Word.ws English Dictionary

hold-up play

hold-up play noun: a play where an attacker retains possession of the ball, while the teammates can move up the field.

Noun

hold-up play (plural hold-up plays)

  1. (idiomatic) A play where an attacker retains possession of the ball, while the teammates can move up the field.
    • Arsenal must have been pleased that Leeds' leading scorer Luciano Becchio was ruled out with a back injury and the hosts missed his hold-up play and threat for long periods as Wenger's side produced wave after wave of attack.2011 January 19, Jonathan Stevenson, “Leeds 1 - 3 Arsenal”, in BBC

Forms of hold-up play

pluralhold-up plays

Questions about hold-up play

What does hold-up play mean?
Hold-up play means a play where an attacker retains possession of the ball, while the teammates can move up the field.
What part of speech is hold-up play?
Hold-up play is a noun.
What is the plural of hold-up play?
The plural of hold-up play is hold-up plays.

Words near hold-up play in the dictionary

  1. hold-alls
  2. hold-departure order
  3. hold-down
  4. hold-downs
  5. hold-up
  6. hold-up play
  7. hold-up plays
  8. hold-up squad
  9. hold-up squads
  10. hold-upper
  11. hold-uppers

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: hold-up play (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-au-hold-up play.ogg.

Cite this entry: “hold-up play.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/hold-up_play. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.