Purpose:
Instructions are one of the fundamental coaching methods for developing skills in sport. Recent research has shown that activating implicit learning processes through metaphorical or analogical instructions is as effective as the activation of explicit learning processes by instructing step-by-step movement rules. Nevertheless, these effects have not been investigated in youth handball yet, and past research has shown a lack of the systematic use of analogy instructions in general. For the first time, the current study investigated the effectiveness of step-by-step instructions and analogy instructions in young athletes’ learning of basic skills in team handball.

Methods:
A short-term intervention with a sample of 36 participants (9–10 years) was conducted. One group of the athletes were instructed with step-by-step movement rules, while the other group were instructed with analogies, in 3 different handball-specific tasks (stand throw, body feint, defence position). The athletes’ performances were rated by 15 handball coaches.

Results:
The conducted intervention resulted in small and task-dependent performance improvements under both instruction conditions. In the throwing task, no performance improvement was observed overall, whereas the participants improved in both instruction conditions in the feint task. As for the learning of the defence position, the participants in the analogy conditio improved more than the others.

Conclusions:
The current results are in line with recent investigations of different sports tasks and should motivate coaches and teachers in team sports to try to be ingenious and creative in developing functional analogies, metaphors, or pictorial instructions for skill acquisition.