How To Help Sensitive Footballers After They Make A Mistake

Making mistakes when you play football or soccer is a normal part of the game but is really hard for some people to take.  You’ll often see the following on a pitch, from the bench or the stands when a mistake has been made.

• The footballer who has team-mates on her back because of the high standards expected at the level that they play at. 
• The dad of a talented young footballer whose face and body language is appalling when his son makes mistakes. 
• The coach who can’t control his emotions when his players take a risk that doesn’t come off and end up making a mistake.
• The footballer whose head goes down and hides from a game for 10 minutes or so because he’s dwelling on a mistake that he’s made.
• The spectators who shout abuse, telling the footballer that he is rubbish and isn’t fit to wear their shirt after making mistakes.

One part of the issue for the player, especially the player who is overly sensitive and hates making mistakes is that he or she will attribute a meaning to the mistake, this then causes a negative reaction.  Here is an example:

Dan – a central attacking midfielder, who is great at carrying the ball forward at pace through the middle of the pitch is going through a period where his confidence is low and his team are struggling for results.  His coach is feeling pressure as a result and when players make mistakes, he’s quick to tell them.  A recent pattern that has happened is that players who have made numerous mistakes (in his eyes) have been shamed by the coach and have been substituted.  Dan is one of these players. 

Now, Dan has built up an expectation that if he runs with the ball in tight areas in the middle of the park and gets tackled or loses the ball that his coach will show his frustration, and most likely go on to substitute him.    

Dan is in JUDEGMENT MODE in his mind, he sees himself as incompetent, judging himself against a different version of himself or against other players.  He’s also in the FUTURE predicting what may happen if he makes a mistake.  He starts building pictures in his mind of mistakes and experiencing big negative emotions such as embarrassment and shame.  He also pictures his coach, remonstrating with him and adding to the sense of embarrassment and shame by carrying out his threats to substitute him.

His thought processes go like so: “I’ll play it safe, that way the coach won’t have a go at me”, “oh s##t that’s me off in 10 minutes”, “I’m rubbish” and “I want this game to end.”

So how do we help particularly sensitive footballers who hate making mistakes?

One thing coaches and parents can do is help them to start to change their meaning of mistakes, if we can do that then we can help them to respond differently.

1. Remind players and children that you are SUPPOSED to make mistakes.

For coaches – in training make sure that players are given opportunities to make mistakes, remind them mistakes are great because you can now learn new ways of doing things.  And DON’T CRITICISE MISTAKES.

For parents – help your children appreciate things that they used to do as part of the learning process and don’t do now.  Highlight the steps they took to learn something new.   Reiterating time and again when you get something wrong you then learn better ways for future.   This is how our brain learns new skills.

2. LOOK for key messages in mistakes.

For coaches – mistakes from your players can give you some clues about the player.  Maybe the player is fearful, has faulty expectations of themself or others, is worried that they may get criticism.  It’s your job to find out more about this to be able to help them rather than pointing the finger at them for not being able to do something.

For parents – when your kids make mistakes in football, could it be that they are feeling stressed, and perhaps too challenged? Are they lacking support? Are they too tired and need a little break? Has something happened at school?  Look and examine the signs.

3. MODEL mistakes

For coaches – make sure you make some mistakes in front of your players and own those mistakes.  Admit your failings, show them that you can be vulnerable and are not perfect.  Explain what you have learned from your mistakes and what you will do differently.

For parents – have conversations about some of the mistakes that you have made during your day and what you learned about yourself and the situation.

OTHER IDEAS….

Listen to this week’s Demystifying Mental Toughness Podcast where I speak to Double Olympian and now and executive coach, Chris Cook who shares some great ideas so that you can unlock your inner potential and question your approach.