Using positive self-talk to improve performance

Picture this: Jenny and Maddy play on a team together.

Jenny is a United Soccer Coaches’ All-America award-winner, high school scholar national player of the year recipient and considered one of the top players in her state - opponents have referred to her as a ’soccer ninja’ and ’soccer Jedi’. In her most recent season, she scored 18 goals and had 16 assists in 15 games.

Maddy is one of the top defenders in the state and has anchored a team that only allowed three goals in 15 games. Her team-mates call her the ’brick wall’ because of her ability to anticipate plays and defend 1v1.

In the first overtime period of one of the sea most intense games of the season, Jenny receives the ball at the top of the penalty area, splits two defenders and dribbles at the goalkeeper.

She fakes a shot and sends the keeper diving right. Jenny calmly takes a step to the left, gets the ball under control and gets ready to send her team to an amazing win. 

Then, she completely shanks the shot.  

Maddy, who was running down the field for what she surely believed would be a celebration, gets in Jenny’s face and screams: “I can’t believe you did that! How can you miss that shot? You just cost us the game! Seriously, how is missing that shot even possible? You could have dribbled it into the net."

 

"We rarely address the berating that occurs internally when mistakes happen..."

How many of us would tolerate that type of behavior from Maddy? We know berating a team-mate is wrong, even worse in the heat of the moment and in full view. 

What we don’t know or rarely address is the type of berating that occurs internally when mistakes happen. 

I can guarantee you that what players do to themselves is significantly worse than the fictional situation described above.

By the way, although their names have been changed, those players are real. They were actually sisters that played for me.

There has been a lot of discussion regarding climate and culture across all levels of soccer, and for good reason.

From grassroots to the professional game, our sport has started to deal with coaching behaviors that lead to toxic team atmospheres.

However, one rarely developed area which can have significant impact on team climate and culture is positive self-talk.

In 2011, an analysis of 32 studies showed the effectiveness of self-talk in sport and encouraged its use as a strategy to facilitate learning and enhance performance.

The theory is clear - positive self-talk can improve performance. How do we put that into practice when we only see our players for 90 minutes at a time?