Soccer Accessories & Equipment

If you want to make your soccer experience easy and safe please poke around and check the lists of a soccer must-haves. We will walk you through of all the equipment and accessories that you or your young boy or girl should have in its soccer training bag. Okay, let’s start from the bottom up with our stars in the spotlight, the soccer players.

List Of Main (Basic) Soccer Accessories

Soccer Ball. Having a ball is a no-brainer, but soccer balls differ for amateurs, professionals, kids, youth, adults and the playing surface. I cover in detail everything about indoor soccer balls in another article, and you can find a detailed review of the best soccer balls and all types here. So what comes next? Like it or not, this happens all the time – when you buy a new soccer ball, most of the time it comes deflated, which bring us to the next item.

Editor’s pick:
Senda Volta Premier

Pump. Pack yourself with a proper soccer pump, because regardless of the ball quality, you are going to use it quite often. In case you want to choose the right one, we have also written an article reviewing the best soccer ball pumps.

Editor’s pick:
Under Armour Dual Pump

Inflating needle adaptor. Unfortunately not all soccer ball pumps come with inflating needle adaptor. If you don’t have a proper one your pump can be only used to get rid of the dust. Make sure that you either buy a pump that has inflating needle adaptor or just buy the needle adaptor separately.

Editor’s pick:
Metallic Air Inflation Needles

Soccer Ball Bag. Carrying a soccer ball bag is a great piece of equipment, where you can store not just one, but dozens of balls, especially for training purposes or if you want to feel like a real coach to your kid or just help out your team and make their sport live easier. Here you can find a list of great soccer ball bags and pick the one that most suits you.

Editor’s pick:
Super Z Outlet Sports Ball Bag

Soccer cleats or soccer shoes. We have two different types of soccer cleats – indoor and outdoor cleats. Furthermore, Indoor soccer cleats and outdoor soccer cleats can be broken down into three major categories: cleats with plastic studs, iron studs and a mixture of both plastic and iron material. Plastic studs can be worn on artificial grass and natural grass. The iron studs are only used on wet natural grass. You cannot wear plastic studs on a wet field.

Lastly, the soccer cleats that comes as a mixture of both plastic and iron material, are meant to play in a normal environment, or natural grass that is not too wet. If it’s too slippery and wet, the only option left is the cleats with iron studs. Soccer shoes, on the other hand, are only used when we play indoor or outdoor soccer on a field with a hard ground surface.

Editor’s pick:
Adidas Predator

Soccer socks. One of the major differences between a normal and a soccer type socks is the fact that the later are a bit longer and they come a little above the knee. Using high knee socks is a must to prevent serious injuries when tackling, sliding or just falling. It’s part of the game, however, socks solely are not enough. That leads us to the next piece of equipment.

Editor’s pick:
Adidas Rivalry Socks

Soccer shin guards / Ankle protector shin guards. The first line of attack and one of our weakest spots when playing soccer, you guessed it, is our shins. Soccer shin guards fall under the category of protective gear that we must have. I highly highly recommend to put safety first and protect yours or your children shins. As a reminder of how important wearing shin guards really is, is the fact that they are mandatory on official soccer matches across the globe.

Pro tip: Look for shin guards that meet the NOCSAE standards.

Shin guards with ankle protect work the same way as a classic soccer shin guard but they have another layer of protection, specifically for your joints. While it’s always advisable to minimize and prevent a possible injury, personally I stick with the classic shin guards.

That way my feet feel natural feels more natural and I feel lighter and I can move around more easily.  It’s up to you, if you haven’t tried shin guards before, you can try both models and find out which suits you the best.

Editor’s pick:
G-Form Pro

Soccer practice/training uniform.   The part that we are all familiar with, it all comes down to having proper shorts (with or without pockets), jerseys, shirt, undershirt, and comfortable underwear.

Soccer game uniform. In comparison to the training uniform, when it comes to a soccer match there is only one rule we need to follow – if we play away we wear the away uniform and if the game is home we have to wear the home team uniform. Of course, we are talking here about the home team jersey, shorts, and the team custom socks. If it’s not an official match then we can sneak up and weak or favorite soccer player jersey as an alternative.  Lastly, if it’s a humanitarian event each team is given custom-made and shirts that we usually wear over our jerseys, to support the cause.

Soccer Gloves. Despite the general belief soccer gloves are not mandatory for the goalkeeper when we talking about professional or official matches, however, you have to be tough as this guy in order to leave them into the locker room. Soccer gloves are allowed for the regular soccer players as well, and it’s recommended to wear them in cold, wet or windy conditions.

Editor’s pick:
Renegade GK Talon

Soccer Goals / Rebounder goals. Back in the day when I was playing soccer with my friends, we were using improvising goals, usually made up of everything that we can put our hands on to mark the goal line. Nowadays, things have changed, and we have access to a variety of soccer goals types and sizes to choose from. There are also goals made specifically for training purposes, also known as soccer rebounder goals. The way they work, is they bounce back after you score. Great practice gear both for the soccer players and the goalkeeper. Another type are portable & foldable soccer goals. Perfect to move them around so you can play wherever you want. If they have the folding ability that’s even better as you can easily store them. Then there are also backyard soccer goals, which are great for home use. Did you hear about pop up soccer goals? These are really handy. Not as other normal goals but as their name says: you pop them up and you’re ready to play. If you want to get the most durable and professional models, you should look at metal, aluminum and steel soccer goals. These goals will serve you for a long time.

Editor’s pick:
Trigon Sports Soccer Rebounder

Training Field Gear & Skill Development Soccer Equipment

Except for the major soccer gear we listed above, there are also other accessories, more specifically meant for training and practicing purposes, and improvement of our overall soccer level quality and performance.  Here are some of the other training equipment that you might want to add it to your list:

• Agility ladder
• Jump rope for resistance and cardio training
• Cones (smaller and bigger)
• Training parachute for resistance training
• Training vest to split players into teams on training or also when playing for fun with friends
• Training rings
• Training hurdles
• Training Poles
• Books & different videos to learn soccer
• Soccer ball machines
• Soccer ball on a string
• Soccer tennis net
• Soccer Backstops
• Soccer Goal Targets to practice shooting
• Portable & Folding Benches where you and your teammates can seat
• Training mannequins which are excellent for practicing free-kicks
• Corner flags to corners of a soccer pitch.

Most of the time you won’t use all these things in one training, so it depends on what type of training you want to do that particular day.

Here’s my favorite soccer book by Dan Blank, here you can check my soccer ball machines review (automatic ball launching and throwing machines) and here’s a great training parachute for resistance training. In case I missed something, please let me know in the comment section and I’ll make sure to add it in the list.