in. In one sentence, explain why a team rehearses its contingencies at training while an individual athlete often does not need to.
Discuss the factors that influence how strategies and tactics are applied in individual and group sports.
Discuss asks for arguments on more than one side and an informed position. Here the sides are the competing claims of a pre-planned strategy and in-contest adaptation.
Plan: define the issue, argue the case for planning, argue the case for adaptation, name the tension, then take a position.
A strategy is the overall plan for a contest and tactics are the decisions taken within it. The issue is how far either should be fixed in advance, given that the factors influencing them — the opposition, the conditions, and the athletes available — are only partly known before the contest begins.
There is a strong case for planning in advance. Opposition analysis identifies known strengths and weaknesses, so a plan can be built to exploit them; group strengths and weaknesses determine which structures the team can actually execute; and rehearsed set plays and patterns can be performed under pressure precisely because they were decided when nobody was fatigued or anxious. In a group sport a shared plan also coordinates the behaviour of many athletes, which improvisation cannot achieve.
There is an equally strong case for adaptation. Environmental conditions — wind, heat, rain, a heavy surface — change what is possible and are often unknown until the day. The opposition may deviate from their analysed pattern, and injuries or fouls alter the personnel available mid-contest. A plan followed after it has stopped working is a liability, and in individual sports especially the athlete must adapt without any external instruction, since they are alone in the contest.
The tension is that the two requirements draw on the same preparation time and pull in opposite directions: heavily rehearsed patterns execute well under pressure but generalise poorly to unforeseen situations, while training for adaptability produces flexibility at the cost of the automaticity that pressure demands.
The defensible position is that the balance should follow how predictable the contest is. Closed and individual sports with stable conditions justify heavier pre-planning, while open, invasion and group sports justify training decision-making itself — through modified games and constraint-based practice — so athletes hold principles rather than scripts. What should be fixed in advance is the framework for deciding, not the decisions.
A strategy is the overall plan for a contest and tactics are the decisions taken within it, and the issue is how far either should be fixed in advance, given that the influencing factors — opposition, conditions and available athletes — are only partly known beforehand. There is a strong case for planning: opposition analysis identifies known strengths and weaknesses so a plan can exploit them; group strengths and weaknesses determine which structures a team can actually execute; rehearsed set plays perform under pressure precisely because they were decided when nobody was fatigued or anxious; and in a group sport a shared plan coordinates many athletes in a way improvisation cannot. There is an equally strong case for adaptation, since environmental conditions such as wind, heat, rain or a heavy surface change what is possible and are often unknown until the day, the opposition may deviate from their analysed pattern, and injuries or fouls alter personnel mid-contest — while in individual sports the athlete must adapt without any external instruction because they are alone in the contest. The tension is that both requirements draw on the same preparation time and pull opposite ways: heavily rehearsed patterns execute well under pressure but generalise poorly to unforeseen situations, whereas training adaptability produces flexibility at the cost of the automaticity pressure demands. The defensible position is therefore that the balance should follow how predictable the contest is — closed and individual sports with stable conditions justify heavier pre-planning, while open, invasion and group sports justify training decision-making itself through modified games and constraint-based practice, so athletes hold principles rather than scripts. What should be fixed in advance is the framework for deciding, not the decisions.
Analyse how environmental conditions and group composition interact to shape tactical decisions.
Analyse asks for the parts and their relationships, and the stem asks specifically how two factors interact. Treating them separately is the failure mode.
Plan: identify the components, state the constraint linking them, relate them across a case, then draw the implication.
Two components are in play. Environmental conditions — wind, heat, rain, surface and altitude — determine what is physically achievable and how quickly athletes fatigue. Group composition — the fitness, skill, size and experience profile of the athletes available — determines which of the achievable options can actually be executed.
They are linked because conditions change the relative value of each group's strengths. A condition does not disadvantage a team absolutely; it disadvantages the strengths that condition suppresses, so the same weather has opposite effects on two teams with different compositions.
The interaction is clearest in a case. Heavy rain on a soft surface reduces ball control and running speed, which suppresses the advantage of a fast, skilful, possession-based side and raises the relative value of size, strength and territorial kicking — so the identical conditions push one team away from its preferred tactics and push its opponent toward theirs. Heat interacts differently again, penalising a side reliant on high-intensity pressing more than one built on structured, low-movement defence.
It follows that tactical preparation cannot treat conditions as a separate contingency added to a plan. The decision that matters is which of the team's strengths remain available under the expected conditions — which is why the same opposition analysis produces different tactics on different days.
