I also meant to add the hamstrings… I was always taught that if one place is tight then the other place absorbs more work etc… Charlie always used to say it was a bit of a chain reaction. I see this with my son who has incredible strength and muscle density but I can’t always control what work is getting done in what area of the body. THis is why complete recovery by routine massage and or water therapy / epson salts etc was encouraged. Takes the guessing out of where the work might end up with the individual. Do you ask the athlete? Do you rely on the program? Or do you treat the entire body and let your body re calibrate or reset or balance itself? Shin splints are preventable and an injury that is over use. When the calves are tight the foot stops moving properly. Or the foot is tight and the calves take more work. If the glutes are tight as load might not be progressive enough or maybe there is a growth spurt depending on age etc… then the hams end up over working too and or calves. Tightness grows and spreads. Athletes can not afford to get behind on the recovery but signs like shin splints are rarely good. Trouble shooting is essential and I was taught this by Charlie who had this reinforced by many therapist but primarily Mike Forgraves who specializes on feet issues/ orthodics and has done most every person we have dealt with over the past 20+ years. Mike has been helping me with my feet since I was 13 years old. He was one of Canada’s top hurdlers and so was his wife Sylvia Forgraves. ( I used to run against her as well).
I hope this answers your question.
You can start doing ice baths on those calves after any session if you can afford the time to do this.Even better do the entire legs. Speed days you could do contrast baths as well. I would also look into a travel roller and you can use this everywhere. ( google it)
You need to start getting after that calf issue and I would bet your hams are also tight etc as I was just responding to Pakewi. If you want to keep playing soccer start resisting more work and you will notice the results. Massage is great but you can do a lot of things to work around this for now. I think you might not need to replace an entire day of sprinting with the explosive med ball drils but you could emphasize on alternating days and see what brings the best result. First you do the warm up, not sure if you do power speed, then your explosive med ball stuff and you can end with some sprints to keep the feel. The next speed day straight speed / no explosive med ball/ next speed session after that again repeat what you did speed session before last. Another way to do this might be each speed day you do both but graduate the emphasis of one or the other over time depending how you are doing things. I would not go too far away from the speed at any one time so much. You should be able to feel how the speed is coming as a result of the med ball drills. You must watch the volumes of your speed. Repeat only what feels great. If you have any question likely you needed to stop one or two reps before. Next time you will know how to adjust the volume.
Very clear,Ange.Thank you.Once more extremely precious words out here.
yes thanks a lot
i will start implementing explosive med ball work into my training
My trial got pushed back a month. So another month without that extra stressor.
Today in the AM: Long warm up then Explosive med ball. 3x10 (backwards, squat and 1 hop)
I cut the last set (the 1 hops) to 6 because quality was deteriorating noticeably.
Stretched a lot after & rolled with the lax ball.
You have an extra month now? If so that’s a good thing I think.
What do you mean " without the extra stressor" ?
Likely you are extremely capable which is an excellent thing but maybe you need to be a bit more progressive with your explosive throws and build into the design of your training a more reasonable progression now that you did this today and had to back off.
I would start with one set of forward explosive throws 4x ( what weight are you using for your med ball?)
followed by 4x backward throws
then I would take a break / shake your legs / stretch
do one more set of each
another break as per above
then I would try single hop throw 3x
This is what I would start with the next time you do this workout
sets of 10 for anyone imo is extremely high
Likely you will feel a bit wanting for more after my suggestion ( if you take the advice which you are not obligated to do) but I have never seen someone do that amount you suggested / not saying it can not be done but if you could feel quality deteriorating I bet it was visible well before that.
yes I think it is a good thing.
By extra stressor I mean that because I’m on trial each training session with the team is very high intensity with the same kind of emotional/mental/physical drain of an actual match.
now I have a month extra to prepare.
Yes I was doing the sets of ten because that is what it recommended in the GPP dvd I have. It was a mistake to start out like that 
Thanks for the suggestion; I will do that next time I do med ball throws.
The weight I used was 6 kilos. I also have an 8 kilo medicine ball but I thought I would work up to that.
PM Lift:
Back squat: worked up to 107.5x5
RDl: 85x10
yesterday did 1800 m of tempo: 100s were done in mid 15s, 200s in 34 (field was only 100 m so I had to turn half way and run back)
today was my last chance to train with a good friend of mine who is going away for 6 months so I just did what he wanted.
That was
2x3x30
3x2x60
1x80
these were done from a gradual build in start
I lifted this afternoon:
cleaned 80kg
did 112.5 kg x3 (was going for 5 but someone stopped me on rep 3–they thought I was going to fail but it was just my sticking pt–so I was annoyed)
today am: 2x4 forward med throws, 2x4 backward, 1x3 single hops. felt very good
today pm: 80kg clean, 80kg bench, 112.5kg squat…I’m so weak 
If you keep your speed days volumes this low - or even lower,depending of what allows consistently smooth progression for you- and gradually increase your tempo volumes to a total of 12.000m weekly (over time and possibly not yet during this offseason of yours),as Charlie maintained for soccer (and I always found perfectly fits the need of most players when done and managed correctly) you’ll be more than ready for your soccer level.
