Emotional Flexibility & Adaptability: Inside the Minds of Professional Footballers on Loan

Host: David Charlton, Sports Psychologist and Mental Toughness Practitioner

Guest: Peter Ramage, Assistant Loans Manager at Newcastle United Football Club and former Professional Footballer and Coach.

Key Themes:

• The psychology of being a loan player in professional football
• Managing expectations and dealing with rejection
• The challenge of social media and comparison culture
• Building relationships in new environments under pressure
• Versatility and adaptability as key mental skills
• The support structure needed for young players away from home

Introduction: From Phoenix to Newcastle

David Charlton: It’s been a while since we recorded the last one. It was five years ago when I began the podcast, and you were one of the first interviews. So yeah, a lot’s changed in that time. You’re out in the States as well, saying now your role is different. Do you want to share with the listeners and the viewers a little bit about what you’re up to now?

Peter: Yeah, I think when we last spoke, I was out in Phoenix—Phoenix Rising—as the assistant coach to the USL side over there. Fast forward five years, like you said—Jesus, it only seems five minutes ago—but yeah, I moved back and came to work back at the football club in Newcastle with the Under-23s as it was at the time.

I was assisting with the Under-23s, then led the Under-18s, and then moved into my current role as assistant loans manager with Shola Ameobi. So it’s been three, four—it’s my fourth season now doing the role—and loving every minute of it.

David Charlton: Excellent. So from the coaching of the 23s, 21s, 18s, I’m guessing you’ve got quite a lot of experience and learnings there where you can help the players going out on loan.

The Unique Qualifications of a Loans Manager

Living the Experience

Peter: Yeah, I think the biggest qualification you need to be a loans manager is actually experience living the game and living being on loan, which I had. Five loans, I think it was in my career—if memory serves me right, I could stand corrected on that. So I’ve had a few experiences of moving away, temporary loans from clubs, and how to deal with that side of things—of not being wanted, or in some occasions it was to go and build up fitness, et cetera.

Understanding Both Sides

And then obviously in my current role, I have to understand what our coaches and the manager in particular want from players and want from the loans, especially young emerging talent who have been identified as potential first-team players in the future. Having that coaching background as well and understanding what has been asked of the players internally—so then when you go out and watch them on loan at clubs where there’s different styles of play, different systems—I can understand the intricacies of their own game within the loan clubs to be able to feed back to the manager. So having that football and coaching background is also key to this role, as well as the experience of actually having lived it and being on loan.

The Psychology of Being on Loan

David Charlton: Do you end up playing part psychologist with the players as well then?

Building a Support Network

Peter: Yeah, that’s a big part of the role, if I’m honest with you, Dave. And we now, luckily, this is the first season where we’ve built an IDT. So we’ve got myself and Shola on the football and the managerial side of things. We’ve got an S&C specific for the loans. We’ve got physiotherapists specific for the loans. And we’ve now got Charlie Myall, who’s the loan psychologist as well. He works with recruitment, but more heavily based with us and the loans. I think all three guys have been key appointments to help build the support network around the players.

The Need for Specialist Support

We know what Shola and I are experts in—the footballing side of things—but there are other roles which we needed to bring in to be able to support the players, and the psychology side of things for us was key. Because our experiences are living through football, but we’re not psychologists to be able to give the players the real insights into having to deal with some of the pressures that come with being on loan. We can just talk from our ex-professional point of view, but sometimes that doesn’t work for some players. So adding Charlie to the team has been crucial.

The Typical Challenges of Going on Loan

David Charlton: So obviously you touched on some of the reasons why some players might go on loan and some of the challenges that they face in the early days. What are the typical challenges, and what advice would you offer a young player? I know we’re generalizing here, but yeah, what advice would you be offering them right now?

A Different World from Academy Football

Peter: Yeah, no, that’s a good question because I think Academy and Under-21s football is totally different to going out on a loan. Obviously we have the rules and regulations that as a coach you have to abide by in the academy system, and invariably those rules are thrown out the window as soon as you go into senior football.

Off-Pitch Challenges: Living Away from Home

So the biggest challenge for us is both on and off the pitch—in terms of living away from family and friends, girlfriends, wives, partners, etc. Living in a hotel or living in an apartment away from everybody, where in your downtime you can’t just pop around to your mum and dad’s for a cup of coffee in the afternoon. You’ve got to try and find something to pass the time.

There’s trying to help them gain a hobby. When I moved to London, I was 24. I started my coaching badges—just gave me some sort of focus to do something—and I picked up golf more. We had a couple of lads in the golf school. But I started my coaching badges just because I thought, “Well, I need to start to plan and prepare,” but it also gave me something to look forward to and do when I went home after training. Because you’re done by one o’clock, can be in the house by two—there’s a lot of the rest of the day and time to fill.