Two components are in play: environmental conditions — wind, heat, rain, surface and altitude — determine what is physically achievable and how quickly athletes fatigue, while group composition, the fitness, skill, size and experience profile of the athletes available, determines which achievable options can actually be executed. They are linked because conditions change the relative value of each group's strengths: a condition does not disadvantage a team absolutely, it disadvantages the strengths that condition suppresses, so the same weather has opposite effects on two differently composed teams. Heavy rain on a soft surface reduces ball control and running speed, suppressing the advantage of a fast, skilful, possession-based side and raising the relative value of size, strength and territorial kicking — so identical conditions push one team away from its preferred tactics and its opponent toward theirs. Heat interacts differently again, penalising a side reliant on high-intensity pressing more than one built on structured, low-movement defence. It follows that tactical preparation cannot treat conditions as a contingency appended to a plan: the decision that matters is which of a team's strengths remain available under the expected conditions, which is why identical opposition analysis produces different tactics on different days.
Go back to card 01. For the team, the change has to be decided, communicated to every player, understood the same way by all of them, and then executed together — and until that is complete, some players are running the old plan and some the new one, which is often worse than either. That is why it takes far longer than fifteen seconds. But it is a difference, not a deficiency: a team can also run several tactics at once and can change its personnel, and an individual can do neither. Write down whether you called it worse or different, and add the one advantage of the team setting that you had not counted.
Multiple choice · 5 questions
MC 1. Which of these is a strategy rather than a tactic?
- A. Approaching the whole match by attacking the opponent's weaker backhand and shortening points
- B. Serving wide to the backhand side on this particular point
- C. Moving to the net behind one deep approach shot
- D. Standing inside the baseline to return one second serve
MC 2. Which factor is, by definition, not knowable before a contest begins?
- A. the dimensions of the venue and the rules of the competition
- B. the squad's injury list and current fitness
- C. the score, time remaining and momentum at any given moment
- D. the opponent's preferred structures from previous matches
MC 3. A coach identifies a clear weakness in the opposition's defence but does not target it, because the players who could exploit it are unavailable. This decision is best explained as:
- A. an error, since the opponent's weakness should always be attacked
- B. a trade-off in which the team's own capability constrains which strategies are actually available
- C. a psychological strategy aimed at reducing anxiety
- D. a contingency triggered by the state of the contest
MC 4. Why does changing the plan mid-contest cost more in a group sport than in an individual sport?
- A. because team athletes have poorer game sense than individual athletes
- B. because the rules prohibit tactical changes during play in most team sports
- C. because team sports have fewer available tactics
- D. because the change must be decided, communicated, understood consistently and executed together, and until that is complete some players are running each plan
MC 5. Which statement about tactical adaptability is most accurate?
- A. individual sports are tactically more sophisticated, because their athletes adapt faster
- B. group sports are tactically more sophisticated, because they involve more people
- C. individuals adapt faster, while teams adapt more slowly but can run several tactics at once and change personnel
- D. adaptability is identical in both, since both are governed by the same factors
Short answer · exam style
SA 1. Understand Band 4 Distinguish between a strategy and a tactic, using one example of each from the same sport, and explain how a tactic can be judged as appropriate or inappropriate. (4 marks)
SA 2. Analyse Band 5 Explain how three different factors influence the tactics a team chooses during a match. Use a different family of factor for each. (6 marks)
SA 3. Evaluate Band 6 Discuss the factors that influence how strategies and tactics are applied in individual and group sports. Your answer must weigh at least two factors against each other rather than list them. (7 marks)
📖 Comprehensive answers (click to reveal)
Multiple choice: 1 → A. 2 → C. 3 → B. 4 → D. 5 → C.
Activity 1, indicative answers: 1 → Family: the opponent, and the state of the contest. Specific factor: the opposition's demonstrated ability to play over the press, plus the evidence accumulated in the first half. Traded against the team's own preparation and cohesion, since the deeper block is a structure they have rehearsed less; the change is justified because the evidence is now clear rather than provisional. 2 → Family: the environment. Specific factor: a slow wet surface, which reduces the effectiveness of approaching the net because the ball sits up and the opponent has time to pass. Traded against the player's own strength, which is net play; the environment wins because a strength that the conditions neutralise is no longer a strength that day. 3 → Family: the state of the contest. Specific factors: the score, the four minutes remaining and, decisively, what is at stake, because an elimination final makes a narrow loss worth no more than a heavy one. Traded against the risk of conceding again, which in a round-robin fixture with points for a close margin might have won the argument instead. 4 → Family: the athlete or team. Specific factor: personnel availability. Traded against the opponent's weakness, and the team's own capability wins, because a plan the squad cannot execute is not a plan and attacking a weakness badly is worse than not attacking it.