I don’t think you are likely to be weak. What are your volumes and progressions of your lifts? Do you have a proper lifting routine or do you just go into the gym and do random stuff ?
Btw, those times for your tempo are very good. Mid 15s and anything under 40 is excellent for 200’s and this is usually always how we did 200’s ( turn around I mean) Rarely did them anywhere continious except on a very rare occassion on a track to see how fast we were going. So important to do tempo on grass and when do most have a 200 meter grass track at their fingertips. ( unless we are from the great land of OZ. yes I mean Australia. What an amazing place that is to train! OMG.)
yeah I’m jealous of Kitkat1 and those lucky guys (except when they’re doing those 300s up the hill )
Thanks, I was really happy with the tempo. It felt really easy and I felt like i could have kept going for ages.
with lifting I try to do the following template
Monday and Friday: I do squats and bench up to a tough 5 reps (about 5 sets of each total including warm-ups)
Wednesday: do squats and bench at 60% of max for sets of 3 trying to be explosive (I do about 6 sets of these 3 reps)
I do cleans every day and RDLs if I want to add in more volume. My volume of lifting however is not that high and I’m usually only lifting for about 30-45 min. For lifting I don’t do any sort of periodisation. I always do it in the afternoon after my speed/explosive stuff in the morning and if I am feeling particularly run down I cut things short.
by weak I mean that of my friends with similar speed and explosive characteristics, I am by far the weakest in terms of squatting strength.
To summerize you are trying to keeping a higher intensity lifting session for squats and bench on M and F = 5 sets of 5?
Wednesday you routinely do 60 percent of max? 6 sets of 3 ( with explosive power?)
You do cleans every day you train? 7 days a week? 5? how many days would you be doing cleans exactly?
Pakewi will likely have some imput to this area as he has extensively worked with several very high level soccer teams in Europe.
I might like to see you put your speed ( 2 or 3x a week) and explosive med ball and weights on the same days
And tempo based work on the other days ( 2 or 3x a week).
sorry I was unclear:
I do speed/explosive med ball in the AM of MWF and lift in the PM MWF
tempo on tues, thurs and sat
cleans are on mwf along with the other lifting (so 3x per week). and yes Wednesday I try not to go over 60 percent of max, instead lifting the weight explosively
My experience has been that :
- 12.000m Weekly Tempo or equivalent
- Low Volume (100- 300m total per session) of 10m-30m Accelerations or equivalent stimuli
- Low Volume (10-20 total reps per session) of explosive Med Ball throws or equivalent stimuli
- Low Volume ( up to 10 total reps per session total) 85%+ weights (1 Upper Body + 1 Lower Body
Exercise) or equivalent stimuli
consistently produced improvements in Soccer players of different levels.
Number of main weekly events (matches),and technical tactical (skills) numbers in training are to be accounted for in season,and numbers above managed accordingly,but the above stand in my experience as safe general guidelines.
ok, so in general except for tempo, keep volumes quite low
Yes. And I never found a need for cleans,explosive weights, runs over 30m,or equivalent stimuli,as the weekly main events and the above stimuli always seemed to cover the general requirements of the sport. Also even for tempo it is more productive to build towards those numbers,letting general fitness levels and performances improvements in the HI elements always dictate progression.
Following Charlie’s and pakewi’s similar guidelines [as much as I could due to others’ pressure (e.g., manager’s)], I reached slightly higher numbers at times (e.g., 18 km of tempo/intervals and 420 m of acceleration work within a week, including some resistance work) during the 8-week preparation period of a 1st division soccer team. We managed to finish this period with no injuries, which was very important for the means we (didn’t) have and the team always run a lot during matches, no problems there. We seemed to lack explosiveness, but with double sessions for 8 weeks (under manager’s orders) that was something to expect. The number provided by pakewi above for tempo for some strange reason seemed just fine; and after a few sessions with the players understanding what was going on, the pace was just right for each player, something I “realised” after a couple of weeks, when we had the lab tests back… The players often made a ‘sprint’ competition out of the last interval, an indirect signal to me that the pace was OK, i.e., evenly paced. In other words, I agree with what has been posted above! 
Good luck with your training, you’ll be fine!
Interesting experience of yours,thank you for sharing.
When I did witness any lack of explosiveness as you say,or lack of consistent progression in any or all of the HI parameters it has been only because of poor management of volumes and interplay of quantities of different training elements,or because of too high paces in tempo work,too often supported by -in my opinion completely vain and almost meaningless- lab tests and similar.
That is part of the process I came up with those numbers above,and the recommendation not to be ever afraid to cut intensity (but not volumes) on tempo and volumes (but never intensity) on all other components.
I also found over time that these guidelines always ended up helping individuals (being players of coaches) out,even when external interferences such as the ones you mention made it impossible to appropriately manage training,if else at least by giving a general frame and a meaningful direction to move towards.