My good friend Mark O’Sullivan of http://footblogball.wordpress.com/ has been reading some articles recently by football psychologist Dan Abrahams.

Mark picked out some points he  felt were relevant to players who want to push themselves to be the best footballers that they possibly can be. Mark says, “The “win” 🙂 word makes it hard to say at what age you should  reccomend this approach but I am sure that there are useful and relevant points here for all ages”.

It is not the will to win that is important. It is the will to prepare to win

Footblogball Points

• How do you talk to yourself on the pitch is as important as your ability to  control the ball.
• Body language is as important a component of performance as the ability to head a cross.
• To be well prepared for a match is more than just what to eat and remember to bring football boots for the big game.

A football player must be good at managing their emotions and managing their thought processes every second of every game. What scientists have discovered is that the brain makes sure that people feel emotions of 10-20 milliseconds and think consciously 500 milliseconds later. – Your brain is your football game.

Confidence can  be the most important skill you have as a footballer

As a coach your goal is simple: to help your players to build and maintain a positive football images related to their games. So maybe as a footballer you keep in mind  the chance you missed to  last week (MEMORY). And that makes you assume that others think you are not good as a striker (PERCEPTION). And to reinforce this by thinking that you are not good as a striker (THOUGHT). And you spend time imagining missing a chance in the next game (IMAGINATION) …

Lionel Messi is brilliant at perceiving things in a positive way and then think about the situation correctly. Messi refused to allow his physical size handicap him. In fact, he used it to his advantage. “I’m more flexible,” he said. “I can learn to play with the ball on the ground better than any other”.

If you can become an even more effective thinker, and if you can build an even stronger football Image, then you will be the best football player that can be.

Check out http://www.danabrahams.com/