Activity 2, indicative answers: Badminton. Evidence the plan is failing rather than not yet working: the opponent is retrieving almost all smashes, so the tactic is being answered rather than occasionally beaten, and the player's own fatigue means it is getting less effective rather than more. Change: at the tactical level, replace repeated smashing with drop shots and clears to move the opponent front and back, and target their movement rather than their reach; at strategic level, shift from attacking to constructing points. Cost and delay: almost none, since the player decides and executes immediately, though there is a psychological cost in abandoning a plan they believe in. What should have been prepared: a rehearsed alternative pattern and a trigger, so the change is a decision rather than an improvisation while losing. Netball. Evidence: the opposition has beaten the press repeatedly with the same long first pass, so it is a solved problem rather than variance, and the deficit has grown across quarters. Change: drop the press to a zone from the transverse line and contest the long pass in the air rather than at its source, or shift one defender to intercept the specific pass being used. Cost and delay: the change must be communicated at the break, understood identically by seven players, and then executed together, so it will take several minutes of play to become reliable, and any player still pressing while others drop leaves a gap that is worse than either structure. What should have been prepared: a named, rehearsed alternative defensive structure with a trigger, so the coach calls something the squad already owns. Identical in both: the discipline of deciding in advance what evidence would justify a change, so the decision is not made under pressure with incomplete information. Different consequences: the cost of changing, which is seconds for the individual and minutes plus a period of inconsistent execution for the team.
SA 1 (4 marks): Strategy [1]: the overall plan for how a contest will be approached, chosen before it and applying across it. Tactic [1]: a specific action or adjustment used in a particular situation to serve that plan, of which a contest contains many. Example from one sport [1]: for instance, a strategy of forcing turnovers in the mid-court and scoring quickly from them, served by the tactic of double-teaming the opposing wing attack at the transverse line after a centre pass. How a tactic is judged [1]: by whether it serves the strategy in the situation it is used in. A tactic that does not advance the plan is not a variation but an error, and this is also why a response that names a whole-match approach and calls it a tactic has confused the two levels.
SA 2 (6 marks): Two marks per factor, one for identifying and locating it and one for explaining the change it produces. Athlete or team [2]: current fitness, skill, experience, injuries and cohesion determine which strategies are executable at all, so a squad without the conditioning to sustain a high press must choose a structure it can hold for eighty minutes, however attractive the press looks against this opponent. Opponent [2]: their patterns and weaknesses direct where tactics are aimed, so a team that has been beaten repeatedly by one long first pass will move to contest that pass rather than continue pressing its source. Environment [2]: weather, surface and the officials' interpretation of the rules determine which tactics are feasible and how heavily each is punished, so a wet surface may cause a team to abandon a short passing game, and a strict interpretation at the ruck may force a defensive plan built on aggressive contact to be softened. State of the contest is equally creditable [2]: score, time remaining and what is at stake change how much risk is appropriate, so the same deficit warrants different tactics in a dead rubber and in an elimination final.
SA 3 (7 marks): Structure the answer by factor rather than by sport, and show each factor producing different consequences in the two settings. Grouping [1]: the factors fall into four families — the athlete or team, the opponent, the environment, and the state of the contest — and the first two are largely known in advance while the last is not, which is why plans need contingencies. Factor one, mid-contest adaptation [2]: an individual decides and executes in seconds with no communication, while a team must decide, communicate, align and execute together, so the change is slower and is lossy while it spreads; teams manage this with structured flexibility, a small set of named rehearsed alternatives with defined triggers. Factor two, capability and personnel [2]: an individual's own fitness and skill fix the available options absolutely with no substitute, while a team can rotate, substitute and change roles, and can run several tactics simultaneously because different players can be doing different things. The weighing [2]: these two factors conflict — the opponent's weakness pulls a plan one way while your own capability pulls it another, and what usually resolves it is whether the weakness can be attacked using your own strength, because a plan that cannot be executed is not a plan; similarly, the pull to stick with a considered plan conflicts with new information from the state of the contest, and the useful resolution is to define the trigger for change before the contest begins. A top-band response also resists turning the difference into a ranking: individuals adapt faster, teams adapt more slowly but hold more options at once, and it notes what is identical in both, namely that the factors themselves and the discipline of deciding triggers in advance are the same.
This completes the third inquiry question. Across Lessons 9 to 13 the unit of analysis has moved from a single session to a season to a contest, and the same comparison has run through all of it: individual and group settings share the principles and differ in the constraints.
Two things to take forward. Group the factors into four families rather than listing them, and put two of them against each other, because discuss is asking you to weigh. And keep the connection to Lesson 12: when a team cannot execute a plan it plainly understands, the cause is often psychological rather than tactical. Lesson 14 begins the fourth inquiry question, on sleep, nutrition and supplementation.
Mark lesson as complete
Tick when you've finished the practice and review.