Attack vs Defence

Objective:

To prepare players for the attacking and defensive understanding, including offside.
To prepare players for 11 vs. 11 soccer.

Target:

Defense to outscore attack by getting more "small goals" than "real" goals; and vice-versa.

Organization

Players are arranged in their team positions - in this example, 6 vs. 6 plus a goalkeeper.
The players start in one half of the field.
Small target goals put on either side of the field near the halfway line for the defending team to play to and score (use cones/flags if no goals available).
Coach serves ball into attacking half.
Normal attack takes place - if defenders (and goalkeeper) win ball, they attempt to score in their smaller goals.

Teaching

Outline briefly - preferably by walk-through demonstrations - the expectations of the practice.
Encourage the defenders to push up because of the advantage of exploiting the offside rule.
If practice is not succeeding and you're sure of analysis, stop the practice and show what could have been done.
Similarly, stop and show what was done well.
Don't stop practice too much or interest will diminish.
Discourage defenders from playing too many short passes.
If defenders win the ball and then give it back foolishly, encourage attackers to punish the mistake.

Progressions

U12 Progressions

This type of practice should be further developed when the team moves into serious 11-a-side play.
Numbers can be built up, e.g., 7 vs. 7 and 8 vs. 8.
To put a defense under pressure you can overload the attack, e.g., 6 vs. 4 or 8 vs. 6.