On-Pitch Challenge: Not Playing

And then the other challenge for players is going out and actually not playing. I think the expectation of a loan is that you just go out and you’ll play every single minute of every single game that you’re available to play in. Whereas sometimes, the challenge that we have with some of the players in the past—and we’ll have going into the future—is that you’re not the first choice of the player that they wanted. Sometimes you’re actually just a squad filler, and sometimes you’re just there to make up the numbers and gain experience.

Earning Your Place

You have to earn the right, first and foremost, to go into that dressing room and earn the shirt. When you go into the lower levels, these players are on a hell of a lot more money than what the players are in that dressing room. So I go back to my experience—when a whippersnapper came in looking to take my shirt, it was like a red rag to a bull. So you have the challenge of trying to find yourself within that environment, which can be totally different to the academy environment in terms of the dressing room. And then, like I said, earning your right to play.

The Communication Gap

When players are not playing and managers are not giving them the reasons why, that was probably one of the biggest challenges that we faced—trying to educate them that this is senior football, this is what you wanted, and now you have to deal with these challenges of not being told why you’re not playing or not being told why you’re not in the squad or why you’re playing out of position and things like that. Because in academy football you’re given all this information and the players are told reasons why, from X, Y, and Z. But as I’ve experienced in football and Shola has experienced in football, sometimes managers just haven’t got the time and, for want of a better word, can’t be bothered with a young player, explaining their reasons why—because they don’t have to. So yeah, there’s quite a broad side to it, but they were kind of the major challenges.

Social Media: The Double-Edged Sword

David Charlton: I’ll hone in on a couple of the points there and we’ll go in a bit deeper. So obviously you mentioned the fact, yeah, it’s a shorter day, they’ve got plenty of downtime. So I guess if we think about the player who’s got plenty of downtime, finished at two, three o’clock, and they’re not playing and they’re in a strange place, no partner there, got a lot of time by themselves. Obviously what you mentioned there about hobby or coaching is really helpful. I guess as well, one of the other challenges will be social media for that type of player as well—whether they get into seeing what some of the other loan players are doing, some of their mates, and getting into that sort of comparisonitis, if you like.

The False Reality of Social Media

Peter: Yeah, I think that is—when we were coming through, social media wasn’t anywhere near as prominent in life than it is now. I’ve got two young daughters and they’re literally glued to the phone, looking at TikTok, Instagram, whatever it is that they’re looking at. And I think players are like that as well. They’ll always search for something to try—I don’t know if things aren’t going well—to say, “Well, why is it happening? Why is he playing week in, week out and I’m not?”

I do think there’s a huge amount of pressure from social media on young players these days and almost a false reality of what this life is like. So it is—the academy does a lot of great work in the preparation for players, not just to go into senior football, but for going into a career after football, because not everybody at the academy will come out of there and walk through the front gates of the first team. They’ll go out the gates of our academy and maybe into just an everyday job in their life. So it’s trying to plan and prepare them for that. And I think a big thing is the psychology of not taking everything literally in social media and trying to separate reality from what I believe is just a false sense of what it is. But that’s easier said than done.

The Pressure to Portray Success

Some of these players have a social media presence. They’ve got tens of thousands—some of them have hundreds of thousands and millions of followers—and they need to be portraying that successful lifestyle when sometimes they’re going out on loan and it’s not working out how they want. So yeah, it’s a challenge, but I don’t think it’s something that’s going to be really hard to eradicate because I think it’s now part of everyday life. It’s just trying to separate the wood from the trees, so to speak.

Managing Mental Health Through Difficult Times

David Charlton: Yeah, I guess as well, if you’re not playing and you’re feeling it inside, those are the moments where ideally you would try and be disciplined and not use social media, but equally it can be really hard to do that and catch yourself in that moment. It’s like having a process in place, isn’t it, in some ways?

The Role of the Psychologist

Peter: Yeah, I think it is. This is some of the stuff that Charlie works on with the players, and he does a fantastic job trying to navigate the players through them difficulties and them challenges. Like you said, what to focus on and how to process things when it’s not going well—and equally just as well when it’s going really well, because I think that sometimes can prove a challenge as well for players. They get a little bit above their station, they believe all the hype, and that’s when you can be on the slippery slope.

Social Media as a Second Income

But again, it’s something that’s hard because everybody wants to have that social media presence. It can almost become like a second income for some of the lads because they’re asked to promote certain products or whatever it is. So they have to have that presence on there. And that’s great. That’s fine. And we don’t have an issue with that. It’s just trying to educate them to make sure that they’re using it in the right way. And if things are starting to not go as well as they thought, how to process this, how to work out to navigate ourselves through this to make sure that it doesn’t affect the training first and foremost and then your game time.

