drilled

3.1

A person trained by repeated practice to be disciplined and skilled

adjective
/drɪld/

: entrenado

His well drilled soldiers are a precious resource not to be thrown away on a doomed enterprise.

They look a well drilled team, just set piece.

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Examples

When they lose the ball, you can see they're well drilled, a well schooled unit.
They look a well drilled team, just set piece.

Rio Ferdinand Presents
OK, I'm absolutely drilled, but I'm here and I'm here with a special guest, Izzy.
The players appeared as a drilled unit, executing their game plan flawlessly.
After months of training, the coach praised the athletes for being well drilled in their routines.
His drilled skills in martial arts made him a formidable opponent in competitions.

Synonyms

trained

vsdrilled

1.9

Able to do something well because of practice

emphasizes repeated practice and stricter discipline than general instruction

practiced

vsdrilled

3.7

Someone who has a lot of skill because they did something many times

focuses more on repeated instruction and strict discipline than on experience

How Trained

expert

3 3.5

drilled

3.1

well-trained

40 3.7

trained

1.9

inexperienced

66 3.4

untrained

31 3.4

Surface Forms

drilled positive

Morphology

drilled = drill (transparent) = drill + ed

Formed from the verb 'drill' with the standard participial/adjectival suffix '-ed', so the meaning 'trained by repeated practice' is directly derivable.

Etymology

Drilled comes from the idea of the tool drill, which means 'to make a hole' and works by repeating the same action, so a helpful way to remember it is to imagine practising one movement again and again. So, to be drilled is to have trained in something many times until it becomes easy and natural.