This quasi-experimental study will examine whether a Tactical Critical Thinking Program (TPCT) can improve technical-tactical decision-making in university volleyball players compared with usual training. In many university teams, practice is dominated by repetitive technical drills and coach-centred instruction, with limited opportunities for players to analyse the game, discuss options with teammates, or reflect critically on their decisions.

The study compares two groups of adult male volleyball players from a university-level programme in Colombia. The intervention group completed a 4-week Tactical Critical Thinking Program integrated into regular volleyball practice, while the comparison group continued with their usual training routines, without structured reflection or guided questioning. The TPCT uses representative game-based tasks, short planned pauses for group discussion, and questions that prompt players to identify tactical problems, generate alternative solutions, justify their choices, and adjust strategies collectively.

All participants assessed before and after the 4-week period. Assessments included validated technical skill tests for serve, reception and spike, and standardised small-sided games (4 vs 4) recorded on video. Trained observers coded each action to calculate decision-making indices for the three key skills, expressing the proportion of tactically appropriate decisions during play.

The primary aim was to determine whether adding structured tactical reflection and critical thinking activities to volleyball practice produces greater improvements in decision-making than usual training alone. A secondary aim was to explore whether the TPCT also enhances technical execution. Findings are expected to inform coaches and physical education professionals about how to design cognitively enriched, game-representative training for university team sports.

This interventional study evaluates the effect of a Tactical Critical Thinking Program (PTPC, by its Spanish acronym) on technical-tactical decision-making in university volleyball. The study uses a quasi-experimental, non-randomized, parallel-group design with intentional allocation. One group receives regular volleyball training enriched with the PTPC, and a comparison group continues with usual practice routines without structured reflective spaces.

The setting is a university men's volleyball programme in Cartagena, Colombia. Eligible participants are adult male players who belong to the university team, have regular training experience, are medically cleared for full participation and can attend the planned training and assessment sessions. Exclusion criteria include any current injury or medical restriction for sport participation and an inability to comply with the intervention schedule.

The PTPC integrates critical thinking and collaborative reflection into representative volleyball practice. Across approximately 12 sessions, embedded within normal team training, each session follows a stable pedagogical sequence. An initial brief activation phase clarifies the tactical focus of the day (for example, organisation of reception, serve-receive-attack connections or spike decision-making) and invites players to identify recurrent problems and shared objectives. The central phase consists of game-based drills and small-sided games that manipulate numerical relations, court spaces and rules to expose players to tactically demanding situations involving serve, reception, spike and defensive actions. Within this central phase, the coach introduces short, preplanned pauses in which players analyse recent sequences and discuss what is working, what is limiting performance, which technical resources they use or lack, and which tactical or positional adjustments they propose. A final phase of more open play under full rules emphasises the application and refinement of the agreed tactical adjustments and promotes metacognitive reflection on why certain options are chosen and how they relate to collective strategy.

The comparison group follows the usual training programme designed by the coaching staff. This programme includes warm-up, physical preparation, technical drills and team game play, but it does not include the protocolised reflective pauses or the guided questioning structure that characterises the PTPC. Training volume, frequency and general intensity remain as comparable as possible between groups so that the main planned difference is the presence or absence of the structured critical-thinking component.

Outcomes focus on technical-tactical performance in serve, reception and spike. Technical execution is assessed through a standardised battery of volleyball skill tests that quantify accuracy and consistency for each action using target zones and scoring criteria based on established methodological references. Tactical decision-making is assessed during standardised small-sided games (for example, 4 vs 4) on a regulation court under official rules. Games are video recorded, and trained observers code each serve, reception and spike as tactically appropriate or inappropriate according to predefined criteria (such as serving to vulnerable zones, directing reception to an optimal setting area, or attacking into uncovered spaces). For each player and each skill, a decision-making index represents the proportion of appropriate actions out of the total number of observed actions.

Assessments take place in the week immediately before the intervention period and in the week after its completion. Data collection also includes basic sociodemographic and anthropometric information (for example, age, training experience, body mass, height and body mass index) in order to characterise the sample and, if necessary, use these variables as covariates. Observers receive training in systematic notation of volleyball actions, and inter-observer agreement is checked prior to formal coding to ensure acceptable reliability.

Data management relies on anonymised participant codes and secure storage of datasets and video material. Statistical analysis describes the sample with means, standard deviations, medians and interquartile ranges as appropriate. Pre-post changes in decision-making indices and technical scores are analysed within each group, and differences in change between the PTPC and comparison groups are examined with standard parametric or non-parametric tests according to distribution, complemented by effect sizes and 95% confidence intervals. The level of significance is set at 0.05, and interpretation acknowledges the quasi-experimental, non-randomized nature of the design.

The study aims to provide evidence on whether embedding a structured critical-thinking programme into routine volleyball practice optimises decision-making and technical performance, and whether this model offers a transferable framework for other team sports and educational contexts.

Inclusion Criteria:

• Age 18 years or older
• University volleyball player enrolled in the participating programme in Medellín, Colombia
• Regular participation in team training (at least two organised sessions per week before study enrolment)
• Medically cleared and physically able to take part in full volleyball training and match play
• Availability to attend the majority of scheduled intervention and assessment sessions over the ≈ 4-week study period
• Provision of written informed consent

Exclusion Criteria:

• Current musculoskeletal injury or medical condition that limits safe participation in volleyball training or matches
• Any medical contraindication to high-intensity intermittent exercise as reported by the participant or team medical staff
• Planned absence that would prevent attendance at baseline or post-intervention assessments or more than 20% of training sessions
• Concurrent participation in another structured intervention specifically targeting tactical decision-making or psychological skills in volleyball
• Withdrawal of consent at any point before completion of post-intervention assessments

De-identified individual participant data (IPD) underlying the published results (decision-making indices, technical skill test scores and basic demographic variables such as age and playing experience) are available to other researchers for academic, non-commercial use. No video files or direct identifiers are shared. Data access depends on a reasonable research proposal and the signing of a data use agreement that prohibits re-identification or data linkage with other identifiable sources.

IPD are available starting approximately 6 months after publication of the main results paper and remain available for at least 5 years thereafter, or as long as the dataset is curated by the investigators.

Researchers send a brief proposal describing objectives, methods and requested variables to the corresponding author. Proposals are reviewed by the study team and, when applicable, by the institutional ethics committee. Once approved, data are shared in de-identified format under a data use agreement that limits use to the approved project, forbids attempts at re-identification and excludes commercial use.