Earning the Right: The Reality Check of Senior Football

David Charlton: Yeah, being able to separate yourself really in that way. One of the things you touched on was earning the right ultimately to wear the shirt in the loan club. And coupled with that, you mentioned managers in clubs may not give you reasons for not playing or for putting you in a different position—they just thrust you in there. Is that a lot different to what they’ll be experiencing in academies?

The Open Forum vs. The Silent Manager

Peter: Yeah, well, we sit down and we’ll have constant reviews with players. It’s an open forum where they can ask questions as to why this and why that and things like that. But they do recognize and understand that sometimes the answers aren’t going to be what you want to hear. But then you can go out to a loan club and the manager just doesn’t even give you that time. We’ve had that in the past with some players, and they just can’t compute that. And that can be a real challenge for players because, like I said, everybody expects to go out and play.

Acting as the Mediator

This is where our role—we can maybe come in and be the mediator in that and say, “Listen,” because there have been times and challenges with players throwing the toys out of the pram, so to speak, because they don’t know how to deal with this and they just react in a negative manner. There have been other players that have taken it right—”OK, I’ll take this on the chin and I’ll show you.” It’s us being able to communicate with managers and understanding, “OK, is there a reason why he’s not playing?” And then we can help because we’ve got obviously that relationship with the players to try and get them in a place to be able to earn that shirt. And when that opportunity comes, put them in a place where the processes that we’ve given them can help them stay in the team.

Preparation: Understanding the Club and Manager

But also it’s understanding and giving them, before they go out, the understanding of what kind of club and what kind of manager they’re going into. So again, it’s a lot of the work that we do in the preparation for loans—digging deep into what the club that they’re going to is like. What’s the culture like? Is there any players that we maybe know there? Is there any staff that we know there? Do we know the manager? Do we know the CEO? And very recently, somebody at the football club does. I’ve had a hell of a lot of managers in my career, Shola has had a hell of a lot of managers in his, and particularly in England, we’ll know kind of what the manager’s like. Or again, we’ve got Jack Ross working closely with us as well, who’s an experienced manager.

So we’ll utilize—and Jack’s been brilliant—being able to give that managerial side of things, that insight to players. So between the three of us on the football side of things, we’ll try and give that little insight to the players before they even go into the loan club—how to manage the expectation of them from the manager and then help them with maybe little tips on what they might need to do to be able to build that relationship with the coaches and that manager.

Building Relationships: Starting from Scratch

David Charlton: I guess that’s key, isn’t it? In some ways, as you say, managing the expectations of the player and then for the player to be building those relationships. Because ultimately, I guess when you’re thrown into a new club, you’re just there for a short period of time. The manager has probably already got the trust of, I don’t know, half a dozen players plus that are well established. And yeah, you’re starting afresh essentially, aren’t you?

The Ideal Scenario: Pre-Season Integration

Peter: Yeah, I mean, ideally for us, particularly in the summer window, we try and get the players there as soon into pre-season, if not before pre-season, as we can. So you’ve got that time before the first game of the season to have built that relationship and that understanding with the coach. You can then understand your role within the squad and on the team, but then the manager understands you, and you can almost have these little hiccups before you go into the season.

The Reality: Late Moves and Quick Adaptation

The challenge is sometimes—and invariably for the players—that because we’ve got our first team literally littered with international superstars, our manager likes a certain amount of players for training, and invariably they’re the players that are the better players in the Under-21s and in and around the first-team squad. They’re getting an invaluable experience of working with one of the best managers in the Premier League, with coaching staff that’s only going to make them better. But we know that they’re potentially going to go on loan in a couple of weeks’ time.

Well, those weeks could be used to get them ready and prepared for that first game of the season at the loan club, but it just doesn’t happen. So when they’re thrown into the deep end, we’re trying to do all this work before they actually go out on loan. And sometimes it takes players time—it takes players time to adapt to new systems, new environments, new culture, and new ways of actually being managed.

Mindset: Opportunity vs. Threat

David Charlton: Yeah, no, most definitely. I guess really, you mentioned about seeing things as an opportunity, seeing them as a challenge really has got to be the key, hasn’t it? That type of mindset for you to be able to thrive and prosper when you’re on loan, rather than seeing playing out of position, playing for a manager who doesn’t speak to you, playing in a completely different style of play as a big threat. That’s going to be the problem for some players.

Learning from the Best: Dan Burn and Joelinton

Peter: Yeah, and listen, we’re really privileged to have a manager who gives that kind of insight anyway, because you just—the two examples that I’m going to use next are Dan Burn and Joelinton. Dan Burn’s a center-back, but he’s been told to play left-back, and he doesn’t ask any questions. “I’ve got the shirt, I’ve got to play left-back, and I’ll go and do it.” Joelinton can play in the middle of the park, might be asked to play on the left, he might be asked to play on the right—just does it, gets on with it. “That’s my role. How can I maximize myself to be able to give my all for the team?” And that’s two of our main players in our squad.

