Knowing how to choose the best soccer goalie gloves is just the first step. Then comes breaking them in after you’ve already become accustomed to your last pair. Find out how players can break in new gloves so their play style is left undisturbed.
Soccer goalie gloves: resources
If you’re trying to create a uniform of soccer protective equipment that works and stands up to the contact in soccer, there are seven steps we’ve outlined to navigate.
- Know what makes goalie gloves great.
- Understand why anatomy matters.
- Research popular goalie gloves.
- Consider what features are valuable to you.
- Learn how to care for them.
- Buy a quality pair that matches your play style.
- Break them in for proper performance and longevity. (This is what this article covers).
Why do goalie gloves start stiff?
There are three common reasons why new soccer goalie gloves start stiff.
- If they didn’t start stiffer, they’d fall apart faster. It increases their lifespan by giving them extra durability so all the movement and contact done don’t affect them as quickly.
- Many pairs will have an invisible layer on them in the warehouse to keep them looking and feeling good before they’ve been sold. This protective layer adds to the stiffness but wears away quickly once the breaking-in stage has begun.
- New goalie gloves, specifically, haven’t been used yet, so there’s been no moisture, heat, or contact to make them more malleable.
4 ways to break in your soccer gloves without ruining them
Junior soccer gloves need to go through some movement and practice to feel game ready. Playing with stiff gloves makes it more difficult to keep a firm grip on the ball and make saves. The key is to break them in enough for optimal performance, but not so much that they deteriorate and end up like your previous pair at the end of the season.
1. Manipulate the fingers
The fingers in a new pair of junior soccer gloves can start too firm for proper movement. With a Storelli pair, first remove the finger spines so this protective piece is kept intact. Then, there are a few options to make the fingers more flexible.
- Use tape to keep the fingers in a different position for a little while. This can be backward and/or spread out.
- Wrap the fingers around a softball (or something round of a similar size) to increase their flexibility.
Do this enough until the goalie gloves are on, they feel like they offer enough movement to catch the ball, and make saves without compromise.
2. Wear them during practice
This is probably one of the most straightforward methods of breaking in a pair of new goalie gloves. Wear them during practice where the stakes aren’t high, but where the movements and environment are similar. This will force the gloves into the positions and scenarios they’ll see in a game.
Movement doesn’t have to come strictly from soccer, though. It can come from other forms of training. Wear them to do push-ups, handstands, or stretching to work on wrist mobility.
3. Have a backup pair
One trick to boosting the lifespan of a pair of goalie gloves is once they’re broken in to use a backup pair during practice. Don’t continue to wear down the game-quality gloves in practice. Keep them just right according to your preference for as long as possible by using a backup pair.
With this rule, your last game-quality gloves should now be your practice gloves if they still have enough life left in them. Goalies play hard, so it’s not unreasonable for goalie gloves to lose their oomph.
4. Use glove glue
During a game, some goalies will resort to spitting on their gloves for added grip but this has a low efficiency and sustainability rate. Instead, use glove glue to quickly enhance the glove’s grip at any stage of its lifespan.