Using First-Team Examples

And when the players go out on loan, they’re ringing up and saying, “He’s playing me on the right today and I just want to play in the middle.” Well, yeah, but remember, Joelinton did that against Arsenal the other week. Dan Burn had to go up against [Bukayo] Saka the other week. He did it. So go on then. And then again, if our manager asks you if you want to play on Saturday but you’re going to have to play out of position, you’re going to tell our manager, “No, you can’t”? And I think it’s trying to build that confidence in the players that they can go out and they can play in different positions.

The Value of Versatility

The Modern Footballer Must Be Adaptable

Peter: Footballers now need to be versatile. Gone are the days where you’re just literally a defender, a midfield player, or attacker. You’ve got to be able to play in multiple positions. And particularly when they’re leaving top clubs and they’re going to sit lower in the pyramid in English football, players that are able to have versatility in the game are absolute diamonds.

The Financial Reality

Because salaries come into factor on this as well. If I can get a player who can play three different positions, that might save me a couple of quid on having to go and get—if I’m a center midfield player, but I can play on the left and I can play on the right, I might not need to go and get a left winger now. I can save that money and I might be able to actually use that money to go and get a better number nine or if I need a goalkeeper. Trying to instill that into young players who just want to be a center midfield player—well no, no, you’re a footballer, you’re not a center midfielder, you’re a footballer. You have to be able to play football in different positions. To be able to play in that position adds value to you as a player, both internally and externally as well.

Controlling the Controllables: Studying the Game

David Charlton: So in some ways for those type of players, I mean, we hear the word “control the controllables” bandied around an awful lot, don’t we? That’s one of the keys there. And then I guess whether they’re playing in League One, League Two, whatever league they’re playing in, is probably looking at some of the better players in those leagues—whether if they are a center midfielder and they’re asked to play on the left or the right—and probably being an expert, studying the game an awful lot must be a real skill for them.

When to Share Information with Players

Peter: Yeah, I agree. So we will try and let the players know who’s interested in them. And we only let them know when there’s actually serious interest and invariably when there’s actually an offer on the table. We take so many phone calls from clubs asking, “Have you got a left winger? Have you got a right winger? Have you got a center-back? Have you got a goalkeeper?” Yeah, we’ve got all these, but until they actually—there’s no point in us going to the player and saying, “This club, X, Y, and Z are interested in you,” because nine times out of ten they’re on a list and invariably they’re lower on it.

Doing Your Homework

So until a concrete offer comes in for the player, then that’s when we’ll let them know. So, for argument’s sake, “Newcastle United’s interested in David Charlton.” “Dave, Newcastle are interested in you. You’re a center-back. I think you need to watch Dan Burn, you need to watch Botman, you need to watch Schar. What have you got that’s going to get you in the team? Or what are they doing that’s governing them?”

So with them, we will then put it on them a little bit to do a bit of homework too, because I think we do a lot in the academy for players, and we give them a hell of a lot of information. So when they go out, you don’t have the resources that we do at our place. So it’s like, “OK, start to do your own analysis. You’re going to be playing against Harrogate next Saturday and Grimsby the week after. You’re going to have to start to understand who you’re playing against because the analyst at that club that you’re going to might only be one of them. And the manager’s got him doing this project.”

Building Self-Sufficiency

So watch the games. We’ll give you access to games if you want them. Ring us up. We’ve got an analyst who will give you it. So I think once clubs come in, they’ve got the offer on the table, we’re starting to negotiate on that loan deal, we’ll ask the players to do a little bit of homework as well on where they’re going to, so they understand who’s going to be their competition, what kind of style of play. So when they are going into that environment, they’ve got a little bit of understanding themselves and it’s not just all coming from us.

Key Takeaways: Mental Toughness for Loan Players

The Psychological Challenges:

• Living away from support networks requires finding purpose and hobbies
• Not playing immediately is normal—earning your place is part of the process
• Senior football operates differently than academy football—managers may not explain their decisions

Social Media Management:

• Separate the false reality of social media from your actual situation
• Use social media wisely, especially during difficult periods
• Focus on your own journey, not comparing yourself to others

Building Relationships:

• Early integration during pre-season is ideal but not always possible
• Adapt quickly to new systems, cultures, and management styles
• Use your preparation time to understand the club and manager before arrival

Versatility is Vital:

• Modern footballers must be able to play multiple positions
• Learn from first-team examples of players adapting to different roles
• Versatility increases your value and opportunities

Take Ownership:

• Do your homework on the club, opponents, and style of play
• Study players in your position to understand expectations
• Control what you can control—your attitude, preparation, and effort

Support Systems:

• Use the resources available—psychologists, S&C coaches, physiotherapists
• Don’t be afraid to reach out when struggling
• Remember: going on loan is a learning experience, not just about playing time

For more episodes of Demystifying Mental Toughness, visit our podcast page.